U.S. Insists On Keeping Control Of Internet 1167
veggie boy writes "A U.S. official strongly objected to any notion of a U.N. body taking control of the domain servers that direct traffic on the Internet." From the article: "'We will not agree to the U.N. taking over the management of the Internet,' said Ambassador David Gross, the U.S. coordinator for international communications and information policy at the State Department. 'Some countries want that. We think that's unacceptable.' Many countries, particularly developing ones, have become increasingly concerned about the U.S. control, which stems from the country's role in creating the Internet as a Pentagon project and funding much of its early development."
It's not broke... (Score:5, Insightful)
My turn (Score:2, Insightful)
Which is Europes way of saying, "gimme, gimme, gimme, my turn to play with the toys!"
Many countries, particularly developing ones, have become increasingly concerned about the U.S. control
Whiskey Tango Foxtrot? What do developing countries have to do with jack? They're small and tend to have very poor Internet infrastructures. Does this mean that we're now supposed to turn over control to them so they can screw it up?
Cripes. The Internet works. If it's not broke, DON'T FIX IT.
UN control of something important?! (Score:2, Insightful)
The organization that put Libya in charge of human rights. Yes, Brilliant.
The UN is incompatible with the internet (Score:3, Insightful)
To hand the Internet over to the UN is to hand control to a body based on the interests of free and non-free countries alike. The UN has no principals placing individual rights above consensus and political expediency. And wherever the UN cannot find consensus, it defaults to inaction, even where inaction allows continuous decline.
This is not a critique of the UN. The above works fairly well for mobilizing to help small countries in crisis. It works well when trying to avoid provoking a war, which is usually appropriate. The above does not work however, for furthering the spread of free* access to - and dissemination of - information.
Speech, not beer.
Good (Score:5, Insightful)
From the Constitution of the People's Republic of China [people.com.cn]:
Article 35. Citizens of the People's Republic of China enjoy freedom of speech, of the press, of assembly, of association, of procession and of demonstration.
Unacceptable? (Score:1, Insightful)
Some countries want that. We think that's unacceptable.
This sort of attitude doesn't help create a warm fuzzy feeling about the US in the rest of the world. Someone in the Government should really take a step back and ask themselves why this would actually matter at all. The UN is the ideal place to run the internet rules at the moment, its got the largest reach and global membership and a stated goal of being independent.
That of course in unacceptable as co-operation with other countries is just plain wrong.
"We've been very, very clear throughout the process that there are certain things we can agree to and certain things we can't agree to," Gross told reporters at U.N. offices in Geneva. "It's not a negotiating issue. This is a matter of national policy."
A matter of national policy that cannot be negotiated? I don't seem to recall the 132nd ammendment stating that internet domain ownership is the right of every american citizen.
He said the United States was "deeply disappointed" with the European Union's proposal Wednesday advocating a "new cooperation model," which would involve governments in questions of naming, numbering and addressing on the Internet.
Because co-operation is bad eh? Damn those pesky Europeans for wanting oversight on a random organisation like ICANN which has been so successful and caused no issues thanks to its openness and brilliant decision making.
The US Goverment does itself, or its citizens, no favours by continually persuing unilateral rather than multi-lateral approaches.
Exqueeze me? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:UN control of something important?! (Score:4, Insightful)
Please give me a break!
i hope this is a troll... (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:UN control of something important?! (Score:3, Insightful)
So, they should do it anyway... (Score:5, Insightful)
They just have to have the will to do it.
Then all they gotta do is convince/coerce all of the Internet entities in their respective countries to use THEIR TLD servers, they become the de-facto TLDs for those countries...
There's nothing to stop them but their lack of will...
Re:My turn (Score:5, Insightful)
I am assuming you have heard of a country called India, which is a developing nation. If you still don't get it, then get out of your basement and watch the real world. We are not in 70s anymore.
IANA (Score:2, Insightful)
However, if I were, I'd feel like saying. You don't like it? Don't use it. Build your own. You're very welcome to.
For the next few years at least, I think the status quo is the sensible way forward.
Talking to myself (Score:5, Insightful)
Let me put it this way, I just stayed up most of the night documenting in my blog how the Chinese government abuses its people and ignores the very laws it put in place to protect its people. Now first thing in the morning, I hear that the UN wants to turn over full control of the DNS heirarchy to countries like China. Countries to whom "freedom" is just a word to be filtered. Countries where a constitution is just words on some expensive paper. Countries that care little for anything except maintaining their own power.
If we turn even the slightest control over to these people, it's a surefire guarantee that they will abuse it. They would use the technology to further oppress their people (illegally, I might add) and attempt to extend their influence to elsewhere in the world.
So I will repeat, the Internet is not broken. Don't fix it.
In other news: U.S. insists on control of Nebraska (Score:2, Insightful)
If the rest of the world doesn't like it, let them build their own internet with their own namespace and put their own DNS system on it. Since, AFAIK, the internet as we know it has grown by continual attachment to the U.S. developed core, nobody has a right to ask that the U.S. give up control.
Re:My turn: Democracy (Score:2, Insightful)
Now: The anglo european view of the world is one of Freedom and Democracy. And no where is that espoused more than in the US. So what kind of hyprocracy is it to say: you can cant control your own countries identity on the internet. And you cant have a say in how its run.
Let the US keep control of
Case in point. The
Anyway, the US was founded on idealism and "self evident truths" and its breaking collective our hearts to see it fall before the alter of real-politik, pragmatism, and partisan politics.
Re:UN control of something important?! (Score:2, Insightful)
Not a huge issue really (Score:1, Insightful)
Might be a problem for people in the US, but if it took off there would be nothing stopping integration.
It's a non issue.
Why? (Score:4, Insightful)
Gross dismissed it as unacceptable.
"We've been very, very clear throughout the process that there are certain things we can agree to and certain things we can't agree to," Gross told reporters at U.N. offices in Geneva. "It's not a negotiating issue. This is a matter of national policy."'
The question is, why?
"Some negotiators from other countries said there was a growing sense that a compromise had to be reached and that no single country ought to be the ultimate authority over such a vital part of the global economy."
Could someone tell me why are they wrong? And if they are not wrong, what is this US opposition? If the USA doesn't like living in a world where there are multiple countries to deal with, they can just close their borders and shut down their trade. Noone will miss them.
It seems to me the US is playing "i don't want to do this and i won't tell why not". Those dealings are the most suspicious to me, as they are not only arrogant, but they cannot be sustained for a long time.
