DPGs #1

 

The oldest and best example of a digital public good is the Internet. Why people don't start from this is surprising to me:

Since 1982, source code of the exemplary implementation from UC Berkeley has been 

available plus documented in an open access series of books documenting that code and working:TCP/IP Illustrated (vol 2)

The key thing here was that every thing accepted as an internet standard had at least 2 interoperating implementations, preferably three, one of which was open source (unencumbred by any IP) - for me, this defines digital (code/data), public (there's no barrier to entry due to ownership restrictive practices) infrastructure (you can run the code and computers are general purppose machines so any computer can run it, subject to resource constraints:-)

Two other reference points - despite the best of intentions and some clver game theory in design processes , we still suffer from frequent tussels in cyberspace - see Tusslees in Cyberspace

from the same people that said this:

"We reject: kings, presidents, and voting. We believe in: rough consensus and running code." David D. Clark 1992.

The standards process in the IETF has open governance, overseen by the non profit Internet

Society, with free access to standards documentation (RFCs) and processes...plus online/remote access to standards meetings for 30 years...go from here: The Internet Society and the Internet Engienering Task Force which includes hackathons and code sprints as well as writing specs.

For many years, there were also open events for interoperation testing. I remember going to the first Interop Trade Show in Monterey in 1986

The actual operational running of the internet (a mix of private, public and mixed provisioning) 

has teams of people around the world coordinating - e.g. NANOG and RIPE and AfNOG in US and Europe

and Africa e.g. see Reseaux IP European and also net information registries e.g.  AfriNIIC

As well as this, the origin of computer emergency response teams (the "CERTs) who deal with 

coordinated response to security incidents...was from coping with attacks on systems and the infrastructure.

Much of the leading edge research is also covered in open access academic conferences which also typically feature published code and test data (artefacts) and even reproducibility testing results - e.g. see ACM SIGCOMM for a good list of examples of state-of-the-art (probably about 5 years ahead of deployment

A sustainable DPG would include a decentralised grid made of a very large number of microgenerator sources - we have been building something like this on public buildings in the City where I live (London, England) where we crowdfund putting large solar installations on schools, gyms, etc, at scale of 100Kw typical configurations. We are working on getting permission to build a publically owned grid to re-distribute spare power locally (rather than having to just go through the privately operated centralised grid). SUch a system could (with appropriate use of storage, e.g. in batteries in nearby parked EVs) provide a power source for must digital public services.

A whole ecosystem ready built as a way to do all aspects of a DPG!