Subject: Re: [78attendees] We'll meet again...

From: Thomas Walsh <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 5 Aug 2010 15:42:39 -0400

I agree we should consider smaller cities as well. Maastricht (and recently Hiroshima also) did so much to make IETF attendees feel very welcome. Maastricht was a wonderful city and I too would like to thank the hosts for a nice job last week.

-----Original Message-----
From: [email-masked] [mailto:[email-masked]] On Behalf Of Ted Lemon
Sent: Friday, July 30, 2010 1:19 PM
To: Olafur Gudmundsson
Cc: [email-masked]
Subject: Re: [78attendees] We'll meet again...

On Jul 30, 2010, at 7:11 PM, "Olafur Gudmundsson" <[email-masked]> wrote:

> Overall I think my preference for IETF meetings is smaller cities as we 
> get treated better and it just feels good to visit towns that appreciate 
> that we are there.

Yup. Maastricht was lovely. My windows were surprisingly soundproof, which was a good thing...   The bus service was great too--it's nice to see a city where public transit really works.  Seeing the guy riding his bike with the Weimaraner running beside out the bus window was a highlight.  
_______________________________________________
78attendees mailing list
[email-masked]
https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/78attendees

---

From: "WORLEY, Dale R (Dale)" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 5 Aug 2010 18:28:11 -0400

________________________________________
From: [email-masked] [[email-masked]] On Behalf Of Thomas Walsh [[email-masked]]

I like being in smaller cities also.  But I suspect that small size was one of the contributing causes of the expensive and inflexible hotel prices.  We probably accounted for 2% of the city's population at the peak.  If we need most of the hotel rooms in a city, we're not going to have good bargaining power.

Dale

---

From: David Kessens <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 5 Aug 2010 21:28:06 -0700

On Thu, Aug 05, 2010 at 03:42:39PM -0400, Thomas Walsh wrote:
>
> I agree we should consider smaller cities as well. Maastricht (and
> recently Hiroshima also) did so much to make IETF attendees feel very
> welcome.

I am wondering, what is your definition of a small city ? Hiroshima's
population would be the 4th largest city of the US if transplanted to the
US. Or to say it in another way, it is larger than San Jose and San
Francisco combined.

David Kessens
---

> Yup. Maastricht was lovely. My windows were surprisingly soundproof, which was a good thing...   The bus service was great too--it's nice to see a city where public transit really works.  Seeing th…

David Kessens
---

---

From: "Monique Morrow (mmorrow)" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 6 Aug 2010 08:00:04 +0200

+1!

---

From: "Sprecher, Nurit (NSN - IL/Hod HaSharon)" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 6 Aug 2010 13:03:33 +0200

+1

From: [email-masked] [mailto:[email-masked]]
On Behalf Of ext Monique Morrow (mmorrow)
Sent: Friday, August 06, 2010 9:00 AM
To: Thomas Walsh; Ted Lemon; Olafur Gudmundsson
Cc: [email-masked]
Subject: Re: [78attendees] We'll meet again...

+1!

-----Original Message-----
From: [email-masked] on behalf of Thomas Walsh
Sent: Thu 8/5/2010 12:42 PM
To: Ted Lemon; Olafur Gudmundsson
Cc: [email-masked]
Subject: Re: [78attendees] We'll meet again...

I agree we should consider smaller cities as well. Maastricht (and
recently Hiroshima also) did so much to make IETF attendees feel very
welcome. Maastricht was a wonderful city and I too would like to thank
the hosts for a nice job last week.

-----Original Message-----
From: [email-masked] [mailto:[email-masked]]
On Behalf Of Ted Lemon
Sent: Friday, July 30, 2010 1:19 PM
To: Olafur Gudmundsson
Cc: [email-masked]
Subject: Re: [78attendees] We'll meet again...

> get treated better and it just feels good to visit towns that
appreciate

Yup. Maastricht was lovely. My windows were surprisingly soundproof,
which was a good thing...   The bus service was great too--it's nice to
see a city where public transit really works.  Seeing the guy riding his
bike with the Weimaraner running beside out the bus window was a
highlight. 
_______________________________________________
78attendees mailing list
[email-masked]
https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/78attendees
_______________________________________________
78attendees mailing list
[email-masked]
https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/78attendees

---

From: "WORLEY, Dale R (Dale)" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 6 Aug 2010 10:22:48 -0400

________________________________________
From: [email-masked] [[email-masked]] On Behalf Of David Kessens [[email-masked]]

Though Hiroshima would rank only 20th considering metro area populations.  But the 20th ranked metro area in the US is Denver, and nobody would consider Denver to be "too small" to host an IETF.

Hiroshima's metro population is about 20 times that of Maastricht.

Dale

---

From: Thomas Walsh <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 6 Aug 2010 10:43:51 -0400

Perhaps smaller isn't the right word.  Some people were complaining about having easier airline access than Maastricht or Hiroshima afforded.  Applying that as a screen would have meant missing such wonderful venues as these two.  I'd like to keep the focus on the nice job of the Maastricht host.  

-----Original Message-----
From: WORLEY, Dale R (Dale) [mailto:[email-masked]] 
Sent: Friday, August 06, 2010 7:23 AM
To: David Kessens; Thomas Walsh
Cc: [email-masked]
Subject: RE: [78attendees] We'll meet again...

