Subject: On the IETF Consensus process

From: Lakshminath Dondeti <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 22 May 2007 14:20:25 -0700

I am beginning to wonder about the IETF consensus processes and so 
figured I will ask for advice on this list.  First, a summary of some of 
my observations over the past few months (I have real examples of these, 
but we don't quite need to get into those):

     1. Some people (WG chairs) seem to (want to) ask for consensus on 
everything and that too many times:
          1a.  Ask for consensus on whether to adopt a document as a WG 
item,
                                             whether something is/should 
be in the charter
                                             who should be an editor
                                             should the WG meet
          1c. Ask again and again

    2. Some people do it in multiple settings and in many different 
combinations
         2a. Ask on the mailing list
         2b. Ask at a f2f meeting (sometimes, after having asked a 
question on the mailing list)
         2c. And sometimes ask again on the mailing list (sometimes, 
after 2a even)

    3. Some people ask questions at a face to face meeting and declare 
consensus one way or another

 From 2418 and 4677, my understanding has been that

   i) there are certain things such as appointing editors which are up 
to the chairs' discretion and appointing chairs which is up to the ADs' 
discretion (they may seek open or selective input, but are not 
necessarily required to do so).
  ii) asking for consensus once is sufficient and the process may be 
repeated only if things were unclear.
  iii) asking a question on the mailing list is sufficient to declare 
consensus; if opinions were sought at a face to face meeting, the 
chair/AD must ask on the mailing list before declaring consensus.

Yet I see ADs declaring consensus after getting the sense of the room at 
a face to face meeting and so I am curious whether our process documents 
are out of date or whether I am reading them out of context.

Thoughts?

regards,
Lakshminath

_______________________________________________
Ietf mailing list
[email-masked]
https://www1.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf

---

From: Brian E Carpenter <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 23 May 2007 09:31:49 +0200

>                                             whether something is/should 

Those are all separate questions. What is the harm in a chair wanting
to test consensus, even on matters where the chair has power of decision?

>          1c. Ask again and again

That certainly happens when the reply to a question is silence, or just
a couple of messages, or irrelevant replies. A chair who really needs
to know whether a draft has WG support, for example, sometimes needs
to ask several times to hear from anyone except the authors. Again,
what is the harm?

>         2c. And sometimes ask again on the mailing list (sometimes, 

Yes. Results can be ambiguous and people can change their minds after
hearing additional arguments. As I understand it, the philosophy is to
get the best possible technical spec, not to meet an arbitrary deadline.
And that can mean looping over the same items.

> consensus one way or another

You can declare consensus of the people in the room. But as you say,
the rule is that the consensus that counts is the consensus on the list.
That's exactly why you will see the sequence 2a 2b 2c; 2c is to confirm
the consensus in the room reached in 2b. The discussion in 2b may change
some opinions given in 2a.

>   i) there are certain things such as appointing editors which are up to 
> the chairs' discretion and appointing chairs which is up to the ADs' 

Exactly. So what is the problem with a chair choosing to seek WG input?

> repeated only if things were unclear.

And in my experience, they are often unclear, and new technical
issues are often raised.

> chair/AD must ask on the mailing list before declaring consensus.

Correct.

> a face to face meeting 

But they must always add "to be confirmed on the list" and must always
do so - if they don't, it's a clear process violation and can be
appealed.

> and so I am curious whether our process documents 

They are out of date on many details but IMHO not on these
fundamentals.

     Brian
-- 
NEW: Preferred email for non-IBM matters: [email-masked]

---

From: Scott W Brim <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 23 May 2007 08:20:49 -0400

I believe I agree with Brian.  It sounds like you are hoping for clear
deterministic procedures, but imho the IETF should avoid too much
deterministic procedure.  We shouldn't say "Mr. Chairman, you
evaluated consensus within the last 10 minutes, therefore your new
request is disallowed!".  Sometimes when issues are tricky you need to
break them down into small steps and be very clear at each step.
Sometimes everything is easy and you can sail through major milestones.

---

From: Lakshminath Dondeti <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 23 May 2007 12:40:43 -0700

Brian, Scott,

Many thanks for your responses, but here are some followup notes.

The problem I see is that WG chairs and ADs have a lot of latitude in 
running WGs or areas.  The possibility for abuse is tremendous; they get 
to read consensus however they like and may advance or block a 
particular document or work item based on personal preferences.  The 
inconsistent behavior goes either unquestioned or explained away as 
being within the rules.  The recourse is the appeals process which to 
most people looks like a hammer and thus seldom used.

Additional notes inline:

On 5/23/2007 12:31 AM, Brian E Carpenter wrote:
>> figured I will ask for advice on this list.  First, a summary of some 
>> of my observations over the past few months (I have real examples of 
>> these, but we don't quite need to get into those):
>>
>>                                             whether something 
>> is/should be in the charter
>>                                             who should be an editor
>>                                             should the WG meet
> 

Nothing wrong with it, unless of course, the WG gets used to that mode 
of operation and demands that everything be decided based on WG 
consensus (which on spurious issues could mean that a vocal minority 
gets to decide how things work).

> And that can mean looping over the same items.

Reopening the discussion when there is substantial new information is 
one thing, but revisiting past decisions every time someone has some 
free time leads to endless delays.  All I am saying is that we need to 
have some determinism in the process.

My philosophy is to deliver a good technical specification (for some 
definition of good) within a relevant time frame.  Some of the time 
frames are due to other working groups within the IETF and others due to 
activities in other standards bodies.  Many other standards bodies of 
course work on tighter timelines; while I am not saying that the IETF 
needs to do that, but we need to get to a stage where our timelines are 
more predictable than they are now.

>> to the chairs' discretion and appointing chairs which is up to the 
>> ADs' discretion (they may seek open or selective input, but are not 
>> Yet I see ADs declaring consensus after getting the sense of the room 
>> at a face to face meeting 
> 

This is one of the things I am trying to get a clear sense of.  How is 
this supposed to work in case of BoFs?

regards,
Lakshminath

> 
>> and so I am curious whether our process documents are out of date or 
>> whether I am reading them out of context.
>

---

From: Jeffrey Hutzelman <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 23 May 2007 17:02:29 -0400

On Wednesday, May 23, 2007 12:40:43 PM -0700 Lakshminath Dondeti 
<[email-masked]> wrote:

> running WGs or areas.

This is not a problem; it's a feature.

> The possibility for abuse is tremendous

Not really.  The decisions that chairs and AD's make are all public, and 
nearly all of the input to those decisions is also public.  There is plenty 
of opportunity to review what they are doing and speak up if you see 
something problematic.  There is also generally lots of opportunity to 
resolve issues informally before the formal appeals process becomes 
necessary.

> they get to read consensus however they like

Well, no.  The job of a chair or WG is to judge for what there is or is not 
a (rough) consensus.  There are a lot of tools available for use in making 
those judgements, but ultimately the nature of a consensus is that if you 
claim there is one and it isn't so, then people will object.

> and may advance or block a particular
> document or work item based on personal preferences.

Certainly not.  Chairs or AD's may _express_ preferences like any other 
participant, but are expected to judge consensus on the basis of consensus, 
and not personal preference.  As I mentioned above, when this doesn't 
happen, people object.