The Internet is of a growing importance, it shouldn't be held hostage by one single country just as no single country should have total control of anything which is used globally. I guess the EU thinks so too, because they set up their own GPS system. If the USA's position won't change, i guess people can just ignore the states and set up an alternative dns servers/architecture.
Re:nothing to see move along (Score:2, Insightful)
We'll be expecting your cheque/credit card number.
Thank you for your business.Re:UN control of something important?! (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Talking to myself (Score:5, Insightful)
I think the above is pretty much why the rest of us are unconfortable with the current US administration being in control of the internet.
North Americans (Score:3, Insightful)
And yes, I really don't give a damn if any "offended" American mod me troll, I'm saying the truth, you like it or not.
The lesser of two evils? (Score:4, Insightful)
Is there a third alternative? Maybe decentralized governance? Self-governance? A meritocracy? Unpaid volunteership? Management by 1000 chimpanzees randomly pushing buttons?
The Internet is important to me. I'll feel troubled so long as I don't see an approach that works well and efficiently, is relatively bias and value neutral and allows reasonable freedom and privacy to the average user.
Re:The UN is incompatible with the internet (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:The UN is incompatible with the internet (Score:3, Insightful)
Emphasys mine.
If you believe that bullshit ideologic and ignorant statement, then i guess maybe you should have learnt history and looked around in the world. Shame that the USA still thinks its the "best est democracie" in the world while they are violating human rights on a daily basis.
Re:Talking to myself (Score:1, Insightful)
Internet governance is a tough issue. And clearly the US has no lessons to teach anyone in this area.
Besides, I find it hard to argue that granting control of CCtld to the countries that the CC represents is not a fairly decent idea.
You talk about abuse and control. I see paternalism and convenient imperialism.
The Internet is not broken. Its current governance mechanism are not acceptable to most of the planet (read 190 states minus the US).
Not that it matters much. Leapfrogging will eventually occur if nothing gives.
Re:My turn: Democracy (Score:3, Insightful)
That just goes to show you how little influence is exerted by the US government on the internet. Do you really think the administration wouldn't love to have a big ceremony "reopening" the
Like people have been saying. It is not broken. Don't fix it. And moreso please don't let the UN fix it. I wouldn't be worried about many of the European contries some crontrol, but letting China get anywhere close to even having any say on controlling the internet is incredibly stupid.
Minority rule? (Score:1, Insightful)
Yang Xiaokun (China) "You cannot come to a meeting like this saying something is non-negotiable. You must show flexibility and compromise. [...] There must be change."
Even Great Britain isn't supporting the US on this. If even your staunchest suck-up^H^H^H^H^H ally isn't on your side
you're probably wrong.
You are so right!!!!!1111!!! (Score:2, Insightful)
- The one nation in history using nuclear weapons on civilians.
- The nation that toppled the democratically elected government in Chile, to replace it with a dictatorship that killed thousands.
- The nation that did the same thing as above in many, many, other countries.
- The nation that sold Saddam WMDs and helped him to use them against Iran.
- The nation that is currently engaging in an illegal war in Iraq, started under false pretenses, that has already killed tensofthousands.
- The nation that doesn't grant the most basic human rights to it's POW.
Yes, Brilliant.
Re:The UN is incompatible with the internet (Score:4, Insightful)
We're talking about the future of the Internet here, you're talking about the past of the US. Look around yourself and tell me what's left of your individual rights after subtracting out the DMCA, PATRIOT, Eminent Domain and other Constitution-defying laws!
As for "the only country"... where did you learn this, the National Enquirer?
Re:In other news: U.S. insists on control of Nebra (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Why? (Score:2, Insightful)
Stop your US-hating for a moment and actually use your brain and think. UN control would be a nightmare.
Re:Talking to myself (Score:3, Insightful)
No, I'm pretty certain that's the very definition of "If it ain't broke, don't fix it." i.e. The idea behind the "don't fix it" concept is that improvements always come with a risk. In this case, the risk is high that the Quailty of Service will drop considerably.
So we have to weigh on one hand the fact that the DNS system does everything that's needed today against allowing countries to control their own domain names and international funding/support of the DNS root computers on the other hand.
The problem is that the call for international support is not particularly compelling. The US is happily eating the costs of maintaining the Internet, is keeping standards high, and is generally doing a good job. (Despite the problems with ICANN.) What is so broken with the system that we need control to change hands? The answer is "nothing." So we come back to, "it ain't broke, don't fix it."
Re:Talking to myself (Score:5, Insightful)
No single country should. That's the point.
Maybe IPv6... (Score:1, Insightful)
Web != DNS, ICANN = meh. (Score:3, Insightful)
Repeat after me:
DNS is *not* the web.
ICANN's not perfect, but if you look at how they operate, you'd be surprised to find out they weren't setup by the UN. They're clearly the product and brainchild of a bunch of bureaucrats. There are huge fees to apply and propose, and then they arbitrarily create new TLDs to sustain the new fees rolling in the following application period. They burn through their government contract cash when all they do is push paper around, and then ask for more like a fat kid with a food fetish.
If the UN really wants to take control, I say fine - fuck it, stop our government wasting some money on this albatross.
ICANN [icann.org]
"In 2000, ICANN introduced seven new gTLDs:
* (and by they, I mean the people who dropped the huge fee to apply for those gTLDs, as ICANN doesn't think them up only approve them)
All they ever did was introduce competition by having multiple registrars, and that's not exactly some amazing idea, it's something that was *long* overdue.
Re:Talking to myself (Score:2, Insightful)
Didn't think so.
Re:The UN is incompatible with the internet (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:The UN is incompatible with the internet (Score:2, Insightful)
No! The only reason the Internet is free is that it was pioneered by academics, and in the academic world there has been freedom and peer review for a long time.
Look at how the world wide web was created, not by Pentagon but by an academic working in Switzerland. Free as in speech.
Now compare that to Skype, which was created in a company and is now in the hands of Ebay. Not free as in speech.
And stop abusing the word freedom. The US is not a free country, it's a police state run by religious fanatics, a military industiral complex and we're it's legal to give money to politicians to change their vote (usually called bribery in other countries). I'm a Swede but I lived in the US as a kid, now I can never go back without being treated like a criminal leaving fingerprints at the border. And you'll never give freedom to Iraq within our lifetime, you are there to stay.