Dale

---

From: Ole Jacobsen <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 6 Aug 2010 08:09:30 -0700 (PDT)

Cities like Maastricht and Hiroshima offer the "all in one place"
experience. Pretty much everything your would want to see/buy/eat
could be gotten to by foot, a short cab ride or even the tram.
This is also very much true for places like Oslo, Vancouver, and
yes Amsterdam (apart from the separation of venue and hotels for
an event as large as the IETF).

This has a lot more to do with geography than it has to do with
population density.

Ole

Ole J. Jacobsen
Editor and Publisher,  The Internet Protocol Journal
Cisco Systems
Tel: +1 408-527-8972   Mobile: +1 415-370-4628
E-mail: [email-masked]  URL: http://www.cisco.com/ipj

On Fri, 6 Aug 2010, Thomas Walsh wrote:

> Perhaps smaller isn't the right word.  Some people were complaining 
> about having easier airline access than Maastricht or Hiroshima 
> afforded.  Applying that as a screen would have meant missing such 
> wonderful venues as these two.  I'd like to keep the focus on the 
> nice job of the Maastricht host.
>

---

From: "Spencer Dawkins" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 6 Aug 2010 10:17:51 -0500

My understanding (forgive me if I am confused) is that the point was, 
Hiroshima was more aware of, and more accommodating to, the IETF than Tokyo 
would likely have been; Vienna, Prague, Stockholm and Maastricht were more 
aware of, and more accommodating to, the IETF than Paris and London were ...

Not that any of these places were SMALL, but that they were smaller than 
some of the obvious BIG places that we could have gone to, in the same 
region.

I think that sounds about right.

Spencer

> Perhaps smaller isn't the right word.  Some people were complaining about 
> having easier airline access than Maastricht or Hiroshima afforded. 
> Applying that as a screen would have meant missing such wonderful venues 
> as these two.  I'd like to keep the focus on the nice job of the 
> Maastricht host.

---

From: Joe Touch <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 06 Aug 2010 13:00:39 -0700

Hi, all,

I too enjoyed visiting Maastricht, and like the idea of not always going 
to the same large places repeatedly, and don't mind a brief (2-hour or 
less) train ride after a flight.

That said, I would appreciate future locations be less 'pinned', i.e., 
where at least some alternatives (for lunch, [brewed] coffee, or just to 
take a break) were available within a reasonably brief walk.

This is less an issue with city size than with venue location within the 
city. IMO, Hiroshima, Stockholm, Anaheim, and Vancouver had this, but 
Maastricht and Dublin's venues (NOT the cities) made the week more 
difficult than it needed to be.

Joe

---

From: Ole Jacobsen <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 6 Aug 2010 13:18:51 -0700 (PDT)

We were somewhat mis-informed about the availability of restaurants 
and other facilities within walking distance of the MECC. Future site 
visit will take this into account and claims will be verified :-)

Ole

Ole J. Jacobsen

On Fri, 6 Aug 2010, Joe Touch wrote:

> Hi, all,
> 
> I too enjoyed visiting Maastricht, and like the idea of not always going to
> the same large places repeatedly, and don't mind a brief (2-hour or less)
> train ride after a flight.
> 
> That said, I would appreciate future locations be less 'pinned', i.e., where
> at least some alternatives (for lunch, [brewed] coffee, or just to take a
> break) were available within a reasonably brief walk.
> 
> This is less an issue with city size than with venue location within the city.
> IMO, Hiroshima, Stockholm, Anaheim, and Vancouver had this, but Maastricht and
> Dublin's venues (NOT the cities) made the week more difficult than it needed
> to be.
> 
> Joe
>

---

From: David Kessens <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 6 Aug 2010 15:21:11 -0700

Tom,

On Fri, Aug 06, 2010 at 10:43:51AM -0400, Thomas Walsh wrote:
> having easier airline access than Maastricht or Hiroshima afforded. Applying
> that as a screen would have meant missing such wonderful venues as these
> two. I'd like to keep the focus on the nice job of the Maastricht host.

I agree ;-). I had the same thought initially but then started thinking
that Hiroshima couldn't possibly as small as Maastricht ...

I do think we have to be careful with our words, as the IAOC might decide
to go to Minneapolis again if we tell them that we like smaller cities ;-).

Words like secondary cities within a particular region/country might be more
what we were looking for.

On the hand, I personally like the variation of going to many different
types of venues and locations: if I have to travel for work, I can as well
see something different each time even if it costs me some extra (personal)
travel time.

David Kessens
---

---

From: joel jaeggli <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 6 Aug 2010 15:52:44 -0700

> to go to Minneapolis again if we tell them that we like smaller cities ;-).

Metro MSP/Hennepin county is the 16th largest metro Area in the US...
it's 2/3 the size of finland or 1/5 the size of the netherlands by
population.

---

From: Ole Jacobsen <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 6 Aug 2010 16:00:15 -0700 (PDT)

> it's 2/3 the size of finland or 1/5 the size of the netherlands by

Let's not get carried away here. The part of Minneapolis that "we care 
about" is quite small and reachable by indoor walkways which are handy
for cold weather.

Ole

---

From: K KIM <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 7 Aug 2010 08:11:03 +0900

> This is less an issue with city size than with venue location within the
city.
> IMO, Hiroshima, Stockholm, Anaheim, and Vancouver had this,
> but Maastricht and Dublin's venues (NOT the cities) made
> the week more difficult than it needed to be

I absolutely agree with this opinion.