Note, however, that both chairs and AD's are also expected to exercise 
technical judgement.  If a WG tries to advance a document that is clearly 
underspecified, or fails to meet basic requirements that the IETF has 
established, or that is otherwise "not ready", then it is his job _not_ to 
forward that document until it is ready -- otherwise, he is wasting the 
time of the IESG and of the IETF as a whole.  Of course, it is possible to 
have a situation in which a technical decision must be made and the chair 
is in the "rough"; in such a sitution the chair is expected to forward the 
document anyway, possible with comments if he feels strongly that the 
decision in question is a mistake.

> The inconsistent
> behavior goes either unquestioned or explained away as being within the
> rules.  The recourse is the appeals process which to most people looks
> like a hammer and thus seldom used.

Well, quite a lot of inconsistent behavior _is_ perfectly legitimate. 
Different people have different management styles, and different groups 
operate in different ways.  Nothing says everything has to work exactly the 
same every time -- this is an organization of people, not computers.  Our 
process gives chairs and AD's a lot of latitude, because it must in order 
for the organization to function.  However, it also includes a lot of 
checks against abuse, both intentional and otherwise.

The appeals process is actually used fairly regularly, and it should be 
noted that the only appeals that come to the attention of this list are 
generally those that reach the level of appeals to the IESG as a whole. 
Things that get resolved at the WG chair or AD level are likely to 
completely escape your notice if you're not involved.  As, of course, are 
issues that are resolved informally.

> Nothing wrong with it, unless of course, the WG gets used to that mode of
> operation and demands that everything be decided based on WG consensus
> (which on spurious issues could mean that a vocal minority gets to decide
> how things work).

A vocal minority only gets to decide if the majority consents, or the chair 
is asleep at the switch.  Being loud does not make one part of a consensus.

> Reopening the discussion when there is substantial new information is one
> thing, but revisiting past decisions every time someone has some free
> time leads to endless delays.  All I am saying is that we need to have
> some determinism in the process.

A good chair will prevent that from happening.  And while a certain amount 
of determinism is useful, a completely deterministic process is neither 
required nor necessarily good.  Our process involves groups of humans 
attempting to reach agreement; often this requires mediation by a human 
exercising good judgement in order to be successful.

> this supposed to work in case of BoFs?

BOF's are not working groups, and in most cases, they don't get to make 
consensus decisions.  In particular, they do _not_ get to decide whether a 
working group will be formed or what its charter will say (though this 
seems to be a common misconception).  Those decisions rest with the 
sponsoring AD(s) and the IESG; the purpose of a BOF is to guage interest 
and provide a forum for community input.

-- Jeff

---

From: Lakshminath Dondeti <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 23 May 2007 18:56:10 -0700

Hi Jeff,

On a first scan of your email I thought to myself, I agree with most of 
it and so pondered about the problem that I was trying to put forth in 
front of the community.  The conclusion was that indeed if everyone 
follows the rules and if the checks and balances work as they are 
supposed to, perhaps there are no problems.  Unfortunately though, our 
system of checks and balances is that people need to object, as you put 
it; often people at the losing end of an argument may object and thus 
may be dismissed.

Consider what happens if a WG chair or an AD's decisions are skewed, 
either intentionally or because they are naturally biased towards a 
particular philosophy?  Often people tend to try and live with it or 
adjust to it.  There is not really a viable avenue to provide feedback 
about the AD.  Appealing (happens rarely) or recalling (never happened?) 
are drastic measures.

Next, I agree that all the decisions are public, but I will note that 
not many people have the bandwidth to know what all is going on (there 
are ADs who don't monitor WG mailing lists on a regular basis).  There 
is also the tendency to be silent hoping that other people will raise 
the issue.

For instance, I had started thinking more clearly about BoF processes 
and how a small set of people can derail a BoF process after I started 
this thread.  A few vocal people at the mic and secret reports from IAB 
members (conflicts of interest seem to go unnoticed) can undo months 
worth of work and the proponents have to wait 4 more months to do 
anything.  There is no reason it needs to be that way.

There is the idealistic mode of operation and there is reality.  We need 
to take reality into account and work on fixing the way we work.

regards,
Lakshminath

On 5/23/2007 2:02 PM, Jeffrey Hutzelman wrote:
> nearly all of the input to those decisions is also public.  There is 
> plenty of opportunity to review what they are doing and speak up if you 
> see something problematic.  There is also generally lots of opportunity 
> to resolve issues informally before the formal appeals process becomes 
> necessary.
> 
> 
> Well, no.  The job of a chair or WG is to judge for what there is or is 
> not a (rough) consensus.  There are a lot of tools available for use in 
> making those judgements, but ultimately the nature of a consensus is 
> that if you claim there is one and it isn't so, then people will object.
> 
> 
> participant, but are expected to judge consensus on the basis of 
> consensus, and not personal preference.  As I mentioned above, when this 
> doesn't happen, people object.
> 
> technical judgement.  If a WG tries to advance a document that is 
> clearly underspecified, or fails to meet basic requirements that the 
> IETF has established, or that is otherwise "not ready", then it is his 
> job _not_ to forward that document until it is ready -- otherwise, he is 
> wasting the time of the IESG and of the IETF as a whole.  Of course, it 
> is possible to have a situation in which a technical decision must be 
> made and the chair is in the "rough"; in such a sitution the chair is 
> expected to forward the document anyway, possible with comments if he 
> feels strongly that the decision in question is a mistake.
> 
> 
>> The inconsistent
> operate in different ways.  Nothing says everything has to work exactly 
> the same every time -- this is an organization of people, not 
> computers.  Our process gives chairs and AD's a lot of latitude, because 
> it must in order for the organization to function.  However, it also 
> includes a lot of checks against abuse, both intentional and otherwise.
> 
> completely escape your notice if you're not involved.  As, of course, 
> are issues that are resolved informally.
> 
> 
> A vocal minority only gets to decide if the majority consents, or the 
> chair is asleep at the switch.  Being loud does not make one part of a 
> consensus.
> 
> 
> 
> A good chair will prevent that from happening.  And while a certain 
> amount of determinism is useful, a completely deterministic process is 
> neither required nor necessarily good.  Our process involves groups of 
> humans attempting to reach agreement; often this requires mediation by a 
> human exercising good judgement in order to be successful.
> 
> 
> 
> consensus decisions.  In particular, they do _not_ get to decide whether 
> a working group will be formed or what its charter will say (though this

---

From: Jari Arkko <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 May 2007 08:28:11 +0300

> BOF's are not working groups, and in most cases, they don't get to
> make consensus decisions.  In particular, they do _not_ get to decide
> whether a working group will be formed or what its charter will say
> (though this seems to be a common misconception).  Those decisions
> rest with the sponsoring AD(s) and the IESG; the purpose of a BOF is
> to guage interest and provide a forum for community input.

I would add that a successful BOF results in
having some idea from the room of what the
charter should be. Often this is different
from what initial proposals were floated
before the meeting; after the meeting
specific text for the charter is discussed
on the BOF mailing list. And, at the very
end of the process, we have IETF review
of the new charter. So the final determination
rests with the IETF community, and is done
over e-mail. Of course, before we get that far
the BOF chairs, ADs, the IESG, and the IAB need
to be happy with the proposal as well.

Jari

---

From: Jeffrey Hutzelman <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 May 2007 14:11:03 -0400

On Wednesday, May 23, 2007 06:56:10 PM -0700 Lakshminath Dondeti 
<[email-masked]> wrote:

> it; often people at the losing end of an argument may object and thus may
> be dismissed.

