Subject: Re: I-D Action: draft-hardie-iaoc-iab-update-00.txt

From: Brian E Carpenter <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 3 Feb 2016 08:19:13 +1300

Hi,

I think this draft mixes up two things.

(1) A proposal that the IAB Chair's ex officio seat in the IAOC be changed
to be a seat for an IAB voting member designated by the IAB. That of course
can only be achieved by an RFC that formally updates RFC 4071 and so becomes
part of BCP 101.

(2) A description of some IAB internal organisational matters, which the IAB
is clearly free to arrange how it wants, and publish if it wants. IAB
internal arrangements don't need to be BCPs.

I've got nothing to say about (2).

About (1), I think we should hear the pros and cons, because I doubt if
this proposal arose in a vacuum. In particular, how would this help the
IAOC be more effective and more responsive to community concerns?

Regards
   Brian Carpenter

On 03/02/2016 07:20, [email-masked] wrote:
> 
> A New Internet-Draft is available from the on-line Internet-Drafts directories.
> 
> 
>         Title           : Updating the ex-officio member of the IAB in the IAOC
>         Authors         : Ted Hardie
>                           Andrew Sullivan
>                           Russ Housley
> 	Filename        : draft-hardie-iaoc-iab-update-00.txt
> 	Pages           : 4
> 	Date            : 2016-02-02
> 
> Abstract:
>    At the time the IETF Administrative Oversight Committee was set up
>    the Internet Architecture Board had an internal structure
>    significantly different from its current structure.  This document
>    aims to update the ex officio member from the IAB who serves on the
>    IAOC in order to better account for that change and better match the
>    skills set out in RFC 4333.
> 
> 
> The IETF datatracker status page for this draft is:
> https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/draft-hardie-iaoc-iab-update/
> 
> There's also a htmlized version available at:
> https://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-hardie-iaoc-iab-update-00
> 
> 
> Please note that it may take a couple of minutes from the time of submission
> until the htmlized version and diff are available at tools.ietf.org.
> 
> Internet-Drafts are also available by anonymous FTP at:
> ftp://ftp.ietf.org/internet-drafts/
> 
> _______________________________________________
> I-D-Announce mailing list
> [email-masked]
> https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/i-d-announce
> Internet-Draft directories: http://www.ietf.org/shadow.html
> or ftp://ftp.ietf.org/ietf/1shadow-sites.txt
>

---

From: Ted Hardie <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 2 Feb 2016 11:51:21 -0800

> internal arrangements don't need to be BCPs.
​So, to be clear, this is something still under discussion within the IAB,
so please take it as the opinion of the authors at this point and nothing
more.

I agree that we could split this into a BCP update and non-BCP
informational document, but it seemed useful to us to describe the intended
mechanics within the IAB to the larger comm​unity at least initially.  For
final publication, we could split them if desired.

The program description is intended to make clear that there would be a
long-lived mechanism supporting this approach if it were adopted and that
the IAB would identify from among its members a group that will commit to
following the public work of the IAOC and being available to advise the ex
officio member or the IAB.

> IAOC be more effective and more responsive to community concerns?
​There's a trade-off here.  When the ex officio member is also the IAB
chair, as is the case now, you get a single individual who has state on a
wide variety of things (IAB, IAOC, IETF Trust, as well as IESG).  That's
valuable, but it comes at the cost of focusing all those time demands on a
single individual and, potentially, ending up with an individual chosen for
a balance of skills even if there were other individuals available owho
might be more effective​ for IAOC service according to the lights of RFC
4333.

This document explores making the trade-off a different way:  it should
increase the amount of time available for IAOC work for the ex officio
member; it should increase the understanding of the IAOC work in the IAB as
whole; and it should make the choice of IAOC ex officio member and Chair
independent.

You're right that it didn't arise in a vacuum.  The immediate driver was
largely the "time available" problem.  This year the IANA transition has
eaten a great deal of time for the IETF and IAB Chairs, pushing the job
well past the advertised percentage.  That will eventually resolve, but it
will always be something.  This makes sure that in cases like that, the
IAOC effort does not suffer.

As I said, still very much under discussion, and I appreciate your review,

regards,

Ted

---

From: Eliot Lear <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 2 Feb 2016 21:19:37 +0100

Hi Brian,

See below.

> IAOC be more effective and more responsive to community concerns?

Pro:  it is best to have the possibility of delegating responsibility to
someone who really can devote all the time necessary to the role.  You
may recall that the IAB chair's time is in quite high demand.  The IAOC
is only one of many matters that can come to her or his attention.  I
view this as a simple matter of scaling.

Pseudo-Con (really a pro): the IAB chair keeps substantial context in
his head, and can bring that to bear when dealing with the IAOC. 
However, it is better to have the chair share that context with other
board members, and particular any delegate to this role.  For one thing,
it reduces the impact when the chair departs the board.