KIM, K.

On Sat, Aug 7, 2010 at 5:00 AM, Joe Touch <[email-masked]> wrote:

> Maastricht and Dublin's venues (NOT the cities) made the week more difficult
> than it needed to be.
>
> Joe
>
>

---

From: Geert Jan de Groot <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 07 Aug 2010 13:38:51 +0200

> visit will take this into account and claims will be verified :-)

Having seen the attendance at various restaurants and bars in the evening
I think most travellers did work out the transport system in Maastricht,
as the city was really crowded by IETF folk, whereever one looked ;-)

The requirement to have lunch-restaurants on walking distance, strongly
biases towards environments where "walk-out for lunch" is common,
and that's not common everywhere. The ability to cater ~1000+ folk
quickly during a short lunch break is a cultural thing and
certainly uncommon in some other parts of the world.
I know of complete industrial environments, with many different companies,
employing tens of thousands of people, with not even a sandwich bar
anywhere near any of these facilities.

I agree the caterer failed big time on monday (partially because
of the credit card thing really) but didn't see huge queues during
the rest of the week.

I'm sure other venues will have other drawbacks, wherever we go.
We can't make the attendees list quiet, can we?

Geert Jan

---

From: Ted Lemon <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 7 Aug 2010 07:48:44 -0400

> of the credit card thing really) but didn't see huge queues during

I didn't see any *commerce* the rest of the week, which indicates to me that people either just skipped lunch because they needed to be in the venue and didn't want a repeat of Monday, or went to town, because they didn't need to be in the venue.   That was my strategy for the rest of the week.

---

From: Haibin Song <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 09 Aug 2010 16:21:22 +0200

> difficult than it needed to be.

I agree. I'm also very happy if the host can find some nice and convenient locations within cities like Tokyo and Beijing, where you can have restaurants in walking distance, and where that is not so crowded and noisy. 

Haibin

> On Behalf Of Joe Touch
> Sent: Friday, August 06, 2010 10:01 PM
> To: Ole Jacobsen
> Cc: [email-masked]

---

From: Mary Barnes <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 11 Aug 2010 10:38:41 -0500

I also agree with Joe's point.  While I found Dublin to be a great place to
spend time and found that once I reached the city, the choice of places to
eat was excellent, having a meeting at such a remote location is not a good
thing.  Maastricht also had some excellent restaurants once I got back to
the city at the end of the day.  But, I did not consider the cities in
general to be a good choice for a business meeting.  For many of us, the
week is extremely grueling and we have to manage on very few hours of sleep.
When the venue, hotels and places to eat are not conveniently located, extra
time is added to our already very busy days.

The one thing that I really liked about Dublin was that there were buses
provided so that we didn't have to find our way back to the venue on our
own.  It was extremely helpful and very much appreciated that we were
provided access to the buses in Maastricht to get us to and from the venue,
however, that did result in some of us having to make our way back on our to
our hotels at night.  This concern may not be one that others encounter, but
as a female traveling alone, wandering around a city where I am not familiar
with areas where I should and shouldn't be on my own is a big concern.
 Certainly, there are enough IETF gentlemen that I can generally find
someone to walk with me. However, that is inconvenient for them and in one
case it was suggested that I could walk to the hotel by myself since the
individual (a male) said it was safe.  That was an uncomfortable situation
for me since the city center in Maastricht (in particular the side street
where my hotel was located) is quite deserted at nite and the only people I
encountered were  hanging out in front of a "coffee" house.  When I took a
self defense class, I was taught that the most effective way to avoid
problems is to not put yourself in a situation where I might be vulnerable.
 I have traveled to many places all over the world on my own and in general
avoid being out at night until I've been able to assess the situation, which
I do by seeing how many females I see out alone at nite.  In general, I have
found major cities that are open 24 hours, so to speak, as very safe places
since there is safety in numbers, if you will.  I have no fears about
traveling around midtown NYC or central London or Paris on my own. In my
experience, the least safe places for me to be alone at night are towns that
pretty much shutdown by around 10 pm at nite or in areas of cities that I
know are not particularly safe.  I live in a small town and can tell you
that the same bad things can happen in small towns that happen in big
towns.

Again, I know that my concerns only apply to a very small subset of IETF
participants, but I have to wonder if it isn't this safety concern that
prevents more women from being actively involved in IETF. It takes far more
guts for a woman to travel to unknown cities on her own than it does to deal
with folks in the IETF.  Statisically, one would expect IETF to have the
same percentage of female participants as there are women in computer
science. Unfortunately, that number is around 10%, but my guess is that the
percentage of women that attend IETF is around 5%.

So, I strongly encourage the folks that plan the meetings to consider the
safety factor associated with a venue that is not located in a city center
with convenient acess to restuarants (that serve food beyond 10pm).  And,
based on my previous comments on the list, access to food markets is also
very important for folks that are on restricted diets for medical reasons.
 I had to skip a WG session that I really should have attended to go to the
market in Maastricht (the nite after I did not receive the meal I ordered at
the hotel restaurant).  I also realize this isn't an issue for the majority
of participants, but I would hope folks could have some empathy for those of
us that go without many meals at the IETF meetings (I'm still down 5 pounds
since that meeting and that raises a big flag with my doctor).  Just
consider how you would feel if the only food that you could eat in
Maastricht for lunch was a salad or if the only snacks available at breaks
was veggies (which I personally really appreciate).

