Subject: ietf mailing list Acceptable Use Policy

From: Dave Crocker <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 20 Jul 2005 14:49:27 -0700

Folks,

I am burdening the IETF list with this note because I looked around on the IETF 
web pages and couldn't find the document or statement that would resolve the 
point.

The question of acceptable behaviors on ietf mailing lists has been discussed at 
length, of course.  But I cannot find a statement that should be used by ietf 
list that is, for example, on a par with the Note Well statement about IPR.

I believe that we DO have pretty consistent rules, but I can't find a pointer to 
text that makes the usual statements about technical focus, professionalism, 
absence of ad hominem language, etc.

It would be great to have an IETF-wide, core consensus-based statement on 
Acceptable Use that new lists could just point to.

  d/
  ---
  Dave Crocker
  Brandenburg InternetWorking
  +1.408.246.8253
  dcrocker  a t ...
  WE'VE MOVED to:  www.bbiw.net

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

---

From: Harald Tveit Alvestrand <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 21 Jul 2005 01:14:58 +0200

--On onsdag, juli 20, 2005 14:49:27 -0700 Dave Crocker <[email-masked]> 
wrote:

> Folks,
>
> I am burdening the IETF list with this note because I looked around on
> the IETF  web pages and couldn't find the document or statement that
> would resolve the  point.
>
> The question of acceptable behaviors on ietf mailing lists has been
> discussed at  length, of course.  But I cannot find a statement that
> should be used by ietf  list that is, for example, on a par with the Note
> Well statement about IPR.
>
> I believe that we DO have pretty consistent rules, but I can't find a
> pointer to  text that makes the usual statements about technical focus,
> professionalism,  absence of ad hominem language, etc.
>

For working group lists, people point to RFC 2418 (WG guidelines) and RFC 
3434 (updates), and for the IETF list, they point to RFC 3005 (IETF list 
charter). And sometimes to RFC 3184 (IETF Guidelines for Conduct), or RFC 
3683 (IETF-wide posting right removal).

But when having to evaluate the question for the ietf-languages list a 
month ago, I did not find a written statement anywhere that said "here's 
how you operate an IETF list that is not a WG list".

So I resorted to "here's what would happen if this was a WG list, and I had 
the power of the WG chair to control the list, and because I run the list, 
I'm going to make it happen".

One of the signs of a maturing organization is said to be that it relies 
upon explicit rules rather than people's individual judgment.
One of the signs of an ossifying organization is said to be that it has 
rules for everything.

So I kind of look favourably upon the idea of writing such a document - 
but... could we do it in such a way that the number of documents we have to 
ask people to read grows shorter, not longer....?

                          Harald

---

From: "JFC (Jefsey) Morfin" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 21 Jul 2005 04:10:13 +0200

Dear Harald,
At 01:14 21/07/2005, Harald Tveit Alvestrand wrote:
>So I resorted to "here's what would happen if this was a WG list, and I 
>had the power of the WG chair to control the list, and because I run the 
>list, I'm going to make it happen".

Did you? I will not dispute here the way a proposition of your consortium 
tries to exclude Open Source propositions and every further innovation from 
multilingual network development area. I will just thank you to repeat you 
are the private owner of a public IANA list documented by an RFC (of 
yours). This is why il will not tease your "WG procedure" without proper 
steps, concerted ADs, appeal, etc.

To come back to your answer: one must add RFC 2860 for registry lists which 
should be/are own by the IANA.

>upon explicit rules rather than people's individual judgment. One of the 
>signs of an ossifying organization is said to be that it has rules for 
>everything.

What then to say of an organisation with 4200+ RFCs?

This shows how complex the IETF has become and the necessity documented by 
many outside of an "Intenet Book" maintaining, along a clear, accepted and 
stable "table of content", the matter and the experience (also included in 
obsoleted ones) of these 4200 RFCs.

Brian, it also shows the necessity, IMHO, of a WG-IANA to work on the many 
details of a complete review of RFC 2860, 2434, etc. extending to a 
standard Registry framework management by IETF and ICANN.
jfc

---

From: Brian E Carpenter <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 21 Jul 2005 12:45:11 +0200

One rule of any list policy would be: stick to the subject or change
the subject header, I think.

