Subject: [seamoby] WG Announcement of Appeal: 3G Biases in SeaMoby and MIP

From: "Phil Neumiller" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 13 Apr 2001 18:29:35 -0500

Attn: SeaMoby and Mobile IP WG members.

Description of Appeal
----------------------
As permitted by RFC 2026 section 6.5.1 an individual (or individuals)  may
disagree with a WG recommendation and may approach the IESG for an
appeal in a case where the WG  has made an incorrect technical choice which
places the quality and/or integrity of the Working Group's product(s) in
significant jeopardy.

In a nutshell, my appeal, is that: the SeaMoby and Mobile IP WGs have
been mis-directed to focus too much on the interests of a group of outside
standards development organizations, namely 3GPP (http://www.3gpp.org/)
and 3GPP2 (http://www.3gpp2.org/), rather than enhancing the global Internet
which is the IETF's primary directive per RFC 2026 section 1.1 which I
quote a subsection here for convenience:

  "In the case of protocols developed and/or standardized by non-Internet
   organizations, however, the Internet Standards Process normally applies
   to the application of the protocol or procedure in the Internet context,
   not to the specification of the protocol itself."

I will attempt to prove in this appeals process that the mobileip and seamoby
WGs have been developing protocols primarily for a non-Internet organization
[namely 3GPP and 3GPP2] and have not kept the Internet context of their
process as their primary focus.

In this case, I believe the technical error to be in both the mobile IP and
SeaMoby WG agendas themselves (therefore by direct consequence each of
the WG's priorities), so the appeal is more appropriately directed at the IESG
than the WG members or chairs.  Since, WG members and chairs must abide
by the IESG approved agenda for the WG.

In this appeal I will not implicate any individual WG member or chair and all
member names will be removed from quotations used in my case.  I will refer
to a "WG chair" as just that, and a "WG member" as just that, thus removing
any prejudices that could intervene in my interest of fairness and the technical
correctness of my appeal.  I can provide on demand the names of the quoted
individuals to the ADs or the IESG if an AD or the IESG needs to cross
reference or ask further questions.

Next Steps
------------
The matter has been discussed repeatedly and at length with the WG chairs and
members on the said lists and they have repeatedly stated that they recognize no
bias in the WG activities.  By section 6.5.1 of RFC 2026 I hereby open this
appeals process to the mobileip and seamoby WGs as a whole for debate.

NOTE:
This is the final chance for each WG to resolve this issue internally before the
appeal will be brought formally to the ADs and possibly the IESG.

After the discussion, which [we can agree] to conclude on April 20, 2001
[provided the chairs and ADs believe this is enough time], and if this appeal
can not be resolved within the mobileip and seamoby WG confines, the matter
will be taken to the ADs for resolution.  I welcome the ADs to monitor this
public airing of the appeals notice to the WGs and interject guidence as
necessary.

As WG  members concerned about mobility and the global Internet please
reply to this message with your own comments that are directly pertinent to this
appeal to the ADs and possibly the IESG itself.   If you wish your comments
to be anonymous please send them to the ADs or WG chairs directly where
your privacy will be respected [I request that an anonymous version be reposted
to the list by the ADs and/or chairs on this thread].

Thanks,

Phil Neumiller

---

From: Patrice Calhoun <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 13 Apr 2001 17:18:32 -0700 (PDT)

> the WG's priorities), so the appeal is more appropriately directed at the
> IESG than the WG members or chairs.  Since, WG members and chairs must abide
> any prejudices that could intervene in my interest of fairness and the
> technical correctness of my appeal.  I can provide on demand the names of
> the quoted individuals to the ADs or the IESG if an AD or the IESG needs to
> cross reference or ask further questions.
> 
> Next Steps
> ------------
> members on the said lists and they have repeatedly stated that they
> recognize no bias in the WG activities.  By section 6.5.1 of RFC 2026 I
> hereby open this appeals process to the mobileip and seamoby WGs as a whole
> for debate.
> 
> NOTE:
> This is the final chance for each WG to resolve this issue internally before
> the appeal will be brought formally to the ADs and possibly the IESG.
> 
> will be taken to the ADs for resolution. 

Given that I will be on vacation, and not have access to the Internet, between
April 14th through the 22nd, I would ask for this timeline to be extended to
April 30th.

PatC

---

From: Cedric Westphal <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 13 Apr 2001 17:37:27 -0700

Phil,

assuming your appeal is validated, and there is indeed a bias in MIP and
seamoby towards 3GPPs, what would be the consequences?
I have a hard time figuring out what is the purpose of this crusade.

If it makes you happy, I'll agree to all the biases you want. Yes, many members
of MIP and seamoby WG that earn a paycheck get it from one of the
76 companies that are 3GPP2 members (including all 3 chairs, one area director,
one technical advisor, and yourself till a couple weeks ago). Do they influence the
outcome?
You bet. QED. WGs are biased. Congratulations, you won.

To answer my first question, what consequences? I suggest to ban from the
IETF all these pesky corporate sell-outs working for cisco, lucent, nokia, sun,
nortel, etc. They are way too influential.

Cedric.

---

From: Charlie Perkins <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 13 Apr 2001 18:31:42 -0700

Hello,

I'm confused about how you can tell whether the working groups
were biased.  What if the working groups were just working on the
agenda items suggested by the participants?  Can you suggest an
alternative agenda which would not have shown the effects of
the claimed bias?  What else should the working groups have
been working on, other than the things that were brought into
discussion by the participants?

As someone who was involved in the mobile-ip working group,
and also who tried to become familiar with the needs of 3GPP2
and 3GPP, I don't know if I would be considered to be objective.
With that understanding, however, I'll state anyway that I don't think
the agenda in the mobile-ip working was subservient to the needs
of outside SDOs.  In fact, even before there was substantial input
from those organizations, we had already made a lot of discussion
about regional registration (called in those days Hierarchical
Foreign Agents).  Questions about smooth handover are of
more recent vintage, but do not show evidence of being under
the control of 3GPP*.  There were some drafts to exhibit 3G
requirements.  I don't think they progressed to Informational
RFC, and I don't remember too much recent discussion.

Can you characterize the effects of the claimed bias?

For possible comparison purposes, I can suggest some things that
didn't happen, which would have been more solid evidence of bias:
- Allowing GTP as a tunneling choice along with IP-within-IP tunneling
- Insertion of additional round trips to HLR before granting
  network access
- Allowing PPP as a tunneling choice along with IP-within-IP
   tunneling (...maybe it would have been a good idea, though!...)
- Specification of SS-7 proxies

These things didn't happen.  Some things more directly related
to 3GPP2 were actively discussed, but they could not at all
be characterized as displacing other more important topics
like Mobile IPv6.

I think you have a very difficult case to make, given the available
evidence.

Lastly, I do not think that the discussion raised by considerations
of 3G requirements have had the harmful effect you claim, except
unless you believe that adopting IETF standards would have the
effect of making those standards longer-lived and thus antithetical
to your goals for a longer time.

Regards,
Charlie P.

---

From: "Phil Neumiller" <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 17 Apr 2001 19:19:07 -0500

I give up.  It is clear from the emails I have received thus far that this
appeal is not going to go anywhere in the MIP or SeaMoby WGs.  Consider
it cancelled.  I still believe there are too many 3G biases among
other problems in the agenda and priorities of the MIP & SeaMoby WGs.
However, I will show deference to each WG as a whole.  I am sorry for
the inconvenience this thread may have caused the WG and chairs.

Best regards to all,

Phil Neumiller