And, while I'm on the topic of why I did not find Maastricht to be a good
place for a business meeting, the fact that we could only buy train tickets
at the station between 10am and 5:30 pm is another negative.  In Yokohama,
we were able to purchase our train tickets at the venue - that was extremely
helpful. That would have been really nice in Maastricht.

I also don't buy into the idea that these smaller cities are less expensive.
The transportation expenses and extra travel time have already been raised.
 My guess is that the less expensive part in these smaller/out of the way
venues is the meeting space. Personally, I'd prefer to pay a higher meeting
fee and have the meeting in a large, easily accessible city. In my
experience, you can find reasonably priced hotels in many major cities. For
example, the hotel that I stayed in in Paris after the meeting was 30 Euros
a nite less than my hotel in Maastricht (same class of hotel). And, the
subway in Paris is very inexpensive.  I found the venue in Paris in 2005 to
be perfect - there was even a market located in the shopping center
connected to the hotel/venue.

Regards,
Mary.

On Mon, Aug 9, 2010 at 9:21 AM, Haibin Song <[email-masked]> wrote:

> I agree. I'm also very happy if the host can find some nice and convenient
> locations within cities like Tokyo and Beijing, where you can have
> restaurants in walking distance, and where that is not so crowded and noisy.
>
> Haibin
>
>

---

From: "Elwell, John" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 12 Aug 2010 08:53:15 +0200

Picking up only on the issue of cost, I found the overall cost of Maastricht a lot less than Anaheim (even after adjusting for lower flight cost and one day shorter stay). Food certainly was cheaper, plus the fact that my hotel rate included a decent breakfast - not the case in Anaheim.

John

> From: [email-masked] 
> [mailto:[email-masked]] On Behalf Of Mary Barnes
> Sent: 11 August 2010 16:39
> To: [email-masked]
> I also agree with Joe's point.  While I found Dublin to be a 
> great place to spend time and found that once I reached the 
> city, the choice of places to eat was excellent, having a 
> meeting at such a remote location is not a good thing.  
> Maastricht also had some excellent restaurants once I got 
> back to the city at the end of the day.  But, I did not 
> consider the cities in general to be a good choice for a 
> business meeting.  For many of us, the week is extremely 
> grueling and we have to manage on very few hours of sleep. 
> When the venue, hotels and places to eat are not conveniently 
> located, extra time is added to our already very busy days.   
> 
> The one thing that I really liked about Dublin was that there 
> were buses provided so that we didn't have to find our way 
> back to the venue on our own.  It was extremely helpful and 
> very much appreciated that we were provided access to the 
> buses in Maastricht to get us to and from the venue, however, 
> that did result in some of us having to make our way back on 
> our to our hotels at night.  This concern may not be one that 
> others encounter, but as a female traveling alone, wandering 
> around a city where I am not familiar with areas where I 
> should and shouldn't be on my own is a big concern.  
> Certainly, there are enough IETF gentlemen that I can 
> generally find someone to walk with me. However, that is 
> inconvenient for them and in one case it was suggested that I 
> could walk to the hotel by myself since the individual (a 
> male) said it was safe.  That was an uncomfortable situation 
> for me since the city center in Maastricht (in particular the 
> side street where my hotel was located) is quite deserted at 
> nite and the only people I encountered were  hanging out in 
> front of a "coffee" house.  When I took a self defense class, 
> I was taught that the most effective way to avoid problems is 
> to not put yourself in a situation where I might be 
> vulnerable.  I have traveled to many places all over the 
> world on my own and in general avoid being out at night until 
> I've been able to assess the situation, which I do by seeing 
> how many females I see out alone at nite.  In general, I have 
> found major cities that are open 24 hours, so to speak, as 
> very safe places since there is safety in numbers, if you 
> will.  I have no fears about traveling around midtown NYC or 
> central London or Paris on my own. In my experience, the 
> least safe places for me to be alone at night are towns that 
> pretty much shutdown by around 10 pm at nite or in areas of 
> cities that I know are not particularly safe.  I live in a 
> small town and can tell you that the same bad things can 
> happen in small towns that happen in big towns. 
> 
> Again, I know that my concerns only apply to a very small 
> subset of IETF participants, but I have to wonder if it isn't 
> this safety concern that prevents more women from being 
> actively involved in IETF. It takes far more guts for a woman 
> to travel to unknown cities on her own than it does to deal 
> with folks in the IETF.  Statisically, one would expect IETF 
> to have the same percentage of female participants as there 
> are women in computer science. Unfortunately, that number is 
> around 10%, but my guess is that the percentage of women that 
> attend IETF is around 5%.
> 
> So, I strongly encourage the folks that plan the meetings to 
> consider the safety factor associated with a venue that is 
> not located in a city center with convenient acess to 
> restuarants (that serve food beyond 10pm).  And, based on my 
> previous comments on the list, access to food markets is also 
> very important for folks that are on restricted diets for 
> medical reasons.  I had to skip a WG session that I really 
> should have attended to go to the market in Maastricht (the 
> nite after I did not receive the meal I ordered at the hotel 
> restaurant).  I also realize this isn't an issue for the 
> majority of participants, but I would hope folks could have 
> some empathy for those of us that go without many meals at 
> the IETF meetings (I'm still down 5 pounds since that meeting 
> and that raises a big flag with my doctor).  Just consider 
> how you would feel if the only food that you could eat in 
> Maastricht for lunch was a salad or if the only snacks 
> available at breaks was veggies (which I personally really 
> appreciate). 
> 
> And, while I'm on the topic of why I did not find Maastricht 
> to be a good place for a business meeting, the fact that we 
> could only buy train tickets at the station between 10am and 
> 5:30 pm is another negative.  In Yokohama, we were able to 
> purchase our train tickets at the venue - that was extremely 
> I also don't buy into the idea that these smaller cities are 
> less expensive. The transportation expenses and extra travel 
> time have already been raised.  My guess is that the less 
> expensive part in these smaller/out of the way venues is the 
> meeting space. Personally, I'd prefer to pay a higher meeting 
> fee and have the meeting in a large, easily accessible city. 
> In my experience, you can find reasonably priced hotels in 
> many major cities. For example, the hotel that I stayed in in 
> Paris after the meeting was 30 Euros a nite less than my 
> hotel in Maastricht (same class of hotel). And, the subway in 
> Paris is very inexpensive.  I found the venue in Paris in 
> 2005 to be perfect - there was even a market located in the 
> shopping center connected to the hotel/venue.  
> 
> Regards,
> Mary.  
> 
> 
> 	I agree. I'm also very happy if the host can find some 
> nice and convenient locations within cities like Tokyo and 
> Beijing, where you can have restaurants in walking distance, 
> and where that is not so crowded and noisy.
> 	
> 	Haibin
> 	
>