Re:My turn: Democracy (Score:3, Insightful)
What if Taiwan wanted to register http://republic.tw/ [republic.tw] ? Right now they can because they control their own DNS, but what if the US was ardently against TW independence, and controlled
Part of being a good citizen of the world is allowing for countries to make their own decisions. Its like trusting your kids, they'll never grow up if you dont give them responsiblilty for their own affairs.
And believe it or not, this stuff matters A LOT. To people outside the US. When the US says "you must obay the Non-Prolifiration Treaty, but we're going to build bunker buster nukes", or "Democracy is best, and no taxation with out represention, but we're going to control the Top Level Domains", people get upset. Trust me, i see it every day here in europe and i imagine its much worse in countries which are not strong US allies.
Re:Why? (Score:2, Insightful)
I dare say that your statement is FAR more arrogant.
US Gov is wrong on this one (Score:5, Insightful)
On the other hand, each government should also have control of it's own DNS servers within it's own geography for maintaining it's commerce and communications sovereignty... but this is not contradictory to a Int Body governing the allocation of address blocks to each country or determining policy for TLDs.
The US Gov doesn't currently control the telephone number address space for other countries, why is the internet different?
On the negative side of things... I'm fairly certain that China is the biggest supporter of getting DNS out of US hands and into the control of a Gov they have influence over, namely the UN. China would probably love to have the ability to cut off their people from accessing anything outside of China without a dispensation for commercial communications from their gov.... this will happen if the UN gets control and it will be really sad, but the Chinese people need to confront their gov on this one and demand more rights... if the people do, then the international public shoud support them against their gov via sanctions to not communicate with China, nor to trade with them. It will be messy but in the end will be better than treating them like the spoiled teenager that they are acting like. ("sorry Li, you can't drive the car cause you're not responsible enough" except Li is 30 years old and needs to go to work... so it should be "Li, if you get a DUI you go to jail. If you get into an accident and kill someone, you're going to jail. Be responsible. We won't bail you out.)
Re:North Americans (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:My turn (Score:1, Insightful)
But then I remembered, the US has it's own "development" problems. HFS! In the past few years we've "developed" an arrogance and insecurity that make other "developing" nations seem light years ahead of us.
How would we gauge our response to Katrina compared to India's response to the massive tsunami?
I also remember reading an article recently about how India's Air Force kicked our ass in joint training exercises.
My point? Let's not be too hasty to judge others and their ability to do something better or worse than us.
Re:North Americans (Score:2, Insightful)
1. Its not that the government is saying they want exclusive rights, they just don't want to give up the control.
2. Err... we already "have it". Its not like the US is demanding we run the Internet, or whatever, we already are administering it. The UN is the one instigating this, by asking for control.
3. Our government made it. Hey glad you're enjoying it, and i think we'd all agree its public domain just about now, but the UN is asking for the change.
4. Personally I'm of the mindset that hey, it works now, why try to change things. Either it will break or become more censored. Course it could and probably would work just as well, but as someone else said "If it ain't broken..."
Now, don't mod me troll, "i's just speakin' the truth".
Re:UN control of something important?! (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, and while the US doesn't have exactly a spotless record regarding human rights, it at least has the technical competancy to manage something like the internet and is a lot more financially sound than the UN. And it is not like there is any particular wonderful track record on human rights coming out of the UN, or its member nations as a group.
Re:Talking to myself (Score:2, Insightful)
Maybe someone can shed some light as to why USA should have the control? What is it that gives the US this right? Since the Internt is not USANet, and spans the globe, it would just be natural that a thing like DNS is on international control and not controlled by one single country alone. I'm sure that if the shoe was on the other foot, i.e some other country had control over DNS, USA would be the loudest kid in the class, screaming for international control.
In tmy book, USA is a big hypocrit in this issue as in so many other, so it was not really a big surprise.
USA want exclusive control? Fine, make a new network that is owned and operated exsclusively by USA and you can keep all control you want, just don't try to hook it up internationally.
Re:Unacceptable? (Score:3, Insightful)
This sort of attitude doesn't help create a warm fuzzy feeling about the US in the rest of the world.
I didn't know that was the goal of our government. I thought it was to look out for American interests. Not be "warm and fuzzy." Maybe we should have been warm and fuzzy with Hitler. (sorry for the Godwin)
Someone in the Government should really take a step back and ask themselves why this would actually matter at all. The UN is the ideal place to run the internet rules at the moment, its got the largest reach and global membership and a stated goal of being independent.
You're crazy. You think somehow it wouldn't actually matter if the US relinquished control of pretty much the most valuable information and communication infrastructure in the world? That we should just hand it over? I can see where perhaps your opinion comes from, especially if you aren't an American, but to say that somehow it just wouldn't matter and not be detrimental to US interests, which is the primary role of the US government in an international context, is just silly.
Cooperating with other countries is fine. We're cooperating with other countries already. Thats why people in other countries are..ON THE INTERNET. Cooperation shouldn't mean we have to relinquish control to an undemocratic body, filled with unelected members, such as the United Nations.
A matter of national policy that cannot be negotiated? I don't seem to recall the 132nd ammendment stating that internet domain ownership is the right of every american citizen.
WTF are you talking about. 132nd amendment? Right to internet domain ownership? What? I mean the internet was created essentially by the US government. I don't see why you think it is somehow unreasonable that the US won't negotiate handing over control to another entity.
Because co-operation is bad eh? No. We are already cooperating as I mentioned earlier. But giving other countries that kind of control is simply not good US policy. I don't see how anyone can argue otherwise.
Damn those pesky Europeans for wanting oversight on a random organisation like ICANN which has been so successful and caused no issues thanks to its openness and brilliant decision making.
Right. Because the UN has been so successful and caused no issues thanks to its openness and brilliant decision making. Get a freakin clue.
My/Our Internet (Score:3, Insightful)
When I think about our US government, companies like Verisign and Worldcom, UN, or any other random organization interested in monkeying with MY Internet, I get a little protective. You see, I want this wild-west frontierism -- that is where innovation comes from -- a need for something that did not exist before, and the lack of rules or laws which would prevent me from building those things. Again, the free exchange of ideas.
If China wants to censor themselves, it's all them -- their routers, firewalls, and filters should not apply to me here in the US. I don't like it, but what can I say? That's not my system. The eventuality, is that some Chinese people will figure out ways around this, 'cause that's how the Internet works, right? Route around the failures?
