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Obama Wants to Control the Web

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Anonymous

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Obama Wants to Control the Web

Guess who's leading the charge to turn the Internet into one big, government utility?


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If you thought Washington—which already took over banking and autos, and is fast-tracking attempts to take over health care and energy—would leave the Internet alone, you were dead wrong. The Internet (perhaps our greatest free market success story in recent years) is squarely in the cross-hairs of the administration and it’s not waiting for Congress to act. The charge is being led by an eager, ideologically committed White House staffer named Susan Crawford. Officially, she is the Special Assistant for Science, Technology, and Innovation Policy. Wired Magazine calls her, “the most powerful geek close to the president.” In recent weeks, bloggers and online activists have begun calling Crawford the "Internet Czar." The shoe fits.



As Bill Collier of Freedomist has reported, Crawford has known ties to ACORN, which is one of the participating organizations of her "OneWebDay" project. Crawford self-consciously modeled OneWebDay on Earth Day and the radical environmental agenda that it propelled forward. As Crawford explained her mission to The Wall Street Journal in April: “We should do a better job as a nation of making sure fast, affordable broadband is as ubiquitous as electricity, water, snail mail, or any other public utility.”



In other words, the agenda of her organization is to transform access to the Internet into a government entitlement project, with all the necessary government intrusion and control in order guarantee it to everyone—in the world. Not surprisingly, listed alongside on the OneWebDay participating organizations list is a group called Free Press, which is the biggest advocacy organization pushing the Obama administration to adopt sweeping regulations of the Internet.



Free Press was founded by Robert McChesney, an avowed Marxist who is Washington’s leading advocate of so-called network neutrality regulations who recently argued—on a Web site called SocialistProject.ca—that this type of Internet regulation is a prerequisite for a socialist revolution: “Instead of waiting for the revolution to happen, we learned that unless you make significant changes in the media, it will be vastly more difficult to have a revolution.”



Crawford and McChesney apparently have the full support of the Obama administration and an FCC that is determined to move toward transforming the Internet into a Washington-controlled utility as quickly as possible. The chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, Julius Genachowski, recently announced his pursuit of precisely the regulations they want.



The FCC isn’t pursuing this just because of orders coming from Obama’s Internet Czar. This goes all the way to the top—Obama himself said on the campaign trail last year: “I will take a back seat to no one in my commitment to net Neutrality.”



It’s of no apparent concern to Obama, Crawford, and Genachowski that net neutrality regulations—which would require network operators to treat every bit of traffic the same way, regardless of whether that makes sense from an engineering or business standpoint—will result in a collapse of private investment in Internet infrastructure, because they regard private investment as unnecessary within their vision of government ownership and control.



Proponents of net neutrality rely on the scare tactic that big bad cable and phone companies will block access to Web sites and cause other mischief unless the benevolent federal government rides to the rescue, and soon. But they’ve been ringing this alarm for the better part of a decade and none of the horrors they warn us about have happened. There is a simple reason—these companies are in an intense competition, especially in the wireless space, which is as cutthroat as any industry in America. If one company tried to block access to Web sites or engage in other mischief, they would lose their customers in droves to the competition.



Net neutrality regulations would destroy private investment and we would end up with a government-owned and controlled network. We’ll have nowhere to go if the government turns out to be not quite as benevolent as some have hoped. That’s a frightening scenario and we should do everything we can to stop the net neutrality regulation that would start us down that path.
 

MoGal

Well-known member
MSM is very quiet about this.......... hmmmm....... we're giving the United Nations control of the internet.... read the comments here:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2353887/posts

and the article here:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2009/sep/30/icann-agreement-us



* News
* Technology
* Internet

US relinquishes control of the internet

• Icann ends agreement with the US government
• Move will give other countries a prominent internet

Customers surf the web at an internet cafe in Beijing. Icann, the body that oversees web addresses, has ended its agreement with the US.

Customers surf the web at an internet cafe in Beijing. Icann, the body that oversees web addresses, has ended its agreement with the US. Photograph: Greg Baker/AP

After complaints about American dominance of the internet and growing disquiet in some parts of the world, Washington has said it will relinquish some control over the way the network is run and allow foreign governments more of a say in the future of the system.

Icann – the official body that ultimately controls the development of the internet thanks to its oversight of web addresses such as .com, .net and .org – said today that it was ending its agreement with the US government.

The deal, part of a contract negotiated with the US department of commerce, effectively pushes California-based Icann towards a new status as an international body with greater representation from companies and governments around the globe.

Icann had previously been operating under the auspices of the American government, which had control of the net thanks to its initial role in developing the underlying technologies used for connecting computers together.

But the fresh focus will give other countries a more prominent role in determining what takes place online, and even the way in which it happens – opening the door for a virtual United Nations, where many officials gather to discuss potential changes to the internet.

Icann chief Rod Beckstrom, a former Silicon Valley entrepreneur and Washington insider who took over running the organisation in July, said there had been legitimate concerns that some countries were developing alternative internets as a way of routing around American control.

"It's rumoured that there are multiple experiments going on with countries forking the internet, various countries have discussed this," he said. "This is a very significant shift because it takes the wind out of our opponents."

He added that the changes would prove powerful when combined with upcoming plans to allow web users to use addresses with names in Chinese, Arabic or other alphabets other than Latin. Many countries have lobbied for the shift in recent years, as the expansion of the web reaches out deeper into society and business.

While the issue reached critical mass in emerging economies such as China, it is not the only country that has lobbied for a change. Earlier this year European officials said that they did not think it was proper for America to retain so much control over the global computer network.

Viviane Reding, the EU's commissioner for information society and media, said she was pleased that Washington chose to make the shift.

"I welcome the US administration's decision to adapt Icann's key role in internet governance to the reality of the 21st century," she said. "If effectively and transparently implemented, this reform can find broad acceptance among civil society, businesses and governments alike."

Meanwhile Nominet - the British organisation that handles the day-to-day running of .uk domain names - said that Icann had started a trend for companies with internet influence to appear more open and accountable.

"Putting public interest first will also be a focus for the UK internet community over the coming months as there is growing support for Nominet to develop more of a public interest role," said Nominet's chief executive, Lesley Cowley.

The new agreement comes into force immediately. It replaces the old version which had been in place since 1998 and was scheduled to expire today.

Beckstrom suggested that bringing more countries to the table was the best way of ensuring the long term future of the internet.

"We're more global, period. The chances of the internet holding together just went up, the cohesion just went up," he said. "We expect more active involvement from governments, a higher level of participation from many governments and we're already hearing about more governments joining the team… This was, ironically, a power move from the US."
 

hypocritexposer

Well-known member
Tuesday, 06 October 2009 14:00

It has been pretty clear that the Obama administration does not look with particular favor on the second amendment, but it is also becoming increasingly evident that the President is not much of a ‘fan’ of the first one, either.

According to an article by Anne Bayefsky (“You Can’t Say That — At the UN, the Obama administration backs limits on free speech”),

The Obama administration has marked its first foray into the UN human rights establishment by backing calls for limits on freedom of expression. The newly-minted American policy was rolled out at the latest session of the UN Human Rights Council, which ended in Geneva on Friday. American diplomats were there for the first time as full Council members and intent on making friends.

http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/017/043ytrhc.asp
 
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