Subject: a radical idea

From: Randy Bush <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 09 Mar 2014 08:50:23 +0000

it would be really cool if we had a general ietf mailing list on which
to discuss internet engineering, you know, stuff such as transport,
routing, security, etc.  i realize it would only interest a minority,
and would, of course, be subsidiary to the very important social and
political content of this august list.  but for the very few of us still
trying to do internet engineering, it might be useful.

randy

---

From: <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 9 Mar 2014 08:55:08 +0000

the general IETF list is in fact a release valve for all the other IETF lists,
so that they are not cluttered by this material.

a very necessary function.

Lloyd Wood
http://about.me/lloydwood
________________________________________
From: ietf [[email-masked]] On Behalf Of Randy Bush [[email-masked]]
Sent: 09 March 2014 08:50
To: IETF Disgust
Subject: a radical idea

randy

---

From: Mark Nottingham <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 9 Mar 2014 10:47:05 +0000

What about moving IETF LC discussions / reviews to a dedicated list?

--
Mark Nottingham   http://www.mnot.net/

---

From: Dave Crocker <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 09 Mar 2014 11:00:43 +0000

> What about moving IETF LC discussions / reviews to a dedicated list?

These are examples of targeted topics that come up for the general 
community to consider from time to time.  The current question of how 
best to handle bullying and harassment is another example.

Whatever venue is used, we aren't very good at staying on point for such 
topics.  Witness the sequence that the current thread is part of.

We tend to jump to whatever bright, shiny new item attracts a few folk 
next, rather than staying focused.  Note that this tendency essentially 
enables a denial of service attack by posters; and whether the effect is 
intentional or not does not matter.  It becomes the community's fault by 
not managing the discussion focus.

So I suspect that what we need is not a new venue but active 
facilitation/management of threads that need to converge on an explicit 
outcome.

Working groups often do this, with a facilitator (chair or someone else) 
maintaining an issues list, periodically doing a summary, and 
periodically offering their sense of the groups.  (And yeah, in some 
cases that is a rough consensus assessment.)

d/
-- 
Dave Crocker
Brandenburg InternetWorking
bbiw.net

---

From: Melinda Shore <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 9 Mar 2014 03:08:41 -0800

> What about moving IETF LC discussions / reviews to a dedicated list?

I think there's probably value in keeping it in places where it can drift
under the noses of people who might be interested rather than just those
who are committed enough to subscribe to a separate last call mailing list.

Melinda

---

From: Dave Crocker <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 09 Mar 2014 11:10:27 +0000

> trying to do internet engineering, it might be useful.

Randy,

The phrasing of your suggestion presumes that you are currently 
prevented from having those discussions.  But of course you aren't.

However it would require posting notes with substance relevant to 
whatever specific engineering issues you have in mind and it would 
require others who are interested in discussing them responding.  That's 
not as much fun as creating or following the latest bright shiny list 
distraction, but such is life.

The nice thing about email threading is that it's quite easy to 
distinguish such productive threads from ones that are dominated by 
complaints about the frailties of the IETF.

d/

---

From: Scott Brim <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 9 Mar 2014 11:48:19 +0000

Compare the reasons why most people prefer to have all working groups meet
together instead of fragmenting the meeting.

---

From: Melinda Shore <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 9 Mar 2014 03:53:51 -0800

> together instead of fragmenting the meeting.
I dunno.  I expect that we could also be looking at why we have IETF last
call.

Melinda

---

From: heasley <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 9 Mar 2014 21:29:00 +0000

> prevented from having those discussions.  But of course you aren't.

I believe the point is to separate general technical discussion from the
general everything else discussion, such as the draft-how-not-to-be-a-
wanker discussion, so that those here just for the technical aspects of
IETF need not wade through it.  Which I support.