---

From: Ted Lemon <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 12 Aug 2010 10:15:25 -0400

> Picking up only on the issue of cost, I found the overall cost of Maastricht a lot less than Anaheim (even after adjusting for lower flight cost and one day shorter stay). Food certainly was cheape…

Anaheim is a good example of the sort of place I'd really hope IETF would avoid in the future--it was like living on a desert island, because there weren't any real businesses within walking distance of the venue--just chains.   Maastricht was just as isolated, but felt completely different because of the excellent bus service.   If IETF were making a choice between a venue like the one in Anaheim, and a venue like the one in Maastricht, I would really strongly prefer they choose the latter.

IETF in Ireland worked out just fine for me, but the reason it did was because I figured out in advance how isolated the venue was by using Google maps, and once I realized how isolated it was, I got a hotel that was closer in.   I felt very bad for the people who were stuck at the venue.   OTOH, not being at the venue meant I had fewer of those highly desirable accidental hallway meetings.   I would say that the venue in Ireland was probably worse than Anaheim, but I enjoyed Ireland a lot more than Anaheim.

Maastricht beat either city because even though my hotel was isolated, like in Anaheim, I was close to the venue, so I went to meetings I wouldn't otherwise have attended and ran into people I wouldn't otherwise have run into, and yet with the bus service I was able to go forage for real food.

Honestly, I have no idea how the folks organizing IETF meetings make these choices.   Walking through this, my main reaction is to feel happy that it's not my job.

---

From: Mary Barnes <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 12 Aug 2010 09:56:57 -0500

The one advantage to Anaheim is there are oodles of tourist guide books that
one can find that provide all the information ahead of time as to what the
situation will be. There were no such guide books that I could find about
Maasticht - Lonely Planet for the Netherlands had one very small chapter
that didn't get into any of the accessibility/how to get there issues.

Also, any of the hotels in Anaheim would have been able to provide folks
like me refrigerators in their rooms.  And, many of the hotel chains that
were within walking distance of the venue had such as a standard part of the
room and many of these hotels were in the same price range as what I paid in
Maastricht and I was in one of the less expensive hotels. Also, many of
these do offer a free breakfast that are comprised of pretty much the same
sorts of foods available at the venue. I would certainly agree, however,
that the breakfast I had in Maastricht was much better than any of these.
But, that's generally true in my experience for any European hotel -
reflective of the prevalance of the generally less healthy diet in the
U.S..

So, yes, I would agree that Anaheim wasn't the greatest venue for a business
meeting despite my having found it a great place for a vacation with my kids
the week prior.  But again I consider the requirements for a business
meeting to be distinctly different than those of a vacation locale.
 certainly, Maastricht wins handsdown in terms of a nice place to be and the
social was one of the best I've attended.  I just think that being in a nice
place should be lower priority in the decision making  than the basic
logistics of having an effective meeting - i.e., hotels and food
(restaurants and markets) close to the venue.  The best meetings that we've
had that have provided such have been Paris (by far one of the best meeting
choices), Stockholm, San Francisco and London.   While definitely, the
latter 3 are generally fairly expensive for food (and lodging for the latter
two), I still think those meetings were far more effectiveness due to being
in the city center near places to eat, etc.

One thing that would have helped me tremendously would have been if renting
a car had been described as a really good option for getting to Maastricht
and convenience in reaching the venue for those of us at hotels in the city.
 The website indicated that wasn't at all necessary. In hindsight, I will
rent a car if we have any more meetings in small European towns.  I did look
into renting a car just to get me to Maastricht and dropping it off locally,
but that was cost prohibitive - around 200 Euros.  Again, in hindsight that
might still have been a good choice since I barely caught the last train to
Maastricht on Saturday nite and it was fairly deserted, which I found
uncomfortable for a good reason. Fortunately, a taxi was dropping someone
off as I arrived, otherwise I would have had to walk to my hotel.

