gDisk is a software that turns your GMail account into a portable hard drive so you can always have your important files accessible accross the Internet.

Classic globalism.

Classic liberalism to equate the corrupt European sensibilities with logic and fair-mindedness.

Classic liberalism to believe that the Left-leaning media-driven attitude about the War in Iraq has anything to do with objective reality.

Classic liberalism to believe that the War in Iraq can be compared to everything in history.

Absolute myopia. The Left has no grounding in proportion, objectivity or reality.

The global society is not the inventor of the Internet. What utter arrogance for it to believe that it has a right to be proprietor.

Classic socialism: create nothing, appropriate and regulate everything.

Piss off, Mueller. Piss off Europe. Your bitch asses are in no position to sermonize. We've saved your asses in WW1, WW2 and the Cold War.

All this grief from the continent that gave the world Nazism, totalitarism, Fascism. Now we have to take their socialist, globalist shit and believe that they have a track-record to be trusted.

Accept our gracious offer of allowing you to plug into our Internet. If you don't like it, create your OWN Internet. BUILD SOMETHING OF YOUR OWN FOR A CHANGE. [...]

http://www.icannwatch.org/

A number of people, notably Viviane Reding, the European Commissioner for Information Society and Media, have been asking about how to Break The Internet. Since Mme Reding seems to have absolutely no prior experience in the Information Technology, Computing or Telecommunications industries, I have prepared this brief HOWTO.

2. Build the network of Root Servers.

This is somewhat more difficult. What you really need to do is get some ISPs and universities to agree to host a root server. Unfortunately, the people who work at these institutions have an overdeveloped sense of their own competence, what with all those years of experience, PhDs in Engineering and Computing, and having helped build the Internet in the first place (perish the thought that technologists have a better understanding of technology than you! After all, you have a doctorate in "Human Sciences"! Science! That's better than technology!). So you have two options to persuade them to cooperate: Bludgeon Them With Bureaucracy, or Bribe Them With Cold, Hard Cash. The choice of which option is left as an exercise for the reader.

5. Get everyone to use the new Root Zone.

At first, this seems like the hardest part. But actually, it's not. All you need to do is get all the parliaments in all the countries in the EU to pass laws to force all the ISPs, commercial organizations, academic institutions and private citizens in their countries to use the new DNS root, and make it illegal for them to use any other. After all, if you can legislate for straight bananas, you can do this! For the Chinese and Iranians, it's much easier. If someone complains, they can just execute them. Wouldn't life be easier if you could do that?

6. Sit back and Watch it Burn.

Right, now you've broken the Internet, let's pass a law to set the value of Pi to be 3! That'll make things much better!

"The US is absolutely isolated and that is dangerous," she said during a briefing with journalists in London.

"Imagine the Brazilians or the Chinese doing their own internet. That would be the end of the story.

"I am very much afraid of a fragmented internet if there is no agreement." [...]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/4327928.stm

There was a thread on Slashdot a few days ago about this. The fact of the matter is that the Internet is an agreement between private people to route traffic. It is a technical 'problem' not a political one. Any country can set up its own private network, like Saudi Arabia has, and if the 'rest of the world' doesnt like ICANN being in its position, then they can spend the money to make whatever network they like.

This is a perfect example of why no European country ever came up with anything like the internet (the country closest to making some kind of useful network being France with its hopelessly limited Minitel). The person they put in charge of this matter is a total computer illiterate with no background whatsoever in the subject.

Lets look at the CV of Viviane Reding, 'European Commissioner responsible for the net':

Personal details

Born on 27 April 1951 in Esch-sur-Alzette, Luxembourg, Married, three children

Education: Doctor of human sciences, Sorbonne, Paris

Professional career

1978-1999

Journalist, Luxemburger Wort

1986-1998

President, Luxembourg Union of Journalists

Political career

1979-1989

Member of Luxembourg Parliament

• President of social committee
• Member of the Office of the Chamber of Deputies
• Member of Benelux Parliament
• Member of the North Atlantic Assembly (leader of Christian Democrat/Conservative group)

1981-1999

Communal councillor, city of Esch

• President of Cultural Affairs Committee 1992-1999

1988-1993

National president of Christian-Social Women

1995-1999

Vice-president, PCS (Parti Chrétien-Social)

1989-1999

Member of the European Parliament

• President of the Petitions Committee 1989-1992
• Vice-president of Social Committee 1992-1994
• Vice-president of Civil Liberties and Internal Affairs Committee 1997-1999
• Head of Luxembourg delegation to EPP
• Member of EPP group office

1999-2004

Member of the European Commission (Education, Culture, Youth, Media, Sport)

2004-

Member of the European Commission (Information Society and Media)

There is not a single line in there related to computers, except the last one, where she has just been given the job for heaven knows what reason. It would have been far more sensible to appoint Tim Berners-Lee with this poistion, he is a European, and he has the understanding to do the job correctly. He would never waste time on this DNS nonsense and instead, would focus on the real issues of importance, like how France and Germany block content or the insane copyright and patent laws that attack the network's usefulness etc etc.

America has done some bad stuff, but putting control of the root servers in the hands of computer illiterates for no good reason is just insane.

Alfred Hermida 'Technology editor, BBC News website' is just another journalist like this commissioner, who has presented an article without any FACTS. There are no facts about how the internet runs at the top level, there is only this single very vague line:

..."It manages how net browsers and e-mail programs direct traffic."

Honestly, there is nothing more revolting than an ignorant apointee blowing off jealous steam and causing fear uncertainty and doubt....except an irresponsible and biased journalist who puts heat under the fat underbelly to stoke the boiler.

Look at all of his articles. They are all of the same type, hysteria focussed, issue pumping garbage. Really, there must be SOMONE at the BBQ who has got a clue.

It would be wrong to exaggerate the influence of Icann since the internet is by its nature a highly fragmented system that is very difficult to control. But Icann, though nominally independent, is subject to a veto by the US department of commerce which set it up. The Bush administration has made it crudely clear that it will not give up its veto and especially not to a body answering to the UN.

It is time the US had a more mature approach. Whatever its origins, the internet is a global phenomenon and that must be reflected in its governance. The US has done immensely well out of its invention since it produces most of the hardware and software that powers the internet. This has been a big factor in the prolonged revival of the US economy during the past decade. Whatever legitimate worries there may be about threats to security under broadened control they must not be used as an excuse to prevent the emergence of a new model of internet governance to reflect its global structure. This need not spell the end of Icann, which has done a good job. It would certainly mean broadening the base of its stakeholders.

There is a need for a separate body to deal with global issues such as spamming, child pornography, intellectual property and abuses of democratic rights. The UN would be good for this role, though its bureaucratic structure is not best fitted to run a fast-moving phenomenon such as the internet, nor to deal with political problems including China, which recently forced Yahoo to hand over data that led to the imprisonment of a journalist. China has also been trying to change domain name suffixes to make them inoperable in China. Any new body should have a membership and constitution that reflects the extraordinarily democratic character of the internet, and which also protects it against interference from governments. [...]

Audika is good.