The broadest group of internet stakeholders ever have gathered to discuss internet policy issues in Canberra today.
Bizarrely, the broader public seemed not to have heard of it until the #aulgf hashtag (The Internet Governance Forum of Australia) began trending at midday today.
The Internet Governance Forum of Australia is based on the UN model that hopes to hold an “open, apolitical forum, to discuss internet-related policy issues, exchange ideas and best practices, and help shape the future of the Internet in Australia”
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The Australian forum is a precursor to a global forum in Baku next month, and today's list of internet heavyweights include major regulatory groups like auDA, the Internet Industry Association (IIA), the Australian Communication Consumer Action Network (ACCAN), the Australian chapter of the Internet Society (ISOC-AU) and the Asia-Pacific Network Information Centre (APNIC).
Naturally, everyone else from Google to the Department of Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy is also attending.
Jon Lawrence from internet freedom advocacy group Electronic Frontiers Australia said it is an impressive crowd, in terms of size and good cross-section of the internet space.
“It's getting all these people in the room for the first time in many senses,” he said.
“We have the centrepiece of many circles in a Venn diagram.”
But proposals by the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) to impose top-down regulation over the internet have some critics wary.
Especially in light of as yet undisclosed national security reforms by the Australian government.
“Any attempts to impose any top down control over the internet is very dangerous to innovation and economic opportunities that it may create," Mr Lawrence said.
“The ITU is an intergovernmental organisation so it therefore reflects the views of a whole range of governments such as Russia, China and Iran that have a very difference view about how the internet should be managed,"
He said today's topics have included the internet governance landscape, security, openeness and privacy.
“We are very strong supporters of the multi-stakeholder governance model of the internet. We think it's core to how innovation has been allowed to flourish and has brought us the internet that we know and love today,"
The forum continues tommorrow.