    Brian

JFC (Jefsey) Morfin wrote:
>> So I resorted to "here's what would happen if this was a WG list, and 
>> I had the power of the WG chair to control the list, and because I run 
>> the list, I'm going to make it happen".
> 
> 
> Did you? I will not dispute here the way a proposition of your 
> consortium tries to exclude Open Source propositions and every further 
> innovation from multilingual network development area. I will just thank 
> you to repeat you are the private owner of a public IANA list documented 
> by an RFC (of yours). This is why il will not tease your "WG procedure" 
> without proper steps, concerted ADs, appeal, etc.
> 
> To come back to your answer: one must add RFC 2860 for registry lists 
> which should be/are own by the IANA.
> 
>> One of the signs of a maturing organization is said to be that it 
>> relies upon explicit rules rather than people's individual judgment. 
>> One of the signs of an ossifying organization is said to be that it 
>> has rules for everything.
> 
> 
> This shows how complex the IETF has become and the necessity documented 
> by many outside of an "Intenet Book" maintaining, along a clear, 
> accepted and stable "table of content", the matter and the experience 
> (also included in obsoleted ones) of these 4200 RFCs.
> 
> Brian, it also shows the necessity, IMHO, of a WG-IANA to work on the 
> many details of a complete review of RFC 2860, 2434, etc. extending to a

---

From: Brian E Carpenter <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 21 Jul 2005 12:49:49 +0200

Harald Tveit Alvestrand wrote:
> 
> 
> --On onsdag, juli 20, 2005 14:49:27 -0700 Dave Crocker 
> <[email-masked]> wrote:
> 
>> Folks,
>>
> For working group lists, people point to RFC 2418 (WG guidelines) and 
> RFC 3434 (updates), and for the IETF list, they point to RFC 3005 (IETF 
> list charter). And sometimes to RFC 3184 (IETF Guidelines for Conduct), 
> or RFC 3683 (IETF-wide posting right removal).
> 

One of the first items would be to define what "an IETF list that is not a
WG list" is. Presumably, it's something to do with being set up in furtherance
of the IETF Mission Statement and subject to IETF IPR rules. That being so,
I think all the basics are in the above and pulling them together would be
good. Rather than worsen our patchwork quilt of process documents, however,
perhaps the new document could be a set of citations of the above?

Volunteer in the house?

    Brian
> but... could we do it in such a way that the number of documents we have 
> to ask people to read grows shorter, not longer....?
> 
>                          Harald
> 
> 
>

---

From: Harald Tveit Alvestrand <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 21 Jul 2005 13:03:05 +0200

--On 21. juli 2005 12:49 +0200 Brian E Carpenter <[email-masked]> wrote:

> of the IETF Mission Statement and subject to IETF IPR rules.

We were faced with this question some time ago, and the result was the 
creation of the "IETF Non-WG mailing lists" page, 
<https://datatracker.ietf.org/public/nwg_list.cgi>

The theory being that if something is listed there, the IETF definitely 
considers it an IETF list; if it is not listed, it's either not an IETF 
list, or someone needs to take an action to get it listed (which is simple).

I think defining rules about what is or is not an IETF list is tricky; it's 
simpler to list the ones that are.....

                      Harald

---

From: Susan Harris <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 21 Jul 2005 08:51:53 -0400 (EDT)

> Volunteer in the house?

Sure.

---

From: "JFC (Jefsey) Morfin" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 21 Jul 2005 15:30:57 +0200

On 12:45 21/07/2005, Brian E Carpenter said:
>One rule of any list policy would be: stick to the subject or change the 
>subject header, I think.
>Brian

Difficult to know if this is or not the subject. I think it is for two 
reasons, I might have more precisely documented:

1. There are at least three areas where non WG list exist:

- discussing draft. The owner is clearly the author of the Draft and the 
list is temporary

- the IANA registries as the list is attached to the Registry and therefore 
permanent. The use policy is then by the owner of the list, normally the IANA.