I realize that routers and bandwidth cost money, but when you think about it, if there weren't any people using/administrating/publishing-on it, it wouldn't exist. It is people like me, people like Cmdr Taco (and yes, you too, Zonk), and all you fucked-up readers of Slashdot (and countless others) that make this Internet happen -- all sharing ideas, flames, stories, pictures, porn, and filth. We're all exchanging information between ourselves. This is how it should be, and I'll be damned if I let some assholes (from wherever) interfere with My Internet. Rogue nameservers indeed.
Re:UN control of something important?! (Score:4, Insightful)
The US is by no means perfect! But no other country has a proven track record of supporting other people's freedoms over the past 100 yrs. Furthermore, we have no obligation to turn over a system that we developed to promulgate and enable communication to the the CORRUPT UN, just because we were successful.
Re:My turn: Democracy (Score:5, Insightful)
You seem to have a very peculiar view of the DNS system, most likely due to the fact you live in the US.
I live in Belgium, which has top-level domain name ".be". Any individual or business can register whatevertheylike.be. Do you not think that Belgium would rather control it's own domain rather than depending on another country to make sure root zone files point to a.ns.dns.be for the
As root files will always be necessary, I would rather have a central (neutral) authority guard over such systems that trust on a (not so neutral) country to allow me to use my domain.
The gov't isn't IN control (Score:1, Insightful)
That is why this whole discussion is absurd and I generally ignore any idiots I hear talking about it. They aren't currently controlled by any government, and they shouldn't be either ( the UN ).
I can't get behind this (Score:2, Insightful)
I'm not too keen on turning something that was (for all intents and purposes) invented, nurtured, and developed here, on American soil, over to european interests. What, now that the internet has political value the euro's want it? As far as I'm concerned, if they want it, they can reimburse us for the last 30 years of upkeep. This really strikes me as a thinly veiled grab for power. I really don't understand the logic that goes into making a suggestion like this. Just becuase everyone needs something doesn't make it communal property.
You have to admit, those wacky euros have a great sense of humor asking something ridiculous like this!
Re:Talking to myself (Score:5, Insightful)
Enforse your DMCA laws on us by use of trade blackmail?
But it's not the present I'm worried about, more the future. Your current leadership has shown utter disregard for the international community. They cannot be trusted with the internet; I'm talking about people that have mounted a disinformation campaign to get people to back a counter-productive war for the benefit of their benefactors. How long before those benefactors (sorry, "campaign contributers") seek to control the internet for their own profit? Your government puts the needs of the people behind the needs of corporations. That is not how I would like to see the internet run.
Re:The UN is incompatible with the internet (Score:5, Insightful)
The *rest* of the world doesn't see America as the great land of opportunity anymore, but rather the great land of opportunists, where the average 'honest' guy fights an uphill battle against corporate litigation, pseudo-law that has been reinterpreted via corporate lobbyists to support their agendas (i.e. Software Patents), or military actions that sadly mirror the ones they use to justify who they are fighting (i.e. invading a country to protect its own sovereignty, when the hidden goal could only be oil).
America heaps over with great features and wonderful people, and produces some of the best of everything to be found on this planet, but don't for one second pretend that your country is somehow the last bastion of truth and freedom, and that the rest of the world, via the only legal global governing body, lacks not only the ability but the *right* to govern the internet.
And for those of you who will follow on with 1D patriotic 'fuck-you-and-the-donkey-but-obviously-not-a-repu
----
There's nothing wrong with pissing in the wind, just make sure you are facing the right way when you do it.
UN is irrelevant (Score:2, Insightful)
This will cost the US taxpayer even more... And prop up the most disgraceful bureaucracy of all - the UN - all the while continuing with their "hate Israel, hate America" rhetoric and their legitimizing of unjust, evil governments*. Umm, who's paying for this group-masturbation? You guessed it. The free people of the United States.
This hideous organization has no right to take control of root DNS from the US.
*Zimbabwe, Libya, SUDAN (!!) on the UN Human Rights Council.
*After allowing God's people to have their rightful homeland in 1948, the UN condemns Israel at every turn ever since. Check out this figure: In the United Nation's General Assembly, 429 anti-Israel resolutions were passed from 1967 to 1988. Israel was "condemned" 321 times. Arab nations? Not once.
*60th anniversary of liberation of Aushwitz, Kofi Annan: "evil only prevails when good men do nothing", the same fucking day as hundreds of thousands of Sudanese civilians are exterminated because they are black and "inferior" to the Muslims... oh, that's right, Kanye West says it's Bush who hates black people - he must be right...
*I could go on if you really want me to, you get the picture. Morality is universal. When it is charaded as selectively as it is by the UN, it isn't morality. It's politics.
India? right.. (Score:0, Insightful)
for now, face it, India is not capable of handling something massive like that without interruptions and efficiency. Sure, India is growing, but it will take years before it reaches that level. So making such claims is much like hoping that Sani Mirza would win against Maria Shaparova - unsustainable if it happens for a long while.
While at it, what about the strike that paralysed India for a day yesterday? Oh,, sorry world, internet is down today, our leftist parties are calling for a strike today and some spirited employees have sabotaged the servers already. oops.
Re:Talking to myself (Score:5, Insightful)
Got to respond to this one. Use your own logic:
The existing system, works quite well, thank you very much. If the rest of the world doesn't like it, they are perfectly capable of setting up their own DNS system and encouraging the use of it. For them to demand to be given control of a system setup, funded, and run, by the original creators of the system is just absurd.
You don't like? Just go setup your own system, prove it's better, and people will switch... Just like Linux...
Chicken Little (Score:4, Insightful)
I have heard of no credible evidence that the US is abusing their administration of the internet. Yet other countries want control of it. The only logical conclusion is that these same countries must also have ideas of how the system could be abused, and can't wait to implement them. Censorship is probably on the forefront of each of these countries minds. (Some are worried about it happening, some are salavating at the chance to abuse it.)
Countries know they can not build a corrupt system from the ground up, since no one will use it, so they are attempting to gain control of what people are currently using. I just see transferring control as the equivalent of giving a child a button with "Blow Up World" written on it.
