Wortfeld

The Working Group on Internet Governance (WGIG) has released its final report. For very quick readers: The report recommends a permanent forum for dialogue and presents four organizational models for global public policy development and oversight. It’s not exactly light reading, since it introduces no less than five new ghastly acronyms – GIC, IIC, GIPC, WICANN and GIGF – for a topic area which already is overcrowded with acronyms.

To make the report easier to understand, I have created a two-page PDF illustration of the four models. Caveat! This is an inofficial attempt at visualizing the recommendations. The four models are only described very briefly in the report, so it may well be that the graphics do not match the WGIG members’ understanding of the models. (I’ll possibly change parts of the illustration as WGIG members explain the report in public over the next few days. If you find any errors, please let me know.)

Update: One of the WGIG members emphasized to me that the report calls for a forum for dialogue regardless of the four models. I have tried to make this clear by taking the forum out of the illustrations for models 2 and 4 and instead putting it at the top. (Thus: old version 0.1, new version 0.2)

WGIG website
WGIG report (PDF file, Word DOC)
Semi-official background report (Word DOC)
Press release (PDF file)
Reuters (Irwin Arieff): UN panel fails to agree on how to govern Internet
AP (Aoife White): U.N. Panel Presents 4 Internet Options
Heise Online (Monika Ermert): Mehr Regierungseinfluss in der Internet-Verwaltung
ICANN: Transcript of forum discussion on WGIG
U.S. Department of Commerce: Statement of Principles (2005-06-30)
Michael Geist: Working Group on Internet Governance Releases Report