Subject: Re: Failing to convince an IETF WG

From: Abdussalam Baryun <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 26 Sep 2012 09:52:38 +0200

Hi Dave, and All,

The beauty of the IETF is that it includes all Internet USERS
(i.e.people or organisations) around the world, no one should use it
in their interest, it should progress in the Internet
Society/Community interest following the *open* engineering knowledge
and practice. Engineers in IETF cannot disagree covering their reason
or reference they SHOULD be open. Comments in line below:
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>> The IETF needs total transparency and a way to process alternative
>> standards
>> so that it is not actively involved in anything dark and covert.
>
> That makes no sense ... something can't be an IETF standard if it doesn't
> get created and adopted using The IETF's processes. The word 'standard'
> implies the approval of some organization/standards body. The independant
> stream does allow publishing of alternatives to IETF Standards, but that
> doesn't make tham alternative standards. For that some other recognized
> group needs to declare it a standard and then it will be An XYZ Group
> Standard, not an IETF Standard.
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I agree that the best practice is standards through WGs, because
*knowledge* is the core reason for the GROUP, not *politics*. IMHO,
the best practice is continue *open-discussions* with engineering and
technical knowledge to give progress to WGs, but if some participants
don't want to accept to discuss (by ignoring input) or don't want to
listen to technical/research reasons in IETF documents or  in
publications out IETF, how can the WG progress? Still thoes
participant MAY continue disagree (without discussing why) when
calling for group consensus, what will be the best practice?, will it
be that the submitter has to stop even if his/her has better arguments
in terms of engineering.

Some may fail to convice an IETF WG just because some active
participants reply that they think it is bad, without replying
*reasonably* to discussions. When I read the IETF procedure, I see
that it makes decisions at the *WG-consensus* (with no relation to
discussions and arguments) which I think not enough for progress in
the eyes of IETF mission statement.

Suggest: that if any participant disagree in I-D adoption in a WG,
then he/she take a DISCUSS position (similar to IESG memebrs process,
cannot just disagree), which they MUST have to take and reply to
messages including their good reasons for their positions (you don't
reply this idea/I-D is BAD). Any participant (submitter or who
disagrees with adoption) SHOULD have an engineering reference(s) for
such input.

If I am mistaken please advise, because I need to discuss to
understand, so we can help together make IETF better for the world
users.

Best Regards
Abdussalam Baryun
++++++++++++++++
The mission of the Internet Engineering Task Force is to make the
Internet work better by producing high-quality and relevant technical
documents that influence the way people design, use, and manage the
Internet. See http://www.ietf.org.

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From: Abdussalam Baryun <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 26 Sep 2012 10:15:31 +0200

Hi Todd,

I agree on your concerns but disagree with few issues, read my
disagree reason below:

Todd> Most of the vetting happens between parties offlist and no capture .....
AB> any organisation may have this behavior, but what matters is as
long as you are participating to : monitoring input, questioning,
suggesting, convincing others, writing I-Ds for the IETF, and making
up your decisions.

Todd>The IETF process of today is based on a 'consensus' process from
a membership of zero. That in and of itself flies in the face of
reason and ethical clarity. If there were formal members who came
together in a framework that the IETF administered it would be OK but
the process today is too easily abused.

AB> it is greate that we are not memebrs, we are participants, because
we become equal to any other, if memebrship then we will have a memebr
for 10 years and a memeber for 5 years (not measuring efforts but
time), but with the IETF we are just participants, the value or
difference between us is only how much you participate and author I-Ds
or IETF RFCs. There MAY be abuse to the consensus process only if the
CHAIR does not consider the healthy discussion related. So we need
something to avoid this.

Todd> When the journey is completed the standard will automatically
issue... no IESG no IAB pain no extra administrative overhead for a
bunch of lifer type standards junkies... Just simple and clean access
to the standard process.

AB> standard process is greate as we have IESG and WG reviews, first
because the authors will have to discuss through many things with the
focused/expert IETF group, then secondly the IESG have a more general
review which includes many other affects of the I-D with other WGs in
IETF. Yes painful but healthy.

Best Regards
Abdussalam Baryun
++++++++++++++++

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From: Rémi Després <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 26 Sep 2012 10:28:03 +0200

> or reference they SHOULD be open. Comments in line below:

Same concern.
Some participants have been seen to come up as opponents without having participated in previous debates.

> disagrees with adoption) SHOULD have an engineering reference(s) for

Support for this suggestion, adding that WG chairs should be clearly responsible for weighting arguments in their appreciation of rough consensus, in particular ignoring those that they find invalid.

Regards,
RD