Old Grizzled Engineers (Score:3, Insightful)
And to speak to the political nature.... It the old grizzled engineers that have built and maintained these servers for over 30 years. The internet wouldn't be here if not for them. You wouldn't be reading this if not for them. I'm sorry it has to be this way... but they all live in the US for the most part. And if you don't want to see it all fall apart, you might just want to leave the system be. I will echo an earlier post
Stating the obvious... (Score:2, Insightful)
Dear other countries,
Did the US force you to connect to the Internet? Could you have instead banded together to make your own network? How the Internet works has long been public knowledge. Most of the people on the planet live outside the US, including many or most of the smartest engineers. In addition, most of the world's resources and assets (i.e. wealth) lie outside the US borders. Why not start the UNternet or EUternet or INDIAnet or NotUSnet and include the whole world except the US? I promise G. Bush will not invade your country with geeks carrying routers and spools of Cat5E cable.
The Internet is a global resource only because you voluntarily connected to it, knowing full well who controls it. You are welcome to our research and are free to improve upon what we've built, and you don't even have to invite us to be a part of it though it would be nice if you did. However, don't come to a picnic in my backyard and demand a say in how I landscape my yard.
Warmest regards,
A US Citizen
Re:Talking to myself (Score:2, Insightful)
The arguement that "If its not broke then don't fix it" doesn't really hold true here, with the way that America is going its almost like watching a natural disaster coming right at you and not making any kind of precautions. Oh wait... didn't the Bush administration do just that?
I really don't have confidence the current US government making any possible necessary changes to the net in the future.
Re:UN control of something important?! (Score:2, Insightful)
> there?
A country doesn't have to be a utopia to have better human rights than those in societies aided and abetted by the US.
America is a great country - I'm not saying life in Libya is better, but assuming you're American, you shouldn't let your conditioning blind you to the truth - your government(s) have done/are doing a lot of bad things in your name (and with your tax money).
Re:Talking to myself (Score:4, Insightful)
No, that would be a new feature. A feature, that I might add, comes with significant risk. The US currently imposes no restrictions worth mentioning on domain names. Yet in comparison, countries like Iraq [marcaria.com] don't allow registrations by private citizens. And what if the UN fails to properly maintain the root servers?
Right now, the system works, and works well. I have seen no compelling reason to change it. If someone can actually point to a reasonable improvement that outweighs the risks, then I'll happily agree with ceding control. But right now, it's just political and nothing else.
Re:India? right.. (Score:3, Insightful)
Exactly what I was thinking. Nothing against India, but they are not very politically stable at the moment. If the US has one thing going for it, we have a very stable government. What advantage would there be for us to give up a critical service like maintaining domain servers and give that management to other, less stable countries.
On top of that, no one has to use the US's domain servers, or for that matter ICANN's domain names. A country like India or China could run all of their own domain servers and just proxy out to any sites in the rest of the world that they wanted their people to see.
Finally, what advantage would there be to other countries if they managed the domain servers. I thought all of the names and IP addresses were allocated through ICANN. The only possible reason that I can see to do this is so they could force IP6 and make the US update, of course they wouldn't have the money to make this work either, so we would still be in a mess.
Re:Why? (Score:2, Insightful)
I'm sure they would start to miss us once that global depression hits.
Re:The UN is incompatible with the internet (Score:1, Insightful)
The US was only founded on individual rights for white men. Your country's "greatness" was paid for by the genocide and dispossession of the First Nations, and built by generations of African American slaves.
Which of your founding fathers* was sufficiently interested in "the rights of the individual" to free his slaves? Which of them cared enough about the rights of the individual to halt aggressive expansionism and treat with the rightful inhabitants of the land as equals? Answer: none of them was. You will forgive me if I don't consider this a very impressive pedigree for your constitution.
* I note the absence of any "founding mothers". The three most famous women in American history seem to be famous for being forced to marry a white man, sewing the first US flag, and giving a president a blowjob. Compare this to England, for example, where many of the most famous and successful national leaders have been women (Elizabeth I, Victoria, Thatcher - the reigns of the first two being considered golden ages in England's history).
Wrong! (Score:3, Insightful)
Second of all, the WWW was NOT, repeat NOT, regardless of what you may have red in Dan Browns Angels and Demons, created by an academic working in switzerland. This is categorically not true, and the fact that it is not true is so well documented that I should not have to ever correct anyone about this. The invention of HTML has very little to do with the creation of the internet. First of all, hypertext was around long before HTML, and hypertext files could already be transmitted over the (existing) internet. This is merely another standard for turing text into page layouts, which happens to be in widespread use. It is a small part of the internet at best.
I'm not even going to address your last paragraph. You're so far out there that you probably have escape velocity.
Re:It's not broke... (Score:5, Insightful)
The Internet was never "free" in either sense of the word. You may have had an Internet connection but someone paid for it. In my case, the university I attended paid for the connection and we got use of it in exchange for going to school there.
Napster was never declared "legal". It simply wasn't noticed and when it was, some people had problems with it. Just like if you steal a candybar from a store and never get caught, does that mean you didn't break the law?
A dialup connection can still get you anywhere if you have the right service provider.
Email is important, still. Just like anything else, there's always someone out there who will piss in the pool - spammers looking to make a quick buck or virus writers who do it for the hell of it.
Do you have any specific examples of where the US broke the Internet?
I'm entirely convinced that the UN can't even fix itself, which it needs to do badly before worring about taking on more responsibility (for anything).
Re:The UN is incompatible with the internet (Score:2, Insightful)
I see two real problems with the U.N.:
Re:Talking to myself (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:My turn (Score:1, Insightful)
It is that kind of mindlessly ignorant statement that makes the anti-US crowd lose all credibility.
terrifying, just terrifying (Score:1, Insightful)
Warmest regards,
The Rest of the World
Re:UN control of something important?! (Score:2, Insightful)
Yes, you're clearly right. Let's immediately give sovereign control of the United States to the UN.
----
The US doesn't -need- any arguements to keep it the internet in it's control. The UN hasn't given anything besides "we want it" or "We don't trust the US." Which is countered by the US saying "We have it" and "We don't trust any of -you- to run it either."
Re:Talking to myself (Score:3, Insightful)
What dream world are you living in? Hint: the net cash flow goes into the US, not out. This inbalance is the primary goal of US foreign policy. If you are thinking charity donations, well you don't even make the top 20 [nationmaster.com] However, presenting the image of "America the Saviour" is key to your rulers military campaigns, which is why this propaganda is installed in you from an early age. You went into Iraq to help the Iraqis, not yourselves, right? ;-)
China controls the top level domains and you want to register something like ChinaKillsPeople.com, and you just don't get denied acess
Is "photosofprisonerabuse.com" taken, or perhaps "deadsoldiersreturnhome.com"? People in glass houses should not throw stones. Also, could you drop the "we are better than China, so what's your problem?" attitude. There aren't many countries that aren't better than China WRT personal freedoms and rights, so using this argument actually makes you look bad overall. It's like saying "mom, my boyfriend isn't Charles Manson, he only kills babies at the weekend".
