This symposium will be the first public event in the US to review the UN Working Group’s report, which will be released to the public July 18.  Regime Change on the Internet? Internet Governance After WGIG will also look towards the future of Internet governance, leading up to the World Summit on the Information Society in Tunisia and beyond. The US and Canadian Governments have already issued a call for public comments on the WGIG report.

While the final report won't be released until July 18, Declan McCullagh anticpates the content & poses the question, Will the UN run the Internet?

A preliminary summary of governmental views claims there's a "convergence of views" supporting a new organization to oversee crucial Internet functions, most likely under the aegis of the United Nations or the International Telecommunications Union.

Such a proposal, in the run-up to Tunis would represent a significant challenge to ICANN's authority - essentially the Bush administration's Dept of Commerce - which recently announced that it will not hand over control of Internet domain names and addresses to anyone else.
China, in contrast, has adopted a preliminary position that clearly rejects ICANN as a long-term solution.

.. 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.

This 'Beijing Consensus' on internet governance could push the internet to the brink of

. . . what amounts to the nuclear option: a fragmented root. That means a new top-level domain would not be approved by ICANN--but would be recognized and used by large portions of the rest of the world. The downside, of course, is that the nuclear option could create a Balkanized Internet where two computers find different Web sites at the same address.

I chatted briefly with Milton Mueller at WSIS in Geneva, mostly seeking answers from a root guru about ICANN's China Question.

"It wasn't until now" that a fragmented root was being talked about, says Milton Mueller, a professor at Syracuse University and participant in the Internet Governance Project. "China and other countries might be pursuing responses that lead to fragmentation."

Such an outcome remains remote, but it could happen. That possibility means an obscure debate about Internet governance has suddenly become surprisingly important. .