This is a difficult problem.  I'm sure there are many cases where people 
should speak up and don't.  There are also a number of cases where someone 
who has legitimately lost refuses to accept that.  Unfortunately, the 
latter are usually much more easily observed.  If we could find a way to 
drastically cut down on either category without growing the other, we'd be 
able to make substantial improvements, both to the IETF and, if the 
solution scales, to society as a whole.  Unfortunately, it's a hard problem.

> about the AD.  Appealing (happens rarely) or recalling (never happened?)

Yes, they are, and no, the recall procedure has never been used.  I'm sort 
of torn on this - most every decision is appealable, and if an AD is making 
bad decisions and won't listen to reason, they should be appealed. 
However, if everyone appealed every decision they didn't like, we'd never 
get anything done.

> Next, I agree that all the decisions are public, but I will note that not
> many people have the bandwidth to know what all is going on (there are
> ADs who don't monitor WG mailing lists on a regular basis).  There is
> also the tendency to be silent hoping that other people will raise the
> issue.

True.

> For instance, I had started thinking more clearly about BoF processes and
> how a small set of people can derail a BoF process after I started this
> thread.  A few vocal people at the mic and secret reports from IAB

Sorry; I really want to answer this part, but I'm out of time for now. 
Perhaps I'll come back to it next week.

-- Jeff

---

From: Brian E Carpenter <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 25 May 2007 10:39:17 +0200

> <[email-masked]> wrote:

...

> Perhaps I'll come back to it next week.

Well, I'll have a go. First of all, advising the IESG on WG chartering is
part of the IAB's job, and in my opinion it is the most important point
at which the IAB can actually exercise architectural influence rather than
just pontificating.

Secondly, some of what needs to be discussed at the post-BOF, pre-WG
stage is intrinsically private: suitability of people to be WG chairs,
questions about conflict of interest on the part of individuals who
are pushing for one or another solution, etc. I strongly defend the
IESG and IAB's right to private discussion on these points. And that
means private email.

Thirdly, IAB and IESG members could indeed have potential conflict
between their (or their employers') goals and "making the Internet
work better". That's intrinsic to everything the IAB and IESG do,
not just to BOF handling and WG chartering. That's why we have
a preference for openness whenever possible, and why we have the
appeals and (theoretical) recall mechanisms.

So, I would see value in the IAB's BOF reports being made public,
as far as their technical content goes, but on the clear
understanding that there will be private communication on sensitive
issues.

      Brian

---

From: John C Klensin <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 25 May 2007 17:02:02 -0400

--On Thursday, 24 May, 2007 14:11 -0400 Jeffrey Hutzelman
<[email-masked]> wrote:

> This is a difficult problem.  I'm sure there are many cases
> where people should speak up and don't.  There are also a
> number of cases where someone who has legitimately lost
> refuses to accept that.  Unfortunately, the latter are usually
> much more easily observed.  If we could find a way to
> drastically cut down on either category without growing the
> other, we'd be able to make substantial improvements, both to
> the IETF and, if the solution scales, to society as a whole.
> Unfortunately, it's a hard problem.

There are also cases in which people fear retaliation of one
sort or another if they raise objections, especially when they
perceive that the IAB and/or IESG have already made up their
minds and were likely to treat further input as an irritation or
worse.  At one time, I thought these fears were groundless in at
least the overwhelming number of cases (and that the exceptions
involved serious bad apples on the IESG who probably would have
been recalled had that process been more effective).   However,
some observations in the last few years have led me to conclude
that things have shifted in the direction of that concern being
more legitimate, i.e., a person who exerts vigorous and
constructive objections to action on one issue may be at risk of
damaging his or her ability to get things done in the IETF in
the future.   

If that concern is actually real, we are in trouble and
theoretical discussions about consensus processes are not going
to help us get out of it.

     john

---

From: Lakshminath Dondeti <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 25 May 2007 15:17:37 -0700

Hi Brian,

Glad to hear that you see the value in making the IAB reports public.  I 
think that this is something that needs to happen on an urgent basis. 
Please see inline for additional notes:

On 5/25/2007 1:39 AM, Brian E Carpenter wrote:
>>> and

Sure, we need the reactive approach (architectural policing), but I 
think that the proactive aspects (architectural guidance) are also 
essential.

> IESG and IAB's right to private discussion on these points. And that

That all sounds too political!  Most of this should be transparent. 
What are people on the IESG/IAB afraid of in sharing their honest views 
on whether a particular BoF proposal is bad/ugly/good/ok?  Being 
recalled?  That never happens!

As to picking chairs, why is the BoF process any different than the WG 
chair picking process (interim appointments)?  The sponsoring/advising 
AD may send a call for nominations, may seek input from the community 
(some of them may be on I*, sure) and makes a decision.  He/she might 
write a blurb on why a certain person was selected too.

There is no need for any significant "private" discussion (except for 
discussion on personnel, legal and financial aspects).  Let's just say 
that I like BCP 39's Section 3.6 better than Section 3.2 of 3710.

> appeals and (theoretical) recall mechanisms.

Having been on the nomcom, my recollection is that people say the right 
things in their questionnaires or interviews.  So, I wonder what's going on.

> understanding that there will be private communication on sensitive

Let's start making the IAB BoF reports public!  Do we need to write a 
draft for this or does the IAB just need to start doing the right thing?

regards,
Lakshminath

---

From: Lakshminath Dondeti <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 25 May 2007 15:46:40 -0700

I hope the discussion is not theoretical and that some concrete changes 
come about as a result of discussions such as this (as much as I dislike 
the secret nature of them, I hope the IESG and IAB are having their own 
private debates on this topic and enact some of the changes soon: some 
of the confidentiality decisions are within their control at the moment, 
according to BCP 39).

Some of the aspects are as Jeff notes societal, but we are engineers, 
(scientists or whatever :) ) and we are expected to have some ethics in 
all of this.

Coming to the fear of retaliation issue (I guess we are talking about 
unethical behavior on part of an IESG or IAB member at this point), we 
need to find a way to fix that.  On this, we seem to be worse off than 
the outside world.  Let's take the US as an example (or we can take 
India too; I am sorry, but those are the only two countries I am 
somewhat familiar with): there are always checks and balances.  The US 
president cannot start being a dictator after taking the oath (bad 
example, may be ;) , but let's not get into that).  Yet, our own 
processes allow ADs to do exactly that (more specifically, someone who 
becomes an AD might try and see what all he or she can get away with and 
the push back is often too little or too late).

regards,
Lakshminath

---

From: Lakshminath Dondeti <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 25 May 2007 15:53:20 -0700

> to be happy with the proposal as well.

Sure, however the problem is if the sponsoring AD or the IAB members who 
write reviews are sold on the idea or able to understand the problem 
space, the BoF has a better chance of success.  So, if an IAB member did 
not understand the problem space and say misrepresents what happened at 
the BoF session, the review of course is private and the rest of the IAB 
depends on that report to make a recommendation.  If the BoF report were 
public, the proponents would have a chance to correct the error.

Clearly, I am speaking hypothetically here; things may not always be 
that simple.

Lakshminath

---

From: John C Klensin <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 25 May 2007 19:57:14 -0400

--On Friday, 25 May, 2007 15:17 -0700 Lakshminath Dondeti
<[email-masked]> wrote:

> Glad to hear that you see the value in making the IAB reports
> public.  I think that this is something that needs to happen
> on an urgent basis. Please see inline for additional notes:
>...