Re:Talking to myself (Score:4, Insightful)
You are a nitwit. The internet was developed for military communication that would be fault tolerant (as in nuke), it was later that the uni's started using it, finally branching out from universities to the public around the world.
The internet was founded and paid for by the US government.
Besides, once you go to a country code domain you go to that countries domain servers.
-nB
Re:Why? (Score:3, Insightful)
I'm no knee-jerk patriot, but your argument is weak on a number of points. The Internet is not being held "hostage." What we're talking about is a set of protocols. Think about that. Protocols. Agreed upon methods of communication. Not exporting and enforcing our vision of "peace," not "free market ideals," not "democracy," but freaking communications protocols.
Suppose we begin to run out of IP addresses, and ICANN decides to take a course with IPv6. If a number of other countries decide that's not wise, they are completely free to implement their own system, and if it makes sense, it will have willing participants. You want to turn that over to a UN committee? The Chinese could hold up adoption of a new standard until it includes some draconian censorship capabilities. I believe that the UN can and should be a relevant force in the world, but not in managing technical protocols.
<tangent>
Long before they were conveniently hijacked by the religious right and other dark forces, Conservativism and its ugly stepsister Neoconservativism were simply schools of political thought. Believe it or not, some of the actual principles from way back in the day (I am not going to list them here) are worth further analysis. Not all, not blindly adopted, but just warrant further discussion. Just like lots of liberal ideals are worth debating. Unfortunately political discourse has been replaced by shrill harpies steamrolling their edicts, but anyway...ONE of the principles of conservativism (and other -isms, I'm sure) is that national self interests should outweigh détente. That is, the US should protect the US's interests ahead of creating a feel-good openness with other countries. (I'm neither conservative or liberal, but like to rationally discuss principles from multiple camps.)
</tangent>
The extreme position of that is "Fuck you, we're making a war whether you like it or not" and I'm not advocating that in any event, but in this case, it's "this works as it is, it's in our best interests to keep it this way, and there's little tangible benefit and lots of risk associated with relinquishing control" so yeah, I see their point, arrogance notwithstanding. The simple fact that it's a global standard doesn't carry enough weight to turn over control to a global committee. Should we internationalize control of POTS or wireless protocols on those same grounds? Again, nothing is held hostage here, the world is free to develop and/or implement their own protocol, just don't expect the US to hand over the keys to the existing one.
The UN wants control for the wrong reasons (Score:5, Insightful)
Syria: "There's more and more spam every day. Who are the victims? Developing and least-developed countries, too. There is no serious intention to stop this spam by those who are the transporters of the spam, because they benefit...The only solution is for us to buy equipment from the countries which send this spam in order to deal with spam. However, this, we believe, is not acceptable."
Brazil, responding to ICANN's approval of .xxx domains: "For those that are still wondering what Triple-X means, let's be specific, Mr. Chairman. They are talking about pornography. These are things that go very deep in our values in many of our countries. In my country, Brazil, we are very worried about this kind of decision-making process where they simply decide upon creating such new top-level generic domain names."
China: "We feel that the public policy issue of Internet should be solved jointly by the sovereign states in the U.N. framework...For instance, spam, network security and cyberspace--we should look for an appropriate specialized agency of the United Nations as a competent body."
Ghana: "There was unanimity for the need for an additional body...This body would therefore address all issues relating to the Internet within the confines of the available expertise which would be anchored at the U.N."
These are the people that want to control the internet. They don't want some hands off technical control, they have specific cultural, moral and economic ideals they wish to implement in relation to the Internet. Yes, spam is bad. But "stopping spam" by a macro control mechanism is a control on information. This is contrary to the legal and user technological controls we are implementing now. Do you trust the UN to actually handle specific information on the Internet via their multicultralism moral compass? I don't.
I'm shocked! (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Talking to myself (Score:4, Insightful)
The internet is composed of the networks of all countries. The initial internet grew out of a network of networks, of which DARPA's was the first and largest, true, but that part the US pays for is for one run by private companies, not 'the US' (the US doesn't lay those cables). The US part of the internet is not payed for by the US...it's payed for by the people who buy from their ISP's (although it is true that the TLD's in the US are indirectly payed for by the US, as universities do get grants for that kind of thing).
Point 3 is just out-and-out wrong. It shows such disregard for how the internet is setup, and the demographics, it's stunning. Korea is the most wired country on earth...other countries like the Netherlands are in top slots also...the US isn't anything special concerning people with net connections. Hell, EU vs US, the EU has many more peopel with net connections.
As for that final paragraph....it's
Re:Talking to myself (Score:3, Insightful)
Maybe he's pissed that he can't reverse engineer anything he wants. Maybe he's concerned he'll be sued because he found some way to put a Napster song on an iPod or an iTunes song on a Zen without changing the file format. His songs. His licensed property. His fucking right.
You make the rest of us look worst by attacking someone's comment in such an underhanded and dishonorable way. Do I want our government to "give up control" of the internet to countries like Russia, China, Pakistan, Syria, Libya, or North Korea? Fuck no. Sure, our government isn't perfect, but it's a long shot better than those ones. Maybe there are better ones out there. Maybe not. If there were serious problems with how it was being run, sure. But now it's more of a "I'm afraid of what you may do some day in the future". New plan: when we do it, kick us in the nuts. Seriously. Until then, settle down. There's no guarantee that the U.N. would be any different than the U.S. - as in "what will they do in the future? WHAT IF THEY ALL BECOME COMMUNIST NAZI IMPERIALISTIC DOGS! GASP!" What if, what if, what if. But no matter how silly I think this constant whining is, it's still not worth damaging our arguments against it just because you can't be bothered to be honest in your rebuttles. Shame on you.
Re:Stating the obvious... (Score:1, Insightful)
Dear US Citizen,
Continuing on from your arguement of those that build it control it, even though its clearly become something larger. We would like to kindly ask you to leave the US. Did you discover the country? Were you the original occupants?