Regards,
Mary.

On Thu, Aug 12, 2010 at 9:15 AM, Ted Lemon <[email-masked]> wrote:

> > Picking up only on the issue of cost, I found the overall cost of
> Maastricht a lot less than Anaheim (even after adjusting for lower flight
> cost and one day shorter stay). Food certainly was cheaper, plus the fact
> that my hotel rate included a decent breakfast - not the case in Anaheim.
>
> Anaheim is a good example of the sort of place I'd really hope IETF would
> avoid in the future--it was like living on a desert island, because there
> weren't any real businesses within walking distance of the venue--just
> chains.   Maastricht was just as isolated, but felt completely different
> because of the excellent bus service.   If IETF were making a choice between
> a venue like the one in Anaheim, and a venue like the one in Maastricht, I
> would really strongly prefer they choose the latter.
>
> IETF in Ireland worked out just fine for me, but the reason it did was
> because I figured out in advance how isolated the venue was by using Google
> maps, and once I realized how isolated it was, I got a hotel that was closer
> in.   I felt very bad for the people who were stuck at the venue.   OTOH,
> not being at the venue meant I had fewer of those highly desirable
> accidental hallway meetings.   I would say that the venue in Ireland was
> probably worse than Anaheim, but I enjoyed Ireland a lot more than Anaheim.
>
> Maastricht beat either city because even though my hotel was isolated, like
> in Anaheim, I was close to the venue, so I went to meetings I wouldn't
> otherwise have attended and ran into people I wouldn't otherwise have run
> into, and yet with the bus service I was able to go forage for real food.
>
> Honestly, I have no idea how the folks organizing IETF meetings make these
> choices.   Walking through this, my main reaction is to feel happy that it's
> not my job.
>
>

---

From: K KIM <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 13 Aug 2010 00:04:09 +0900

On Thu, Aug 12, 2010 at 11:15 PM, Ted Lemon <[email-masked]> wrote:

> weren't any real businesses within

--> I absolutely agree.

---

From: Miquel van Smoorenburg <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 12 Aug 2010 17:44:51 +0200

On Thu, 2010-08-12 at 09:56 -0500, Mary Barnes wrote:
> The one advantage to Anaheim is there are oodles of tourist guide
> books that one can find that provide all the information ahead of time
> as to what the situation will be. There were no such guide books that
> I could find about Maasticht - Lonely Planet for the Netherlands had
> one very small chapter that didn't get into any of the
> accessibility/how to get there issues.  

http://wikitravel.org/en/Maastricht

> One thing that would have helped me tremendously would have been if
> renting a car had been described as a really good option for getting
> to Maastricht and convenience in reaching the venue for those of us at
> hotels in the city.

I had a bike. MECC -> Downtown about 8 minutes.

Mike.

---

From: Scott Brim <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 12 Aug 2010 11:49:36 -0400

>     Anaheim is a good example of the sort of place I'd really hope IETF
>     would avoid in the future--it was like living on a desert island,
>     because there weren't any real businesses within 

I guess we have different needs.  Anaheim had wifi, air conditioning,
pizza, chinese food, and even a bar.  Who has time for a real dinner
anyway?  I didn't need any real businesses beyond those.  I would have
enjoyed walking through some real culture between hotel and meeting, though.

---

From: Mary Barnes <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 12 Aug 2010 11:51:04 -0500

Yes, there is information on that wiki, but as far as travel it pretty much
duplicates what was on the host site as far as reaching Maastricht and the
information as to getting around is focused entirely on the city center, in
particular it notes that having a car can be painful, wherase in hindisght
that would have been of a tremendous help to me. There's also no mention at
all of the MECC. Again, if I were on holiday in Maastricht, which seems to
be the central focus of any write-up, then no problems.

I considered a bike, but that wouldn't have been any safer for me at nite
than walking and there was lots of discussion on the list about not leaving
bikes outside at nite and I don't think carrying a bike into my hotel at
nite would have worked well.

Mary.

---

From: Joe Touch <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 12 Aug 2010 09:57:38 -0700

I agree that the Maastricht venue is more useful with a bike.

Similarly Anaheim is more useful with a car.

However, in Anaheim, there were numerous places to eat, or even grab 
quick snacks, within <5 minutes walking distance. The same was not true 
for Maastricht (just the neighboring hotel) or for Dublin. In the US, 
many were chains - welcome to the US, where chains are the norm ;-)

Joe

On 8/12/2010 9:51 AM, Mary Barnes wrote:
> Yes, there is information on that wiki, but as far as travel it pretty
> much duplicates what was on the host site as far as reaching Maastricht
> and the information as to getting around is focused entirely on the city
> center, in particular it notes that having a car can be painful, wherase
> in hindisght that would have been of a tremendous help to me. There's
> also no mention at all of the MECC. Again, if I were on holiday in
> Maastricht, which seems to be the central focus of any write-up, then no
> problems.
>
> I considered a bike, but that wouldn't have been any safer for me at
> nite than walking and there was lots of discussion on the list about not
> leaving bikes outside at nite and I don't think carrying a bike into my
> hotel at nite would have worked well.
>
> Mary.
>
> <[email-masked] <mailto:[email-masked]>> wrote:
>

---

From: Scott Brim <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 12 Aug 2010 13:08:22 -0400

In both Anaheim (where I was at the Super 8) and in Maastricht I
seriously considered a foldable scooter.

