We'll fork the Web to keep it Free - Perens

[Warren Togami]

----- Original Message -----
From: "Brian Russo" <brusso at phys.hawaii.edu>
To: "Linux & Unix Advocates & Users" <luau at list.luau.hi.net>
Sent: Sunday, October 07, 2001 2:24 AM
Subject: [luau] Re: We'll fork the Web to keep it Free - Perens


>
> On Sun, Oct 07, 2001 at 02:11:27AM -1000, Warren Togami wrote:
> > While we are at it, we should fork DNS in order to get rid of the
abusive
> > ICANN and Verisign.
>
> Getting rid of ICANN and verisign does not require an alternate protocol.

I know.  We could run our own alternate root servers.  AlterNET already does
this, and it can work in such a fashion that it can work simultaneously with
the current ICANN InterNIC.  Unfortunately, this service will not be
accepted unless all ISP's implement it.
http://alternic.net/

>
> > Only problem: The industry wont follow.  I am completely against RAND in
W3C
> > standards, but if we fork web standards, we may be the only ones
> > implementing our own standards and further alienate ourselves from the
> > industry.
>
> Do you have a better idea?
>

Unfortunately no.  This is just another case where we are hurt by abusive
corporate America.  I'm afraid that the W3C is corrupted by the money of the
Corporate players, and no matter how much outrage there are in geeks, this
will not be repealed unless the large companies themselves express this same
outrage.  Unlike the DMCA and SSSCA, we can't threaten our elected
representatives with losing our vote if they support RAND.

The scary thing is... IBM supports RAND.  This tremendously weakens our
arguments.  Perhaps IBM does not realize that it would become ILLEGAL to
implement Open Source versions of W3C RAND standards due to patent reasons.
It would be illegal to distribute source code containing patented
algorithms, and GPL-like licenses explicitly forbid the inclusion of
anything that is patented for royalties.

(On a somewhat related note, IBM supports the Canadian DMCA currently in
bill form.  WTF?)