> That all sounds too political!  Most of this should be
> transparent. What are people on the IESG/IAB afraid of in
> sharing their honest views on whether a particular BoF
> proposal is bad/ugly/good/ok?  Being recalled?  That never
> happens!

That may be a separate problem.  However, while I would hope
that the frequency is low, I've been parts of discussions --as
an IESG and then as an IAB member-- in which people have said
things equivalent to "while my employer is pushing this, I think
it is a terrible idea because...".  So, for those few cases, you
might consider whether "fear of being fired" is an issue.

> As to picking chairs, why is the BoF process any different
> than the WG chair picking process (interim appointments)?  The
> sponsoring/advising AD may send a call for nominations, may
> seek input from the community (some of them may be on I*,
> sure) and makes a decision.  He/she might write a blurb on why
> a certain person was selected too.
> 
> There is no need for any significant "private" discussion
> (except for discussion on personnel, legal and financial
> aspects).  Let's just say that I like BCP 39's Section 3.6
> better than Section 3.2 of 3710.

I know I'm in the minority in the community about this, but I
think the IAB and IESG are likely to make better decisions if
they can consider issues, discuss them privately from their
different perspectives, and then decide.  If, by making
everything public, you prevent people from exploring ideas and
encourage them to "play to an audience", you may get worse
results.  While I have not been on the Nomcom and don't know
anything about the internal discussions, there is much evidence
that many of the choices of the last few years have favored
people who don't offend anyone over people who are determined to
exercise their very best judgment to get the right things done,
even if those decisions are unpopular.  Of course, if one is
going to have collective decision-making processes that work and
are subject to appropriate checks, one must have an appeals
process that works, a nomcom process that works, and a recall
process that works, or appropriate substitutes for all three.
In addition, if you want thoughtful group decision-making, you
need to be able --and willing-- to get the group to explain
those decisions and then hold them responsible as a group.
I'd give the appeals process a reasonably high score but the
recall process has become purely theoretical and, despite a
great deal of hard work and good intentions, I don't have a lot
to say about the nomcom process that is really positive and
would observe that notions of not changing out too many people
in order to preserve continuity work against holding groups
responsible as a group.

>...
> Having been on the nomcom, my recollection is that people say
> the right things in their questionnaires or interviews.  So, I
> wonder what's going on.

What almost anyone who had taken political psychology 101 or its
equivalent would tell you is that you have just answered your
question.  People say the right things.  Saying the right things
becomes more important than an understanding of them and how
they will behave.  People who don't say the right things don't
get selected.  And, insofar as the people who are saying the
right things do so because they _want_ those positions for
whatever it will bring to them personally or corporately, you
get bad behavior in the long run.

>> So, I would see value in the IAB's BOF reports being made
>> public, as far as their technical content goes, but on the
>> clear understanding that there will be private communication
>> on sensitive issues.
> 
> Let's start making the IAB BoF reports public!  Do we need to
> write a draft for this or does the IAB just need to start
> doing the right thing?

Let's assume that there are three types of information in those
reports.  There is material that could easily and reasonably be
made public, although the IAB members may have developed a
shorthand for discussions among themselves and with the IESG
that might take some effort to explain.  There is material that
could be made public, but only at the risk of offending people,
especially people who might later turn up on, or influence, a
Nomcom.  And there is material that, for one good reason or
another, should not be public.   Just separating the three and
providing those additional explanations increases the IAB member
workload.  I don't know if it does so significantly or not but
my sense when I was on the IAB was that only a small fraction of
the membership were regularly producing BoF reports that could
actually be useful.  If you discourage people from writing
reports, or reduce the number of BoFs that an effective IAB
member is willing to cover, that isn't necessarily a good
tradeoff.

Nothing is free, including lunches and beer.

Speaking bluntly --and as someone who has given up on wanting or
being willing to take official positions sufficiently to not be
worried about retaliation-- I think you need to think about this
further and, in particular, be more sensitive to unintended
consequences.  

>From your later note...

> Coming to the fear of retaliation issue (I guess we are
> talking about unethical behavior on part of an IESG or IAB
> member at this point), we need to find a way to fix that.  On
> this, we seem to be worse off than the outside world.  
> [...]  Yet,
> our own processes allow ADs to do exactly that (more
> specifically, someone who becomes an AD might try and see what
> all he or she can get away with and the push back is often too
> little or too late).

Then you need a recall procedure that actually works, that can
be used, and that is as public as possible (perhaps more public
than the Nomcom process).    Making more of the discussions that
go into regular decision-making public won't help: all a
potentially-misbehaving IAB or IESG member would need to fear
from having the misbehavior be more public would be the
possibility (not the certainty for a number of bad reasons) that
a Nomcom might not return him or her in a couple of years.
Suggestions have been made over the years about how to do that.
They have included standing or standby committees that don't
need a long and drawn out selection and appointment process to
begin considering action, restoring the ability of IAB and IESG
members (who might be the only ones who know the details of
behavior patterns) to initiate recalls, and changing the nature
of the Nomcom review model for incumbents.  None of those
proposals have gone anywhere: those who are inclined to see
conspiracies and power grabs assume this is because the IESG
would have to approve them and doesn't like the idea of more
controls on its authority; I'm more inclined that, beyond
participation in an occasional conversation on the IETF list,
the community has stopped caring.

   john

---

From: Brian E Carpenter <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 27 May 2007 16:52:10 +0200

On 2007-05-26 00:17, Lakshminath Dondeti wrote:
>>> Sorry; I really want to answer this part, but I'm out of time for 
>>> now. Perhaps I'll come back to it next week.
>>

Yes of course - and in my experience both things happen. But the IAB is
only 13 people, so you can't expect them to be the originator of all
innovation. And the IAB tries to be proactive in various ways, not
just in the BOF process.

> That all sounds too political!  Most of this should be transparent. 

I'm trying to explain the things that need to be discussed in
private: personnel questions, as you say below.

> What 
> are people on the IESG/IAB afraid of in sharing their honest views on 
> whether a particular BoF proposal is bad/ugly/good/ok?

I don't think they are. In fact I've often seen IAB members send mail
to a public list that contains the same points as their BOF report
to the IAB+IESG, except for the personnel issues. If the IAB did decide
to make the BOF reports public, they would clearly be versions
without the personnel issues.

> Being recalled?  
> That never happens!

But nevertheless, in my experience both the IAB and IESG are aware
that it could happen. I'm not saying that is a cure-all, but it's
a reminder that they are responsible to the community.

> write a blurb on why a certain person was selected too.

That could happen, but the timeline for BOFs is very tight. I don't
think there's time for such a process in reality, unless we made the
deadlines much earlier.
> discussion on personnel, 

That is exactly the point. Who chairs a BOF is a personnel issue.

> legal and financial aspects).  Let's just say 

Nothing?

> draft for this or does the IAB just need to start doing the right thing?

Not my department any more ;-)

    Brian

---

From: Brian E Carpenter <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 27 May 2007 16:57:29 +0200

On 2007-05-26 00:46, Lakshminath Dondeti wrote:
...

> somewhat familiar with): there are always checks and balances.  

That's exactly why we have the appeals process, the recall mechanism,
and an independent Nomcom. And speaking for myself (and probably
others) that's why more transparency is always good, as long as
it doesn't prevent the IAB and IESG being able to discuss frankly.

If you can suggest additional checks and balances, please do!