Were you not the people who came into the backyard and demanded to say how the country was run. Taken from not only the original native settlers, but also from the europeans who settled after that. Oh wait, your country is actually completely built from scratch on the notion "come to a picnic in my backyard and demand a say in how I landscape my yard" and then take control of it.
Fondest wishes
a citizen of earth
ps truly not intended as a flame or a knock at america, but merely a sarcastic comment on the slippery slope of the posters idea, after all its not the intention of the rest of the world to cut off from the US internet, but a hope that the issue can be resolved nicely. we are after all attempting to work TOGETHER (i know that's a dirty word)
European Union has human rights constitution too (Score:3, Insightful)
You are wrong. See also:
In the UK, it is a common occurance for an Act of Parliament (a law) to be overturned by the European Court of Human Rights [google.co.uk] on the grounds that it infringes those rights. This is much the same process as a US law being found unconstitutional.
I've no reason to believe the EU and US are alone in having constitutions which grant rights to their individual citizens. In the UK, the concept dates back to the Magna Carta of 1215 AD [www.bl.uk] and I doubt that was the first example in the world, either (although most historical examples, including the original US constitution, had exemptions for various untermensch such as females, slaves etc.).
That said... IMHO the Internet is America's ball. It invented it. It owns it [1]. It can do with it as it pleases. I'm grateful that they let us foreigners on it. But that has nothing to do with any superiority of constitutions.
[1] Actually NATO invented it, but seeing as NATO funding was provided in the vast majority by the USA, as a fellow NATO-member Brit, I'm not complaining.
Re:Talking to myself (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:It's not broke... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Talking to myself (Score:5, Insightful)
Way to completely ignore basic economic facts. Did you ask her how much rent is in her area? How much a Big Mac is both countries? Did you subtract your medical/dental insurance from your monthly wage, as taxes paid hers? Or your pension vs her state pension, also paid thru tax? Just how much does it cost to live in each country for a month?
Only then will you know if you are "better paid". There is more to currency exchange than just the simple exchange rate. Hell, I make more an hour than some people do in a month, but if I were to move to those countries with a year of my pay, I'd never need to work again.
Re:Stating the obvious... (Score:2, Insightful)
What can the UN do with it anyway? The UN has long done nothing about anything.
Re:Talking to myself (Score:3, Insightful)
But that was the reason for invading Iraq! "He might give WMD to terrorists"* You can't have it both ways!! :-)
*Of course, there were no terrorist links, and no WMD, so the "we have always been at war with Eurasia" thinking now is "it was for the democracy of the Iraqi people".
Re:terrifying, just terrifying (Score:2, Insightful)
The USA's DoD(Department of Defense) created a system of interconnecting networks named the internet. It was at first connected to a few select companies and Universities. Over time it connected to Universisties and some test sites abroad. All that we know as the Internet was created and funded by the American peoples tax money. Everything you see now is an extention of that by people from all around the world.
You can have your say for YOUR part of the net, as for the core that the USA made, you have NO say.
Eg, you can wear what YOU want to the party, but you can't chose the venue or the music.
Re:It's not broke... (Score:1, Insightful)
You forget ... (Score:2, Insightful)
Sounds reasonable to me. Not.
Syncerus
Re:Talking to myself (Score:3, Insightful)
The internet is founded by the US in much the same way as the telephone network was founded by A. G. Bell (A scotsman incidentally). The fact that the telephone network is now worldwide means that a single Scotsman is no longer in control. Why not so with the Internet? It is an international network with international users, why not international governance?
Re:Talking to myself (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:I don't know... (Score:1, Insightful)
Only on slashdot is sarcasm insightful.
Okay, but (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Talking to myself (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:The UN is incompatible with the internet (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:The UN is incompatible with the internet (Score:3, Insightful)
See, your problem is that you assume the right to free speech must be held above all others, including the rights of the accused to a fair and impartial trial. Unfortunately, it's not always that obvious (and in this case, I happen to agree with our courts).
U.N. Should take control of the BBC... &the Lo (Score:5, Insightful)
Also, the CBC should be put under control of the U.N.
After that, we need to get the U.N. to take over the Louvre. After all, the Louvre is considered an important part of our World Heritage, and so should be compelled by an international body to eliminate the clearly western bias of most of the artwork contained within. We just aren't going to accept the arrogant attitude that just because the French built the Louvre, paid for the Louvre, and nurtured the Louvre to be the preeminent art mueseum in the world, that they have the right to control it! Zambia, Bolivia, and North Korea have some wonderful ideas of what they are going to do with the place.
Re:Talking to myself (Score:2, Insightful)
If you are thinking charity donations, well you don't even make the top 20 However, presenting the image of "America the Saviour" is key to your rulers military campaigns, which is why this propaganda is installed in you from an early age.
Uhhh, you do know that those other countries tax the hell out of their citizens so they can "donate" money. The only fair way to compare would be to include all donations, private and government. Sheeesh, you make this too easy.
Two reasons (Score:4, Insightful)
2) Because that's what the UN actually wants. They don't just want TLD control, they want to regulate the Internet's content. The current head of the UN telecommunications committee is China's former minister of telecommunications, in other words the guy responsable for censoring their citizens. Slashdot linked to an interview with him some time ago which I just can't find now unfortunately where he makes it clear that he sees the UN have a greater regulatory role over the net and getting to decide what content is acceptable and not.
Re:The UN wants control for the wrong reasons (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Talking to myself (Score:2, Insightful)
and just for future reference, to keep yourself from looking like a dumbass again, all of america did not go to Iraq. just because someone is American doesn't mean they believe in this "Iraqi Freedom" crap. you really buy into this "propaganda" thing dont you? listen, i'm really sorry you hate america, or whatever your problem is, but I think we've given enough free handouts. kthnx
Re:It's not broke... (Score:3, Insightful)
Some countries have been frustrated that the United States and European countries that got on the Internet first gobbled up most of the available addresses required for computers to connect, leaving developing nations with a limited supply to share.
They expect entitlement. What they should be doing is developing! They have the ability to start with IPv6 from the word go, and yet they want to fight over IPv4 space. If they innovate on their own, create something other people actually want access to, they could help drive the move to IPv6. Hell they could work on IPvX, declare their own controller of the address space and dole it out to who ever they wish. Of course all they really care about is making sure their precious Nigerian emails get through.
