Berkman Buzz, week of October 22

BERKMAN BUZZ: A look at the past week's online Berkman conversations
The Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard Law School
Week of October 22, 2007.

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What's going on... take your pick or browse below.

*Rebecca MacKinnon critiques the proposed Global Online Freedom Act of 2007.
*Wendy Seltzer argues for privacy in registering domain names.
*Doc Searls considers Facebook the latest in a string of online “walled gardens.”
*Dan Gillmor praises The New York Times for opening up to outside researchers.
*Citizen Media Law Project: ONI Releases Bulletin on Internet Shutdown in Burma.
*Weekly Global Voice: Costa Rica: Free-Trade Agreement Passes.

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The full buzz.

“CNet reports that the Global Online Freedom Act of 2007 has just been passed by the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Foreign Affairs. CNet also points out that the 2006 version of the bill was also passed by the same committee last year, but never went to a full vote of the House and thus died. The proposed law would impose a series of constraints and requirements on companies like Yahoo, Microsoft, Google, Cisco and others when doing business in authoritarian countries where the Internet tends to be censored and surveilled for purposes other than what Americans would view as ‘legitimate law-enforcement reasons.’”
Rebecca MacKinnon, “Global Online Freedom Act Passes House Committee”

“Doc’s post and the impending comments deadline for the next iteration of ICANN’s never-ending WHOIS saga finally pushed me to write up my thoughts on the latest iteration of ICANN debate.  As Doc points out, much of the current debate is very inside baseball, tied up in acronyms atop bureaucratic layers. Small wonder then that ordinary domain name registrants and Internet users haven’t commented much, while the fora are dominated by INTA members turning out responses to an ‘urgent request’ to ‘let ICANN know that Whois is important to the brand owners I represent’: see the call reproduced in this response.  So what is at stake? Everyone who registers a domain name is required to enter name, address, email, and telephone numbers in a publicly accessible database.”
Wendy Seltzer, “WHOIS redux: Demand privacy in domain name registration”

“Here’s the problem. For me, anyway.  I believe the Net is an open place. Same with the Web.  I also believe private walled gardens on the Web are fine things. Nothing wrong with them.  My problem is when the former starts looking and acting like the latter. And that’s why I’m already tired of Facebook. The ‘friend request’ list (top item to the left there) is one I’ve whittled down from a much higher number. If I could gang-whittle them, I might be more interested, but the routine still involves declining to check off which of many different ways I met somebody (‘both owned the same dog’, ‘set up by a mutual ex-boss’ or whatever), and other time-sucks.”
Doc Searls, “Too much face(book) time”

“Dave Winer has been exploring a superb news resource, exploring the depth and breadth of the New York Times' data-stream. The most traditional of news organizations is opening up, including its archives, in ways that could be truly revolutionary in the news business – and Dave is leading the way toward a new way of seeing a core part of our history and current knowledge.  As he inspires others to do some spelunking of their own, the result is that people outside the Times are doing crucial R&D for the world’s most important newspaper – figuring out what’s available in the story archive and current flow that, in many ways, represents a fundamental baseline for journalism about vital topics, and then figuring out how to make it more available, in smarter ways, to more people.”
Dan Gillmor, “Bringing the New York Times’ Cornucopia to All”

“Yesterday, the OpenNet Initiative released an excellent report on the recent Internet shutdown in Burma, entitled ‘Pulling the Plug: A Technical Review of the Internet Shutdown in Burma.’ Besides the eye-popping technical analysis ONI was able to carry out in a matter of weeks, the report contains a great overview of the dramatic events of late September and early October 2007, including the role that citizen journalists and bloggers played in getting information about the crackdown out to the international community. As for the government's response, the report explains that the government imposed a total Internet outage from September 29 to October 4, followed by a period of regulated outages all day except during the period between 22:00 and 4:00 (Burmese time) from October 4 through October 12.”
Sam Bayard, “ONI Releases Bulletin on Internet Shutdown in Burma”
 
“On October 7, Costa Rica participated in a democratic exercise through a referendum to decide on the fate of the Free-Trade Agreement and citizens were able to be a legislator for day. It was a day with plenty of tension on both sides. Neither those supporting ‘Yes’, nor those supporting ‘No’ were assured of a victory, and in the streets, one could hear equal numbers of songs and chants, and most importantly with respect.”
Roy Rojas, “Costa Rica: Free-Trade Agreement Passes”