    Brian

---

From: "Eastlake III Donald-LDE008" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 27 May 2007 11:18:21 -0400

Lakshminath,

The WG Chairs and Ads are all human beings, are all skewed to some
extent, and all have some philosophy whether strong or weak. I don't see
how this can be avoided. The effect of this may not be what you expect.
For example, one of these, realizing they have a bias towards X, may try
to compensate and adjust their decisions so as to end up having an
anti-X effect. Hopefully the element of randomness in the nomcom process
decreases the correlation in the bias of successive IESG members.

Assume you could come up with some metric and say that an official's
decisions were 5 percent biased. Perhaps, by devoting an ever increasing
amount of time and effort to controlling this bias you could reduce it.
But every ounce of effort you apply in that direction is unavailable to
contribute to technical efforts. And it is not clear how you measure
bias in an un-biased way since everyone will have a different opinion of
what biases there are and how big they are. In fact, as you continue to
increase the time and effort being put into "controlling bias", you end
up with things being controlled by those who have time and effort
available to try to control the organization rather than make technical
contributions.

If you can find a miracle cure that improves IETF decision making while
decreasing the informational and decision making load of the members of
the IETF community, that would be great, but I'm dubious.

Thanks,
Donald 

-----Original Message-----
From: Jeffrey Hutzelman [mailto:[email-masked]] 
Sent: Thursday, May 24, 2007 2:11 PM
To: Lakshminath Dondeti
Cc: Jeffrey Hutzelman; IETF Discussion
Subject: Re: On the IETF Consensus process

...

> about the AD.  Appealing (happens rarely) or recalling (never
happened?)

Yes, they are, and no, the recall procedure has never been used.  I'm
sort 
of torn on this - most every decision is appealable, and if an AD is
making 
bad decisions and won't listen to reason, they should be appealed. 
However, if everyone appealed every decision they didn't like, we'd
never 
get anything done.

...

-- Jeff

---

From: "Hallam-Baker, Phillip" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 31 May 2007 09:00:05 -0700

I think we need an explicit prohibition on a member of the IESG being a Working Group chair. This does not happen often but it has done in the past and it has caused a real problem. Simply prohibiting an AD being chair of a WG in their own area is not enough.

The problem with consensus is how you decide to count the undecideds/neutrals. In most cases of controversy there will be a small group pro, a small group con and the bulk of the WG will be somewhere inbetween. If the breakdown is 25%/25%/50% a biased chair can effectively decide the outcome by choosing to interpret 'no objection' as 'no support' or vice versa.

Consensus is always the preferred basis for decision and usually the best basis. There are situations where putting 'consensus' above pragmatics leads to a proposal that is never going to be deployed. 

If we are proposing to change the internet infrastructure and do not have the support of the ISPs or the core DNS providers or whatever key constituency may be required to put a proposal into effect then we need to have a mechanism for dealing with that situation.

Another limitation to consensus is where there is a conflict between two groups. There may be 100% consensus in group A that approach 1 is best, but serious objections from group B. Or as frequently happens there may be a dispute in group A as to the likelihood of objection a proposal will receive from group B.

The appeals process is not optimal here because it only begins after the process failure has occurred. The recall process is unworkable and unless someone screws up really bad really early is not going to meaningfully shorten a tenure that would otherwise expire anyway.

> From: Brian E Carpenter [mailto:[email-masked]] 
> Sent: Sunday, May 27, 2007 10:57 AM
> To: Lakshminath Dondeti
> Cc: John C Klensin; IETF Discussion; Jeffrey Hutzelman
> talking about 
> That's exactly why we have the appeals process, the recall 
> mechanism, and an independent Nomcom. And speaking for myself 
> (and probably
> others) that's why more transparency is always good, as long 
> as it doesn't prevent the IAB and IESG being able to discuss frankly.
>

---

From: Michael Thomas <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 31 May 2007 10:22:22 -0700

> The problem with consensus is how you decide to count the undecideds/neutrals. In most cases of controversy there will be a small group pro, a small group con and the bulk of the WG will be somewhe…
One thing that occurs to me is that there is usually a huge disconnect 
between
the participation in hums at a meeting and the email equivalent on the 
working
group list. I'd say that it's typically between one and two orders of 
magnitude
at a meeting more hands/hums than on the list. And of course, on the 
list it's
usually just a rehash of the same active participants with a few 
stragglers thrown
in.

Maybe part of the problem with the "official" consensus taking on the 
list is
that it isn't sufficiently anonymous? It's pretty easy in a crowd to hum or
put up your hand in a sea of others; on the list, it requires quite a 
bit more
conviction. Apathy is the other likely reason, but there's not much we can
do about that short of working group demolition derby videos or suchlike.

So might having the ability to contact the chairs in private to register 
their
preference be reasonable? I don't recall seeing this in any of the working
groups I've participated in.

       Mike

---

From: John C Klensin <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 31 May 2007 14:45:10 -0400

--On Thursday, 31 May, 2007 09:00 -0700 "Hallam-Baker, Phillip"
<[email-masked]> wrote:

> I think we need an explicit prohibition on a member of the
> IESG being a Working Group chair. This does not happen often
> but it has done in the past and it has caused a real problem.
> Simply prohibiting an AD being chair of a WG in their own area
> is not enough.

Phillip, 

I think this shows a conflict between two principles.  I would
like to see if we can thread it with some sophistication, rather
than making more and more rigid rules.  I'd like to think that
the majority of our WGs are relatively non-controversial and
that the key consideration in the choice of Chairs is simply
what gets the work done most efficiently.  

So, to take the most obvious case, if there is a WG that is
making reasonable progress and perhaps is getting close to
producing products, has not been controversial, but has been
chaired or co-chaired by someone who then becomes an AD, I'd
rather ask for good judgment than for an immediate resignation.
The decisions and constraints facing the Nomcom are hard enough
without their having to try to evaluate what the loss of a chair
would do to an important WG.

At the other extreme, I suggest that having an AD as chair of a
high-controversy WG, even if it is in a different area,
represents seriously bad judgment for the reasons you suggest
and others.  Personally, I think the bad judgment would be
severe enough that they ought to be calls for resignation (as an
AD, not as WG Chair).  I also believe that, if such informal
calls were ignored, recalls would be in order.

Not only does a little bit more flexibility about this --
coupled with the community insisting on good judgment-- make
more sense to me than a firm rule, but there is a scenario you
didn't outline that would make a firm rule less useful than I
think you are suggesting.

Suppose someone had been chairing a WG for some time.  She has
gotten technically and emotionally invested in the particular
decisions the WG has been making.  The WG has work that is late
in the process -- nearing or perhaps already in, Last Call.
Then she gets appointed AD, takes that position, and resigns as
WG Chair as your proposed rule would require.  I think that, in
most cases, the resignation would accomplish nothing as a "cure"
for any possible bias.  Whether the individual continues as
Chair or not, I think the important thing is that the situation,
and the way in which it was going to be handled within the IESG,
be handled in a fashion that was open enough, and discussed
openly enough with relevant people in the community (including
dissenters within the WG), that the community could evaluate
whether or not the basic integrity of the process was being
upheld.    As above, if so, fine.  If not, we would need appeals
and resignations or recalls, not narrowly-written rules about
positions and resignations.

     john

---

From: John C Klensin <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 31 May 2007 14:49:12 -0400

--On Thursday, 31 May, 2007 10:22 -0700 Michael Thomas
<[email-masked]> wrote:

> So might having the ability to contact the chairs in private
> to register their
> preference be reasonable? I don't recall seeing this in any of
> the working groups I've participated in.