Re:Stating the obvious... (Score:5, Insightful)
Thank you for your grand link pasting efforts. However, this is not about nationalism. Being a nation built on immigration we recognize, value, and sometimes improve upon contributions from the world over. The problem with your argument is the US isn't complaining about anything you listed. I'm not aware of anyone complaining that China invented paper money, or China controls the production of paper money. See, I'm not even sure how that fits. We're not complaining about our republican (note: lowercase r) form of government. The closest you come to something that fits the discussion is the world wide web, which is governed by W3C. I'm not aware of any complaints about that, are you?
I'm not saying "US is #1" or "world is teh sux0r!". My point is that the US made the investment in money, time, knowledge, material. We did not send out armies of technicians to secretly wire your countries with network cable. I'm pretty sure you guys said, "Hey, look what they built. That's pretty cool. Let's hook up to it." An alternate scenario has instead, "Hey, look what they built. That's pretty cool. I'm not comfortable with the US governance of this network though. Fortunately the protocol is open and well documented. Let's get build our own similar network, but instead it will be governed by the all countries. If we need to we can bridge to the US network later."
So you see, it could have gone differently but you didn't choose that path. Wishing you had now is sour grapes.
Warmest regards,
A US Citizen
Re:Stating the obvious... (Score:2, Insightful)
I suppose some of the posters here will be technically minded enough to work gopher, mind you, some of them seem barely able to work the world wide web.
Re:The UN is incompatible with the internet (Score:1, Insightful)
We don't want to be made fun of. The Canadian gov't is, as you've said, monolothic & first-to-the-post. There is a reasonable level of corruption at the top (see: AdScam, Gomery, etc) but there is also a real lack of viable options.
We have one currently viable party, the Liberals (centrist-left). They are only viable because of their populist nature. The 'alternatives' are a farther-left NDP party and a 'right-wing' Conservative party. I call them 'right-wing' because they are fiscal-conservatives (or they claim to be, the New Conservatives have never formed a government) but social-moralists. Thanks to a reigonal party controlling Quebec, the balance of power isn't going to change anytime soon. The moralist Conservative party is despised outside of Alberta/Sask/Manitoba.
As far as quotes like "you don't recognize that free speech is a fundamental human right", the US gov't may have a piece of paper in a museum somewhere that defines speech as a right. That doesn't mean they practice what they preach.
You will, of course, reply "No, the paper doesn't give me the right, it just enumerates rights that I already have." The functional difference is negligible. Especially when the US does the things that you attribute to China ('national security' trumps free speech in the US on a daily basis). You can argue about the origins of your rights until you are blue in the face, it's how society interprets these rights and how governments act on them that matters.
Or is it a more Orwellian system where you defend your rights one day, then defend court decisions removing them from you the next?
Maybe the world isn't entirely black and white?
Re:Different spin (Score:1, Insightful)
Hmm. why is that?
Europeans just have to point somewhere else for their name resolution and ignore the US ones. It's that simple. The US has no say in the matter if someone decides to use their own. Sure they can pretend to manage it all they want
Re:To the U.N. haters: (Score:3, Insightful)
Do you think Russia has the resources to put the UN's interests ahead of its own?
Do you think China advances the UN agenda because they want the whole world to be a happy place?
It (the UN) is a great idea on paper, and it should be more relevant, but this idea that it would function better if the US started playing nice is absurd. All players try to maximize their positions, in almost all cases.
The US won't pay its bill! Boohoo! The US kicked in $6 Billion to African debt relief, dwarfing the amount kicked in by all other industrialized nations. Their commitment to 100% relief essentially guilted all of the other parties into doing so too. This notion that the US is somehow sabotaging the entire organization is foolish.
Of course our current administration is advancing its neo-evil world view, but please, nations like Iran want nuclear "power," Israel wants the right to defend itself from a variety of neighbors, and China wants a laundry list of things, both economic and social. Will the US playing nice change this? Not likely, but pressure might temper them in different directions.
As far as American hegemony being undermined by the rise of China, take two reality pills and step away from the edge. There has always been, and will always be, upending economic forces in the world. Economies respond in cycles accordingly.
Yes, there is cause for concern about the debt issue, but will it make America China's baggage-handler? Not likely. China will make stuff. America will buy it. America is not, and has not been, a manufacturing-based economy in many years, mostly we provide services and entertainment. Remember how Japan 'perfected' the manufacturing process in the 70's and 80's? How'd that turn out? Why didn't they put us out of business?
Re:Why the U.N.? (Score:3, Insightful)
That is worked pretty well. You can pick up you phone in Bumfuck, Kansas, and call anywhere in the world. Even with the joke that is the US fragmented telecommunications system.
You can take an AM radio receiver from Asia, move to Europe, and listen to AM radio there. Or in the USA. International RF spectrum allocations are made to avoid one country from ruining spectrum use for everyone else.
Give technical control of internet standards to the ITU - they have the track record.
Re:It's not broke... (Score:2, Insightful)
This is of course a gross analogy and subject to over-simplification... but the fact remains, most of the significant contributors to the development of the net control the resources of the net. The mother of all of course being the US gov, since they started the damn thing.
MIT owns that space. The people at MIT contributed significantly to the development of the net as it is today. It is for them to do with as they wish. I don't see how I could put that with anything other than a straight face.
Why the UN shouldn't manage the Internet (Score:2, Insightful)
http://apnews.myway.com/article/20050929/D8CTK2SO
Re:It's not broke... (Score:4, Insightful)
So let me go back to my rich guy, poor guy analogy. I'm about the same as everyone around me. Except say I have a river flowing through my backyard. I build a waterwheel and use it to grind wheat into flour. I provide the service to people who live around me to use my grinder in exchange for some of their wheat. So... I'm richer than my fellow men for an idea I developed, and I "give back" to them by saving them the time it takes to grind the wheat by hand...
After a time, those people begin to depend on my grinder and the waterwheel. Does that mean they should own it? Or have a say in what I do with it? Its still mine isn't it?
I still don't like it, but perhaps its a closer analogy...?
Re:My turn (Score:3, Insightful)
1. A big kick in the teeth while the British took the whole place over and ran it for hundreds of years,
2. Its freedom when Britain got tired of pissing around with it, and
3. It's current success (THEY didn't invent high tech, WE did -- and we gave it to them).
I studied history too, FUCKTARD. And they haven't had a single culture for four thousand years; it's been one group after another running the place (not counting the British). Kinda like the rest of the world, huh!
Indians (and everyone else who likes to brag about how great they are) are full of shit. Kinda like you! Fucktard.