A second problem is that the "acceptable use policy" is mainly seen from an 
existing membership point of view. The main problem observed in the case of 
[email-masked] mailing list for the RFC 3066 registry Harald 
quotes, is the policy towards non members. This means the lack of exposure 
of the list in the IANA site and the difficulty in getting subscribed. This 
leads people concerned by the decision taken not to be even aware of their 
discussion. I use the case of that list because I know it and Harald quotes 
it. But I suppose it is the same for other registries? Also, the IANA 
section - or other documents - does not indicate who is the mailing list 
responsible. There is (I use the case of that list) an examiner (other RFC 
may use different names, so I use the name of the function) designed by the 
IESG, but its exact role, the duration and the powers of his mandate are 
not defined.

- there can also be other lists, like the follow-up of a closed WG were all 
the solutions were not found.

2. I fully support the idea of a list of the IETF lists. This is exactly an 
item in the "Internet Book" chapter: each section should probably position 
the theme in a global networking model, list the involved WGs and concerned 
RFCs, give an historic of the standardisation, describe the best practices, 
document existing experimentations, link running code sources, catalogue 
software providers and equipment manufacturers (showing the topic is 
addressed in an open manner), list the interested sites and organisations, 
etc. and list the current mailing lists and their relations to the 
different SDOs, authors, registries.

jfc

>>tries to exclude Open Source propositions and every further innovation 
>>from multilingual network development area. I will just thank you to 
>>repeat you are the private owner of a public IANA list documented by an 
>>RFC (of yours). This is why il will not tease your "WG procedure" without 
>>proper steps, concerted ADs, appeal, etc.
>>by many outside of an "Intenet Book" maintaining, along a clear, accepted 
>>and stable "table of content", the matter and the experience (also 
>>included in obsoleted ones) of these 4200 RFCs.

---

From: Brian E Carpenter <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 22 Jul 2005 01:53:14 +0200

Thanks for the reminder, Harald.

Actually that looks very close to what I suggested: subject to
IPR rules and relevant to the IETF mission, as judged by an AD.

    Brian

Harald Tveit Alvestrand wrote:
> I think defining rules about what is or is not an IETF list is tricky; 
> it's simpler to list the ones that are.....
> 
>                      Harald
> 
> 
>

---

From: Dave Crocker <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 24 Jul 2005 12:04:34 -0700

> or RFC 3683 (IETF-wide posting right removal).

Folks, I looked over the references Harald provided and believe that they do 
indeed provide the necessary detail for defining participant obligations and 
procedures for handling violations.

That is,

1) They tell a participant what the professional rules of conduct are -- what 
are the constraints on their behavior -- sufficiently to catch the behaviors 
that are problematic, and

2) They define procedures and authorities for list management to follow, to 
handle these problematic behaviors.

I've put together a draft web page that is intended to be usable to any 
working group mailing list.  I'd appreciate review comments on it.

It is at:

    <http://mipassoc.org/mass/ietf-list-rules.html>

-- 
 
   d/

  Dave Crocker

---

From: Susan Harris <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 25 Jul 2005 09:41:19 -0400 (EDT)

>   <http://mipassoc.org/mass/ietf-list-rules.html>

Looks good Dave - thanks for doing this.  One thing that could be added is 
info on "what is an ietf list and what isn't."  Harald pointed to:

 	https://datatracker.ietf.org/public/nwg_list.cgi

But as he said, that page doesn't help us define what makes an ietf list, 
just lists the ones that are.

---

From: Dave Crocker <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 25 Jul 2005 07:09:52 -0700

>  just lists the ones that are.

right.

the goal of this particular page is the equivalent of NOTE WELL.  It is 
intended to be used as a way of a priori declarations of list rules, 
rather than more general aspects of mailing list.  

  d/
  ---
  Dave Crocker

---

From: "JFC (Jefsey) Morfin" <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 25 Jul 2005 17:06:38 +0200

>rather than more general aspects of mailing list.

May be a foot-note for RFC 2028 which is quoted in one of the RFC?

I suggest that an "ietf related list" is to be understood as a list which 
can practically apply the IETF rules decribed by the quoted RFCs, ie. 
having an AD and appeal capability to IESG/IAB?
This should exclude IANA lists which should submitted to equivalent rules 
by IANA?

jfc