Since ICANN is always late (believe me) in advertising the local host web site with hotel information, etc., here’s the link:
http://www.icannmarrakesh.ma/ . Internet Explorer is recommended. Firefox unfortunately chokes on some design features. You will also get a boring copyright notice when you try to right-click to save a PDF file locally.
It is not often I agree with John C. Dvorak, but his column in PC Magazine this week is worth reading.
The highly trumpeted concept of Web 2.0 is a marketing mantra designed to convince you to invest in new software acquisitions. The truth is that the Internet is changing in favour of a model where the users are in charge. The blog crazyness is a good example of a world where the content providers are no more big corporations, but also individuals. You can blog for free on services like Blogger. If you want to have more control, you can run you own blogging software. The best of them are open-sourced, ie free to deploy. Best of all, they are simple enough to use, even for Joe Blow’s grandmother.
The trouble with free software of course is that no-one is paying to use it. A nightmarish perspective for several companies which build their wealthiness on the fact that you are paying a lot to run their bloated software, incompatible with their competitors offerings. So, they have to find a way to milk the cow again.
Today, the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) and the Internet Society (ISOC) celebrate the 20th anniversary of the IETF, the world’s leading Internet standards development body.The first IETF meeting was held on the afternoon of January 16, 1986, in San Diego, California. As a community-driven activity the IETF went on to pioneer a unique, open process for standards development. Open to all, and based on principles such as “rough consensus and running code”, the IETF has enabled the development of standards that have supported every aspect of the Internet’s phenomenal growth.
“The IETF is unique,” said Brian Carpenter, IETF Chair. “Unlike other standards bodies, there is very little in the way of formal hierarchy and there are no membership requirements or fees. The IETF welcomes broad participation by anyone interested in the future technical evolution and stability of the Internet – and IETF standards are available to all, without charge.”
“The success of the IETF has largely been due to a pragmatic, consensus-based approach to technology standards development,” noted Lynn St. Amour, President and CEO of the Internet Society (ISOC). “Many of the principles of cooperation and collaboration that were developed in the IETF are now being successfully applied in other global forums. ISOC is proud to be associated with the IETF – we value its members’ accomplishments over the last 20 years and look forward to celebrating these achievements over the course of 2006.”
I went through the statistics of last year.
Quite interestingly, Microsoft Internet Explorer represented only 27.5% of the browsers used, with Mozilla FireFox a close second at 25.6%. Most of the other browsers used were RSS feed readers.
Most readers are from Luxembourg (31.2%), with Great Britain second (20.1%) and USA third (19.2%).
And before you ask: yes, these statistics exclude my own accesses to the blog.
Harold Furchgott-Roth is a former member of the US Federal communications Commission. He currently runs a piece in several US newspapers on the outcome of WSIS.
It is titled “How the White House Defended the Internet” and is a fun read for those of us liking stupid, one-sided arguments. It seems only Steven Forrest can find this thrilling. Bret Faussett disagrees with most of the arguments presented.
While most consider the WSIS was a success for the US, as it did not have to surrender its control on the Internet, Furchgott-Roth nevertheless considers that the UN is a winner, too .
As the title of the paper suggests, it it clear for him the US “saved” the Internet. However, he fails to mention that the USG is currently one of the biggest threats to the stability of the Internet, given the way US national politics has rotten the ICANN debate, as witnessed by the .XXX debacle.
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