Subject: Re: IETF HOF vs. ISOC HOF

From: [email-masked] (Noel Chiappa)
Date: Tue, 23 Oct 2012 15:06:03 -0400 (EDT)

{Apologies for the bunched reply - I was offline for a bit, now trying to
catch up without inundating the list.}

    > From: Theodore Ts'o <[email-masked]>

    > Do we need to wait until someone who has made significant contribution
    > to have passed away before we recognize their contributions?
    > ...
    > I wonder if we are conflating the concept of a memorial and a Hall of
    > Fame

This is an excellent point. I guess I just fell into assuming that the IETF
HoF would be for people who have passed away because that was how the whole
discussion started, and I didn't question that initial assumption. But you're
quite right that it would be nice to recognize people while they are still
around to appreciate it.

(I've always been bummed that Van Gogh only sold like 3 paintings while he
was still alive, and so probably never appreciated how good his work was, and
how much it would mean to other people.)

    > From: Dave Crocker <[email-masked]>

    > Since ISOC recently initiated its own Hall of Fame effort, how would
    > the IETF version be different and why?

Umm, hard to put into words, but basically the IETF one would be i) for
people who had done things for the IETF (e.g. Steve Coya), or people whom we
felt were important, but whose contributions (and affect on the world as a
whole) didn't rise to the level of the ISOC one (e.g. Abha).

    > From: Lixia Zhang <[email-masked]>

    > life moves forward fast, history fading away quickly, if we dont make
    > an effort to put it in record.

Exactly.

    > From: Randy Bush <[email-masked]>

    > a friend suggested privately an article in the ietf journal when
    > someone has died. ... and it is archived.
    > i will not indulge in the swamp of attempting to codify who writes it
    > and how. if the ietf journal editor(s) can not be trusted, replace
    > them.

Agree with both of these (although _very_ significant figures, e.g. Jon,
might merit a full-blown RFC, as Jon did - RFC-2468).

One tweak I would request, though; if someone could set up a web page which is
linked to all the various memorical articles, and put a link to that somewhere
close to the top of the IETF web site, so it would be easy to find/notice,
that would be really useful - short of that, one would have to grub around to
find them all.

    > From: Jari Arkko <[email-masked]>

    > I also think that whoever we at the IETF think is "important" probably
    > wrote enough important RFCs.

Not necessarily. Not everyone important in the IETF writes RFCs...

	Noel