Two bad choices:

1) Led by the US = megacorps have purchased both political parties so its basically megacorp-net. Expect lots of censorship and control focused around maximizing profits.

2) Led by the UN = most of the UN members are crooks, dictators, religious extremists, military leaders who killed the civilian leaders to gain control, basically the scum of the non-business society so its basically dictator-net. Expect lots of censorship and control around killing all dissenters and forcing one lunatic religions beliefs upon people of other lunatic religious beliefs (or non-beliefs)

The register seems to have it quite spot on, somebody is being a drama queen and AT&T+friends probably paid for the drama because they want to increase roaming charges.

Putin wants to make sure that there is no way for Russian dissidents to post information about the election fraud. He is angry that people can put videos of fraud online somewhere else, not in Russia and others can view that video.

Putin's party in Russia would NOT win in real elections, but the way it's done, he is getting the votes he needs, because of all the fraud.

Oh, you think the U.S. is giving that up just because you say so? Or sign some treaty just because you threaten them with...what?

Dozens of countries, including Russia and China, are pushing hard to reach this goal by year's end

Holy crap! If China and Russia are in favor of this, it simply can't be allowed to happen.

I can only imagine how badly the internet would be broken by every piss-pot government bureaucrat around the world decides the internet should (or shouldn't) be allowed to work in a given way.

Criticize the government? Banned. Point out that a politician is a philandering, lying bastard? Banned.

There's already actions in the UN to make it a crime to say mean things about religion ... this will only make it worse, and then some. It's my legal right to say that your imaginary friend can mind his own damned business and that I don't wish to be bound by your scripture.

Go with a central control over the internet, and you're in a race to the bottom to appease the most backwards of governments, and pretty much do whatever the copyright lobby wants out of it.

Keep your hands off my fucking internet.

The answer to the question "Who believes UN governance will result in improvement?" will give a lot of insight into the motives behind transferring control to a UN agency. My immediate suspicions include: the copyright cartels, repressive governments, and telecoms/tier 1's seeking to create international monopolies.

Sure there are technical improvements that arguably can be made at various layers, but does anyone think that the UN can or will do any better at managing them than the current system?

The UN fancies itself as a nascent world government. I don't know about the rest of the world, but the US isn't going to go along with putting the Internet in the hands of the same people that made Qaddafi's Libya chair of the Human Rights Commission.

The UN is totally dysfunctional in way that makes Washington DC look like a Bastian of efficiency, honesty, and virtue. The problem with the UN is there is also the matter that the UN is made up of members that have little to no respect for basic human freedoms, and that includes places like Western Europe where its say illegal to question certain historic view points. That same organization than has the gal to berate us here in the USA on human rights for say executing adult criminals (18 years old), while they would classify all kinds of behavior as criminal which we would never criminalize in the first place.

No I am not a fan of government but when it comes to Internet governance I would much much rather have the USA (who is entitled to by the way as we build the thing) with its still relatively strong Constitutional protections running the Net, than some international body.

Personally if the rest of the world thinks they should govern the Net I say let them build their own, but as soon as packet touches one of our Edge routers, OUR RULES APPLY.

Those of you who are panicked and/or outraged might want to read the Register article, which strongly suggests that none of this is actually happening. In particular, these paragraphs:

The ITU has said, time and time again, that it has no interest in running the internet. Earlier this month the organisation's secretary general pointed out that even if he had a mandate (which he doesn't) he hasn't the budget. ITU budgets are always linked to policy objectives, and taking over the internet is not a policy objective. ...

McDowell claims there's a meeting scheduled for 27 February where the land-grab will be agreed, and that these things will pass into international law in December - as though the US ever moved that fast. He's referring to the WCIT (the World Conference on International Telecommunications), which starts in Geneva next week, but the agenda for that was set months ago and includes no clause to make a grab for cyberspace.

So the question becomes not if anyone is trying to take over the internet, but who stands to gain by spreading the rumour that such a takeover is on the cards. ITU reps, speaking off the record, are starting to fear some sort of conspiracy themselves: they've adamantly stated that they have neither the desire, nor the budget, nor the mandate, to interfere with governance of the internet, and yet the scare stories just refuse to die.

One thing people often forget is that individual citizens are NOT constituents of the UN. The UN does not represent you, your rights, or your interests.

The UN represents GOVERNMENTS, whose interests are often at odds with, or diametrically opposed to, the interests of the people they govern. Indeed, the UN only represents people's intrests when they happen to coincide with the interests of a sufficient number of sufficiently powerful governments, which is quite rare (WHO and the Human Rights folks notwithstanding). Moving authority from a democratically elected government (however dysfunctional, however provincial) to an unelected body that represents government interests over human interests is not a change for the better.

How often do some people say "oh you should let the UN take care of that" or "did you ask the UN?" or "what was the consensus of the international community"...

But offer that same august body control over the internet and everyone won't trust anywhere near it.

Exactly. And that's why it's hard to interact with the UN in all those other circumstances. It's a mess, corrupt, and highly incompetent. Count on it and it will drop you baby on the head every time... repeatedly... possibly on purpose.

There is some hope of changing what the (corrupt) US government does, but none of changing what the coalition of evil known as the United Nations does.

That's the flaw in attempts at "world government", which in reality means loss of sovereignty and that is all.