---

From: Ted Lemon <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 12 Aug 2010 13:21:13 -0400

On Aug 12, 2010, at 11:49 AM, Scott Brim wrote:
> anyway?

I don't know, those all sound pretty good to me, as long as it's not every day.  There was also a decent Indian place.   The problem was more that I couldn't get any fresh fruit without a long excursion, and I couldn't get any healthy food in general, and we were surrounded by freeways, which made going for a bike ride dangerous.

As for having time for dinner, I have to wonder if you are really being effective at IETF if you are so busy during the meeting that you don't have time for dinner.  It's easy to get caught up in every working group   We are all geeks and we all have opinions, some of them valid, about how to solve the various problems each working group is looking at.

But my own experience at least is that if I get that crazily involved with that many working groups, I wind up being ineffective in the working groups I came to the meeting to participate in.   If you're able to work that hard at IETF and still be effective, I salute you, but for the rest of us, some degree of moderation is required.

---

From: Ted Lemon <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 12 Aug 2010 13:27:45 -0400

> seriously considered a foldable scooter.

I had a bike in Anaheim.   It was scary to ride it around there.   I suspect a scooter would have been similarly bad.   In Maastricht, I'd intended to rent a bike, but didn't bother because it was humid and the bus was just as fast.

---

From: Andrew Sullivan <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 12 Aug 2010 14:38:22 -0400

Ok, the subject is too strong for what I really want to say, but I
couldn't resist.  Sorry.

On Thu, Aug 12, 2010 at 01:21:13PM -0400, Ted Lemon wrote:
> 
> But my own experience at least is that if I get that crazily
> involved with that many working groups, I wind up being ineffective
> in the working groups I came to the meeting to participate in.

That sounds like it's skirting the territorry in which the benefits of
having a Big Giant Meeting are wearing off.  And given the number of
bits that are spilled after every meeting noting the large number of
deficiencies with the most recent venue (or responding with "worked
for me"), I am also starting to wonder whether the benefits of the
supposed cross-pollination are worth the cost.

As a single bit of information (keeping in mind that the plural of
anecdote is not "data"), we DNSEXT chairs tried very hard this time to
have a session especially dedicated to those application and other
people -- the consumers of the DNS -- to tell us whether we're even
approaching the mark on a bit of work that we've been contemplating
taking on.  We held a one hour session just for this.  We announced
it, and sent an extra note to the apps-discuss list in the hopes of
drumming up interest.

Nothin' doin'.  When I looked out over the faces in the room on
Wednesday morning, I saw an awful lot of familiar faces.  And at the
mic, I heard only familiar voices.  Same in the jabber room.  So how
much "cross-pollination" is there, anyway?

Maybe the problem is with the very idea of three IETF meetings a year,
and we could solve a lot of the complaints by focussing on areas or
specific WGs or something.

A

-- 
Andrew Sullivan
[email-masked]
Shinkuro, Inc.

---

From: Ted Lemon <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 12 Aug 2010 15:43:19 -0400

> much "cross-pollination" is there, anyway?

How did you spread the word on this?

For my own part, I did actually go to a number of sessions I hadn't planned on going to--e.g., I hadn't even heard of mif until Hui Deng mentioned it in another context, *at the meeting in Maastricht*.   So I would say that there is a problem with figuring out how to create a low-noise channel for communicating this sort of information.

I think you have to have an evangelist who shows up for sessions where interested parties might be lurking, and gives a very short presentation at each.   If nobody is evangelizing, our noise filters are too well-tuned to allow us to hear announcements like this from working groups at which we are not regulars.

I don't think this is a problem of meetings.   Whether three meetings a year is necessary or not I can't say.   To me, the problem seems to be one of noise overload in general.   I follow the ietf mailing list, but it's so noisy that I necessarily miss drafts going by that I should be looking at.

The only way to deal with this kind of noise problem is to accept that there will be noise rejection, and evangelize selectively to overcome it.   Selective evangelism is (or should be) a relatively low-noise channel, which makes it more likely that someone will hear what you are saying and act on it.

---

From: Andrew Sullivan <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 12 Aug 2010 16:21:34 -0400

> How did you spread the word on this?

I sent this message to the IETF list:

    http://www.ietf.org/ibin/c5i?mid=6&rid=49&k1=933&k2=52271 

and also this one to the apparea list:

    http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/apps-discuss/current/msg01589.html

The ADs also forwarded the first of those to the apparea list.

> I think you have to have an evangelist who shows up for sessions
> where interested parties might be lurking, and gives a very short
> presentation at each.  If nobody is evangelizing, our noise filters
> are too well-tuned to allow us to hear announcements like this from
> working groups at which we are not regulars.

But this actually suggests _again_ that the supposed benefit of having
everyone at the same meeting is now swamped by the sheer size of it.
I also stumble across things at IETF meetings.  But I wonder very much
whether the best way to get people to interact in that informal way is
to fly 1500 of our best friends to some remote place and hope that the
right people run into each other.

Maybe what we need, instead of the IETF daily dose, is the slashdot of
the IETF: a sort of news ticker of what interesting things are going
on there.  Now, one could argue that the I-D announcements ought to be
that, but lots of I-Ds are now cleanup, updates of previous
versions. &c.