But I certainly know of cases where it has been done, often with
copies to the relevant AD as a safety precaution.  It is worth
noting that even the new instructions about last calls indicate
the option of sending comments only to the IESG, rather than the
IETF list, if there are exceptional circumstances. Judgment
about what constitutes the latter are apparently up to the
submitter.

I think this is more evidence that we need more flexibility and
good sense, not more rigid rules.

    john

---

From: Melinda Shore <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 31 May 2007 15:02:24 -0400

> good sense, not more rigid rules.

Well, what's under description really isn't consensus
decision-making processes - what's being argued is a sort
of voting.  Rather than getting stuck on definitions, though,
I think it's probably worthwhile to frame the discussion
in terms of intentions - what the original intent was, what
the current intent is, whether or not there's a mismatch,
and how to get the process to look like what's intended, if
it currently doesn't (and wow, do I think it does not).

Arguing over percentages doesn't, I think, go very far
towards figuring those things out.  I think I understand
what used to be intended but I'm not sure I can articulate
it, but I do think that the problems around decision-making
come down to a few things:

    1) not-that-great decision facilitation skills on the
       part of some chairs and leaders;
    2) too many participants who'd be happy shutting down the
       whole process rather than accomodating a decision they
       don't agree with
    3) the organization is just too large for a touchy-
       feely decision-making style.

But it seems to me that if you're going to go with some form
of voting, and that's what's happening in practice, it would
be better to design a fair voting process.  If you're going
try to do consensus better you have to figure out how to deal
with the kvetches in a way that doesn't shut out dissent while
still allowing decision-making to move forward.  Either one is
hard to do but I'm not sure that doing nothing is an option.

Melinda

---

From: Lakshminath Dondeti <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 31 May 2007 12:11:11 -0700

Excellent point about the disconnect between meeting room hums and 
opinions on the lists.

But, I wonder why anonymity is an important requirement.  The mailing 
list verification has at least two properties that are more important to 
the IETF: the archives provide for anyone to be able to verify the 
consensus independent of the IETF hierarchy (chairs, ADs and whoever); 
further the archives provide a means to verify the consistency of any 
IETF participant, chairs or ADs at any given moment, candidates for WG 
chair and I* positions, and anyone in general.

The IETF should be more transparent and allow at least a distributed 
verification process and not a centralized hierarchical process.

Lakshminath

On 5/31/2007 10:22 AM, Michael Thomas wrote:
>> The problem with consensus is how you decide to count the 
>> undecideds/neutrals. In most cases of controversy there will be a 
>> small group pro, a small group con and the bulk of the WG will be 
>> somewhere inbetween. If the breakdown is 25%/25%/50% a biased chair 
>> can effectively decide the outcome by choosing to interpret 'no 
>> objection' as 'no support' or vice versa.
>>

---

From: Lakshminath Dondeti <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 31 May 2007 12:11:11 -0700

Lakshminath

---

From: Spencer Dawkins <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 31 May 2007 14:33:46 -0500

Just following up here...

From: "Lakshminath Dondeti" <[email-masked]>
>
> But, I wonder why anonymity is an important requirement.  The mailing list 
> verification has at least two properties that are more important to the 
> IETF: the archives provide for anyone to be able to verify the consensus 
> independent of the IETF hierarchy (chairs, ADs and whoever); further the 
> archives provide a means to verify the consistency of any IETF 
> participant, chairs or ADs at any given moment, candidates for WG chair 
> and I* positions, and anyone in general.

We've been telling new WG chairs for several years that

- they really need to have most discussions in public/on mailing lists,

- we recognise that some people aren't comfortable challenging others in 
public, and

- we recognise that this discomfort may be more common in some cultures than 
in others.

So, for reasons that both John and Lakshminath identified, we've been asking 
WG chairs to encourage participants to engage in public discussions, but to 
be receptive to private requests for assistance on how to carry out those 
discussions.

The alternative - a WG chair who tells the working group that the apparent 
WG consensus on the mailing list is being overruled because of anonymous 
objections that the WG chair cannot share with the WG, or because of private 
objections that the WG chair is "channeling" from a back room - would make 
voting seem reasonable (or, to use Mark Allman's characterization in another 
thread, "seem charming").

Thanks,

Spencer

---

From: Spencer Dawkins <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 31 May 2007 14:47:25 -0500

From: "John C Klensin" <[email-masked]>

>> the working groups I've participated in.

(Aside to Michael - this may mean that if there WERE private discussions, 
they were actually private! "if you HAD seen this..." :-)

> about what constitutes the latter are apparently up to the

It's worth mentioning that the recent change to last call instructions 
reflected a sense that back-channel discussions with the IESG should be the 
exception, not the rule. When the IESG discussed this, I asked about public 
last call comments that set off blizzards of postings, and multiple ADs 
thought transparency was worth having to dig out of a blizzard from time to 
time.

> good sense, not more rigid rules.

I rarely rephrase John's words, but in this case, I'm thinking "more good 
sense and flexibility", in that order :-)

Thanks,

Spencer

p.s. I also agree with John's point that changing WG chairs when one becomes 
an AD is not likely to improve quality or throughput in many cases, but I'm 
trying to rate-limit my NUMBER of postings these days... that's definitely 
the corner case for "no ADs/WG chairs at the same time".

---

From: Lakshminath Dondeti <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 31 May 2007 12:58:58 -0700

Oh, I understand cultural sensitivities, but I have never heard of not 
wanting to challenge in the public (except the disagreeing with the 
employer thing).  The problem with that is that if people don't like 
something and can't speak up or will only speak through a chair or an 
AD, it allows natural avenues for abuse.  The chair or the AD might as 
well be making decisions at that point.

Even anonymous voting has verifiability as the crucial part of requirements.

If our consensus process is not independently and openly verifiable, we 
might as well close shop!

Lakshminath

PS: BTW, I agree with Melinda that we should not allow a minority to 
block progress; in any type of consensus process, unfortunately some of 
us will be at the losing end of things.

On 5/31/2007 12:33 PM, Spencer Dawkins wrote:

> 
> The alternative - a WG chair who tells the working group that the 
> apparent WG consensus on the mailing list is being overruled because of 
> anonymous objections that the WG chair cannot share with the WG, or 
> because of private objections that the WG chair is "channeling" from a 
> back room - would make voting seem reasonable (or, to use Mark Allman's 
> characterization in another thread, "seem charming").
> 
> Thanks,
> 
> Spencer
> 
>

---

From: Michael Thomas <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 31 May 2007 13:08:39 -0700

One thing that occurs to me is that in my initial message I implicitly
felt that the room hands/hums were a more accurate assessment of
consensus than the list. I guess that I should fess up that I've always
felt that the "consensus is determined on the list" is something of a
charming myth. Of course if we went with the room consensus,
gaming the system would just be done by different means, so my
feeling shouldn't be taken as endorsement of that as an alternative.

