Subject: NEW TOPIC: clarifying normative nomcom instructions

From: Harald Alvestrand <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 02 Apr 2002 11:14:29 +0200

It seems to me that we have a problem in some of our discussions.

We have a tradition in the IETF where we mostly want to make as few rules 
as possible, relying on the common sense of the people involved to do the 
Right Thing.
On the other hand, we have long discussions about what the Right Thing is, 
and feel (justifiably) that the outcome of those discussions should be 
preserved somewhere.

This has most recently come up in term limits ("change is good, but most of 
the time it will happen anyway") and in dual seats on IAB and IESG ("anyone 
crazy enough to want that shouldn't be on anyway, but who knows what 
emergencies could occur")

Two typical solutions to this quandary are:

- Split the documentation into a rules document ("MUST be followed") and an 
advice document ("things that have been thought about")

- Use some mechanism (RFC 2119 MUST/SHOULD/MAY, ADVICE: markers in text, 
Discussion: sections) to clearly distinguish what the rules are from what 
the community thinks the nomcom should consider when deliberating.

(The current document tries to be fairly clear on that, using English.)

It seems to me that it would be easier to achieve consensus on a specific 
point to go into the document if we agreed first whether this was a Rule or 
Good Advice.

Offered for consideration....

                       Harald

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From: Geoff Huston <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 02 Apr 2002 22:38:22 +1000

I personally like the idea of "good advice". There is a growing body of 
knowledge about making this process work within our culture, and many of 
this is not ruleset-based, but some good advice about the intended 
interpretation of the rules.

It may well be that good advice can achieve what rules cannot readily 
achieve: e.g.: that while there are no strict term limits, there is a view 
that movement of individuals has merit in this domain.

At 4/2/2002 07:14 PM, Harald Alvestrand wrote:
>  [...]

>point to go into the document if we agreed first whether this was a Rule 
>or Good Advice.
>

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From: Robert Elz <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 02 Apr 2002 19:09:04 +0700

Date:        Tue, 02 Apr 2002 22:38:22 +1000
    From:        Geoff Huston <[email-masked]>
    Message-ID:  <[email-masked]>

  | I personally like the idea of "good advice".

I certainly have no problem with this, but ...

  | It may well be that good advice can achieve what rules cannot readily 
  | achieve: e.g.: that while there are no strict term limits, there is a view 
  | that movement of individuals has merit in this domain.

figuring out what that advice should be may not be easy.  Certainly
in earlier days there was a pretty strong opinion that stability was
more important than random change just for the sake of it, and when some
previous nomcoms seemed to have made changes without any particularly
good reason, other than to make change, there was a fair amount of
adverse feeling around.

That's how we got the "or aappoint a superior" language that we have
now - that is, we change only if the replacement will be better than
the incumbent.

[Aside to whoeevr raised this point - of course that's a subjective judgement
made by the nomcom, that's irrelevant, all the judgements are].

kre