Anyway, I'm not trying to say, "Poor us, we held a party and nobody
came."  I'm sort of relieved: if nobody wants to tell us what problem
we have to solve, then we can feel comfortable saying that there's
nothing to do.  Good!  No more work for the WG!

A 

-- 
Andrew Sullivan
[email-masked]
Shinkuro, Inc.

---

From: Ted Lemon <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 12 Aug 2010 17:03:02 -0400

> that, but lots of I-Ds are now cleanup, updates of previous

That's related to an idea I've been kicking around in my head for a while--an IETF wiki that would act as a guide to all the work the IETF's done so far, and the work it's doing now.   With the RFC numbers rapidly closing on 6000, there are hundreds of RFCs I definitely should have read, but don't even know about.   But fundamentally, I just completely agree with this idea--I think if we could figure out a way to do it and make it worth reading, yet not too noisy, it might help a lot of efforts along.

> nothing to do.  Good!  No more work for the WG!

I've found that the surest way to get people to say what they really feel is to say "okay, nobody's interested in this, we're dropping it."   Sometimes you get lucky and nobody yells at you.

---

From: Barry Leiba <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 12 Aug 2010 16:15:18 -0500

> That's related to an idea I've been kicking around in my head for
> a while--an IETF wiki that would act as a guide to all the work the
> IETF's done so far, and the work it's doing now.

Just addressing the question of publicizing "interesting" stuff that's
going on at the current/upcoming meeting, here:
The thing is, nearly everyone will flag their own work as the most
interesting, most important stuff happening, and we'll have the same
flood of too much information as we have now.

This is related to the fact that nearly every silly little nothing
application one installs on one's computer wants to put an icon in the
program list and an icon on the desktop and an icon in the favourites
list and a shortcut here and a bookmark there and a "quick start"
application that runs at boot time and, and, and.

Your program is not the most important thing on my computer, even if
you think so.
Similarly, your working group meeting, BoF, or new Internet Draft
isn't the most important thing going on in the IETF, not *in general*.
 But trying to filter that stuff out will be difficult, and perhaps
impossible.

But I *do* want to hear about things like Andrew's special cross-area
"what do you want DNSExt to do for you?" session.  The trick is
finding a way to have a manageable number of such "highlights" without
just having it turn into another filter-failure free-for-all.

Barry

---

From: Peter Saint-Andre <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 12 Aug 2010 15:20:17 -0600

On 8/12/10 3:15 PM, Barry Leiba wrote:

> The trick is

In many ways I think that most active IETF contributors are running at
capacity. For example, various area directors have done a good job of
closing down moribund WGs, which means that the remaining WGs are mostly
humming along, requesting meeting slots (thus compressing the schedule),
holding busy and interesting mailing list discussions, etc. There's
simply too much to keep track of and thus too many things fall through
the cracks. I don't know what the solution is, but the first step is to
admit that we have a problem. :)

Peter

-- 
Peter Saint-Andre
https://stpeter.im/

---

From: Lou Berger <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 12 Aug 2010 17:25:51 -0400

+1

The prior LA IETF was a *much* better location.  (Although, I feel the 
same way about prior IETF in the Netherlands too.)

Lou

On 8/12/2010 10:15 AM, Ted Lemon wrote:
> Anaheim is a good example of the sort of place I'd really hope IETF would avoid in the future--it was like living on a desert island, because there weren't any real businesses within walking distance of the venue--just chains.

---

From: Ted Lemon <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 12 Aug 2010 18:47:51 -0400

> just having it turn into another filter-failure free-for-all.

Sure, but people also don't have a lot of time, so I think the rate of generation of "what's happening" articles could be fairly low.   Also, having articles written for that purpose would be better than what we have now--what we have now is generally announcements of documents, with summaries aimed at people who already basically know what the document does, and often there will be several documents that would be best described to an outsider in a single short article.   So there is definitely potential for a better stream of information compared to what we have now.

---

From: Randall Gellens <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 19 Aug 2010 14:14:42 -0700

At 10:43 AM -0400 8/6/10, Thomas Walsh wrote:

>  I'd like to keep the focus on the nice job of the Maastricht host.

I view IETF meetings for their productivity, not as vacations, so my 
preference would be that we meet in places with major airline access, 
where a single hotel can accommodate the meetings and those attendees 
who wish to stay on-site, and where the IETF can take over the 
Internet access.

By way of example, as much as I personally detest being in cold 
places, Minneapolis in November is a fine place for an IETF meeting 
(even though I'd never choose winter there for vacation).  Likewise 
for Vancouver -- I love visiting the city in summer, would never want 
to go there in winter, but it works well for meetings.

-- 
Randall Gellens
Opinions are personal;    facts are suspect;    I speak for myself only
-------------- Randomly selected tag: ---------------
Police Begin Campaign to Run Down Jaywalkers
--Newspaper headline

---

From: Randall Gellens <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 19 Aug 2010 14:19:30 -0700

>  anywhere near any of these facilities.

Just curious: do the employees of those companies skip lunch, bring 
their own, or does the company provide or sell lunch?

-------------- Randomly selected tag: ---------------
The United States does not have a security system; it has a system
for bothering people.
        --Shlomo Dror, Israeli air security expert, in 2002