       Mike

Lakshminath Dondeti wrote:
> If our consensus process is not independently and openly verifiable, 
> we might as well close shop!
>
> Lakshminath
>
> block progress; in any type of consensus process, unfortunately some 
> of us will be at the losing end of things.
>
>> apparent WG consensus on the mailing list is being overruled because 
>> of anonymous objections that the WG chair cannot share with the WG, 
>> or because of private objections that the WG chair is "channeling" 
>> from a back room - would make voting seem reasonable (or, to use Mark 
>> Allman's characterization in another thread, "seem charming").
>>
>> Thanks,
>>
>> Spencer
>>
>>

---

From: [email-masked] (Scott O. Bradner)
Date: Thu, 31 May 2007 16:10:08 -0400 (EDT)

> might as well close shop!

a hum in a WG meeting is subject to the perceptions of the people
in the room 

but its not clear that a fully verifiable process is needed since we
specifically try to do rough consensus not majority vote - all we 
need to be able to verify is that "most" people support a path 
- if a proposal gets blocked by a secret whisper in the ear of
the WG chair then things are very broken indeed

if the result of a secret whisper results in the chair brings up
topics for public discussion I'm not all that worried

Scott

---

From: Lakshminath Dondeti <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 31 May 2007 13:16:51 -0700

Oh definitely.  Gaming the system is easy with "consensus in the room" 
especially with hums and such.

The IEEE has voting and people allegedly send zombies to raise hands. 
There are provisions to protect against that.  Anyone can challenge and 
claim that there is block voting (people represent themselves and not 
their employers, just as in the IETF).  The chair has a procedure to 
determine whether that is the case and consider all the votes from a 
single company as one vote.  It's a good deterrent.

The problem with consensus in the room is that it flies in the face of 
our mode of operation.  If we have to really wait until a meeting to 
make decisions, we are introducing tremendous delays into the process; 
in that case, we should meet more often.  Next, if consensus in the room 
is how we want to do it and we are resigned to the fact that some of us 
(even those in power misbehave), let's make it fair; let's declare that. 
  I will then tell everyone who listens to send zombies to the IETF to 
hum/vote/whatever.

I hope we haven't come to that!

best,
Lakshminath

---

From: John C Klensin <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 31 May 2007 16:19:46 -0400

--On Thursday, 31 May, 2007 14:33 -0500 Spencer Dawkins
<[email-masked]> wrote:

> So, for reasons that both John and Lakshminath identified,
> we've been asking WG chairs to encourage participants to
> engage in public discussions, but to be receptive to private
> requests for assistance on how to carry out those discussions.
> 
> The alternative - a WG chair who tells the working group that
> the apparent WG consensus on the mailing list is being
> overruled because of anonymous objections that the WG chair
> cannot share with the WG, or because of private objections
> that the WG chair is "channeling" from a back room - would
> make voting seem reasonable (or, to use Mark Allman's

But we have mechanisms for dealing with those kinds of problems.
As an example, I would assume that, if someone challenged an
assertion of consensus based on undisclosed comments, the first
thing a competent AD or IETF Chair would do would be to ask for
names or other ways to validate the input.   The comments don't
need to be public in order to be verified and, in an operation
like the IETF, there is (or ought to be) a difference between
the expectation of not needing to be associated with a
particular position in public and anonymity when making those
comments.

If a WG Chair makes a decision based on private input and cannot
readily demonstrate that the input actually occurred in whatever
numbers are implied (on appeal if necessary), then that WG Chair
should be removed.

If I were a participant in a controversial WG --and I don't buy
the story that one cannot predict or diagnose controversy and
hence must treat everything that way-- I'd expect to see
relatively independent co-chairs and/or an AD who was clearly
independent of the chair.  I'd expect that, if I felt a need to
make a comment "in private", I'd write up the comment and copy
both co-chairs and the AD, not try to whisper into someone's ear
in a dark hall somewhere.

I think that is just good sense (and, yes, Spencer, "good sense"
belongs in front of "flexibility" if one must impute an order.

It is very clear that we have a system that is open to attack if
there are sufficiently many parties with sufficient malice.
Until and unless we start seeing lots of such attacks, it seems
to me that expecting good behavior and having ways to detect and
fix bad behavior should it occur is a much better path than
trying to invent rules that, inevitably, will be addressing the
last attack and not the next one and that will bog us down
further.  I do believe that, if a decision is made that claims
to be based on consensus, but the consensus is not obvious from
public comments, the person making that decision has some
obligation to explain the decision and, clearly, "lots of people
whispered to me" should not be accepted as an explanation.    I
also believe that, if that doesn't occur, appeals should be
initiated and upheld.  But I'm having trouble seeing a real,
rather than theoretical, problem here that justifies new rules
or procedures.

    john

---

From: Andy Bierman <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 31 May 2007 13:33:18 -0700

Spencer Dawkins wrote:
>> list verification has at least two properties that are more important 
>> to the IETF: the archives provide for anyone to be able to verify the 
> - we recognise that this discomfort may be more common in some cultures 
> than in others.
> 
> So, for reasons that both John and Lakshminath identified, we've been 
> asking WG chairs to encourage participants to engage in public 
> discussions, but to be receptive to private requests for assistance on 
> how to carry out those discussions.
> 

This is not an alternative.
If you are not willing to make your technical objections to a technical
specification publicly, then they cannot be part of the IETF decision-making
process.

What's to prevent a WG Chair from "padding" the anonymous "votes"?
If 5 people in public (WG meeting or mailing list) are for some
proposal, and the Chair says, "I heard from 6 people who
are against this, but don't want their identities known, so the
proposal is rejected."  Not acceptable.

> Spencer

Andy

---

From: Spencer Dawkins <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 31 May 2007 15:33:00 -0500

Hi, John,

> But we have mechanisms for dealing with those kinds of problems.

Fully agree. I was thinking about preventing a problem, and you're correctly 
pointing out that we have tools to deal with the problem if we can't prevent 
it. Not that this sounds like fun, but you're quite correct.

... and continue fully agreeing, especially with

Thanks,

Spencer

---

From: Michael Thomas <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 31 May 2007 13:50:37 -0700

Andy Bierman wrote:
>>> But, I wonder why anonymity is an important requirement.  The 
>>> mailing list verification has at least two properties that are more 
>>> important to the IETF: the archives provide for anyone to be able to 
>>> verify the consensus independent of the IETF hierarchy (chairs, ADs 
>>> and whoever); further the archives provide a means to verify the 
>>> consistency of any IETF participant, chairs or ADs at any given 
>>> moment, candidates for WG chair and I* positions, and anyone in 
>>> general.
>>
>> - we recognise that some people aren't comfortable challenging others 
>> in public, and
>>
>> - we recognise that this discomfort may be more common in some 
>> cultures than in others.
>>
>> discussions, but to be receptive to private requests for assistance 
>> on how to carry out those discussions.
>>

If that's true, then why do we have hums at wg meetings at all?
A hum doesn't give the reasoning; it's a binary quantity.

> proposal is rejected."  Not acceptable.

Dishonesty by the management is a problem regardless of what system we
have. Most wg's these days have two chairs, so collusion would need to be
at least that deep, and probably require an AD to be on board too. If that
really were the case, I doubt any system is likely to perform very well.

But this cultural thing does bug me. It seems unsatisfying to me that our
pat answer to cultural differences is "become more western".  The
language issue is already asking quite a lot of the rest of the world.

       Mike

---

From: Andy Bierman <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 31 May 2007 14:07:27 -0700

> A hum doesn't give the reasoning; it's a binary quantity.

I think the inability of the IETF to make decisions in
an open, deterministic, and verifiable manner is a major flaw.
It promotes indecision and inaction.

> really were the case, I doubt any system is likely to perform very well.

Only transparency can prevent corruption.

> language issue is already asking quite a lot of the rest of the world.

I don't see the cultural bias here.
I see the bias in "English only", but these are public
standards being developed.  Everybody in the IETF should
be able to read all of the comments made on a draft, not
just a privileged elite.

Andy

---

From: Sam Hartman <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 31 May 2007 18:14:32 -0400

>>>>> "Andy" == Andy Bierman <[email-masked]> writes:

    Andy> I think the inability of the IETF to make decisions in an
    Andy> open, deterministic, and verifiable manner is a major flaw.

I for one do not wish for deterministic decision making in the IETF.

---

From: Sam Hartman <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 31 May 2007 18:20:02 -0400

>>>>> "Andy" == Andy Bierman <[email-masked]> writes:

    Andy> This is not an alternative.  If you are not willing to make
    Andy> your technical objections to a technical specification
    Andy> publicly, then they cannot be part of the IETF
    Andy> decision-making process.

At one level I agree here.

    Andy> What's to prevent a WG Chair from "padding" the anonymous
    Andy> "votes"?  If 5 people in public (WG meeting or mailing list)
    Andy> are for some proposal, and the Chair says, "I heard from 6
    Andy> people who are against this, but don't want their identities
    Andy> known, so the proposal is rejected."  Not acceptable.

I think that would be unacceptable.  I think that a WG chair going to
people who expressed private concerns and saying something like "Hey,
you need to express your concerns in public.  They are shared; if all
of the people who have these concerns bring them forward then we would
have enough interest in dealing with this issue.  You have a week," is
entirely fine.

I also think it is fine for a WG chair to look at private technical
concerns, realize they are correct and raise them to the WG.  "I
received a private concern; that mail pointed out that the following
trivial attack will break the security of this protocol.  We are not
moving forward until someone fixes this problem or someone explains
why I'm misunderstanding the situation."

It's probably even fine to say "I received a lot of private concerns.
Are the people willing to make public comments firmly behind their
support?"

--Sam

---

From: Andy Bierman <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 31 May 2007 16:14:28 -0700

> why I'm misunderstanding the situation."

I don't understand why such a comment needs to be private.
Once the issue comes to light in the WG, it is no longer going
to be private.

You are assuming the Chair can and should be a proxy for a
WG member who wishes to remain anonymous.  I disagree.

> Are the people willing to make public comments firmly behind their

I am specifically referring to technical comments.
I realize that WG members may have non-technical concerns
which are appropriate to convey to the Chair privately.

I think the IETF consensus process is severely flawed.
Many times I have encountered deadlocks because 3 people
are strongly for something, 3 people are strongly against it,
and 40 people couldn't care less which way the decision goes.
Determining consensus based on hearsay and humming makes matters
even worse.

Andy

---

From: Michael Thomas <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 31 May 2007 16:41:56 -0700

> It promotes indecision and inaction.

Is there any human decision making process that has all of these
characteristics? Or that even believes that those are axiomatic?
> Only transparency can prevent corruption.

Preventing corruption is not the end product of the IETF. Producing
good/useful protocol specs is the end product of the IETF. Thus
"corruption" is just one consideration. Life is messy that way.
> I don't see the cultural bias here.

Which culture are you from?

       Mike

---

From: Andy Bierman <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 31 May 2007 17:05:35 -0700

> characteristics? Or that even believes that those are axiomatic?

no, but there is some evidence that the IETF does not regularly
make timely and effective decisions, relative to the expectations
of the participants.  IMO, this is due to a flawed process which
only works well in "landslide" decisions.  The track record for
close or difficult decisions is not very good.

> "corruption" is just one consideration. Life is messy that way.

The end product is a document.
The document is a result of decisions made (or punted).
The text in the document is fair game for any kind of comment,
as long as the comment is made openly for everyone in the WG
to consider.

If there was an anonymous mailing service, such that people could
comment on WG issues without revealing their identity, then how
do we know everybody using the service will only make their comment
once?  What is to prevent them from making the same comment N times,
hoping to deceive the WG into thinking the comments represent the
views of N people?

> Which culture are you from?

Kalifornia -- as if that matters.

The IETF is not an academic exercise.
I have found that people from the academic culture are appalled
at how their documents are treated by others in the IETF.
In the competitive culture of the IETF, documents are often
attacked (or ignored) in ways that are not common in the academic world.
This is unfortunate, but not enough of a reason to allow the
IETF decision making process to be even more murky and secretive.

Andy

---

From: "Joel M. Halpern" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 31 May 2007 20:14:10 -0400

Maybe I have misread the exchange.
But I do expect chairs to receive private comments about the state of things.
And to try to respond helpful to those comments when they can.

And I expect them to make use of that exchange to help the public conversation.
To use a current example, the chair of one working group just said 
(paraphrasing)
     I have received several comments privately that the description of X
     in the document doesn't match reality.  However, only person A has
     spoken up on the list.  If this is a real issue, please speak up on the
     list NOW.

Being realistic, there are people who will be reluctant to speak up 
on the list.  particularly when some of our best and most active 
participants have been known to land on folks who disagree with them 
like a ton of bricks.
The chair clearly can not let the private comments change the public 
consensus.  But he can use it to be able to tell people that several 
folks agree, and manage the process.
There are also other reasons for sending comments to the chair.  For 
example, I have sent comments saying roughly ~if I raise X it will 
cause a lot of email exchange without resolving anything.  As long as 
you, chair, think we have discussed it enough I will refrain from raising it.~
And many other reasons come up.

Yours,
Joel

---

From: Henning Schulzrinne <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 31 May 2007 22:09:08 -0400

The current process doesn't work very well when voting is required,  
after hum-style consensus has been inconclusive.

I think a fair vote requires

- a clear definition of who can vote

- a vote that is announced well in advance to all parties, not just a  
select few

- some process that avoids favoring one or the other group (e.g., by  
holding a vote during a meeting, while allowing remote participation,  
but holding the vote at such a time that only certain regions can  
reasonably participate)

These difficulties are particularly pronounced when a vote is held at  
a meeting, but the issues of franchise apply in general.

[Without getting into the details, let's just say that I had the non- 
pleasure of participating in a WG vote that had issues with all of  
the above.]

Henning

---

From: Lakshminath Dondeti <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 31 May 2007 19:22:33 -0700

Can anyone point to me where it is written that voting at a meeting is 
the decision making process when rough consensus (hum or whatever) has 
been inconclusive?

 From what I know and have been told, people on the list should have 
been given the chance to opine before declaring any results (so the 
issue of timezones and advanced notice should not have any impact).

Could the IESG/IAB confirm what is the right procedure?

thanks,
Lakshminath

On 5/31/2007 7:09 PM, Henning Schulzrinne wrote:
> These difficulties are particularly pronounced when a vote is held at a 
> meeting, but the issues of franchise apply in general.
> 
> [Without getting into the details, let's just say that I had the 
> non-pleasure of participating in a WG vote that had issues with all of 
> the above.]
> 
> Henning
> 
>

---

From: Lakshminath Dondeti <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 31 May 2007 19:48:17 -0700

Good points.  I don't have a miracle cure, but I am willing to take the
risk to point out things that are not going well and what might need to
be done to make things more transparent, increase accountability and
implement some checks and balances.

I identified two things: 1. The IAB to make BoF reports public; 2.
Implement more checks and balances.

I will start threads on the two topics soon.

thanks,
Lakshminath