Eliot

---

From: Bob Hinden <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 2 Feb 2016 13:02:33 -0800

I agree with Brian’s comments about this having to update BCP 101 and think it get too much into how the IAB currently organizes itself.

The document reads like the IAB Chair position on the IAOC will be replaced by an committee (aka IAB Program).  The person in this role is a voting member of the IAOC and IETF Trust, and needs to be able to exercise their judgement in real time.  It’s going to be a problem operationally if they have to consult the committee before voting.  I think this needs some more work in the document.

The description in the draft of what this committee does seem like a subset of the IAOC and Trust responsibilities (one example, it doesn’t include meeting venue decisions).  It’s a lot more than just reviewing “correspondence”, it's also about how the IAOC  works toward decisions.  I don’t know if that was intentional or not.  I would think not, but it’s not clear.

Also, I suspect in practice that the IAB chair doesn’t spend a lot of time reviwing things like RFPs, IAOC and Trust minutes, and other reports, so moving this to the IAB committee isn’t that important.  They are there for the bigger issues.

While I understand the motivation behind this, I think that the current structure for the IAOC and IETF Trust has worked well when we face significant issues.  The IANA transition is the latest of these, but it’s clear there will be more.  I think it’s been very important that IAB chair is directly involved in how the IAOC responds to IETF and Internet community issues. Not having the IAB Chair directly involved has downsides that are not described in the document.

Further, it seems to me that the next phase of the IANA transition where the implementation starts is going to see a bigger load on the IAOC and IETF Trust.  A lot of decisions will have to be made and having the IAB Chair at the table is going to be important.

Bob

> On Feb 2, 2016, at 11:19 AM, Brian E Carpenter <[email-masked]> wrote:
> 
> Hi,
>

---

From: John C Klensin <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 02 Feb 2016 16:05:50 -0500

--On Wednesday, February 03, 2016 08:19 +1300 Brian E Carpenter
<[email-masked]> wrote:

>...
> About (1), I think we should hear the pros and cons, because I
> doubt if this proposal arose in a vacuum. In particular, how
> would this help the IAOC be more effective and more responsive
> to community concerns?

I am not on the IAB and have not been privy to the latest round
of discussions, but let me try to answer the question from that
outside perspective and some involvement with an earlier effort
to relax the requirement that the IAB Chair (and, IIR from that
time, the IETF Chair and ISOC President) serve personally on the
IAOC.  

At the time the IASA (and IAOC) were created, there were several
specific reasons to require that the IAB and IETF Chairs and the
ISOC President serve directly on the IAOC, most of them
associated with the transition process from CNRI management and
oversight of the Secretariat function.  You, Brian, know more
about that than most of the community.   At this point, slightly
more than ten years on, the particular set of reasons for the
requirement no longer apply.   Some other things have changed
too (I think more significant than organizational changes in the
IAB).  In particular, some of us believe that the IAOC is not
working very well and that some reforms in the direction of
getting more people on it who have the IAOC among their primary
commitments rather than as a required side-effect of some other
(and very time-consuming) position.  As very recent examples, we
see some of the tangles with Buenos Aires arrangements and the
rather confused first draft of the new Procedures as evidence
that the IAOC (at least as a group) is not paying quite enough
attention to its strategic and management roles.

Ted's note covers the present-day tradeoffs well.  I  think
there are two important reasons for doing this:

(1) If we want an effective and accountable IAOC, we need to
reduce the number of people who have more significant IETF
community commitments somewhere else to a minimum.   That may be
an argument for relaxing the IAOC requirement on the IETF Chair
and ISOC President as well but, of the three, the IAB Chair has
the fewest specific commitments to the community that create
special ties that have to be represented on the IAB and is
probably the most part of a Board-type group that is expected to
function together.

(2) I hope the IAB will always be able to select its Chair as
the member the other members judge to be the best for that job.
If we load the Chair job up with responsibilities that the IAB
cannot rearrange, the choice may have to be strongly conditioned
on the minority of members who can take on all of the extra
work, a situation that, IMO, leads to weakening the IAB and the
job it can do for the community.

By the way and reminded by recent encounters with the IAOC
Procedures, if the community makes the change from "the IAB
Chair serves on the IAOC" to "an IAB member selected by the IAB
serves on the IAOC", the rules about which of the voting members
of the IAOC can serve as IAOC Chair should be reviewed.  I don't
have a strong opinion as to whether a change is appropriate or
not, but there should at least be some discussion and a decision
based on it.

     john

---

From: Michael StJohns <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 2 Feb 2016 16:45:12 -0500

On 2/2/2016 4:05 PM, John C Klensin wrote:
> In particular, some of us believe that the IAOC is not
> (and very time-consuming) position.

The above is probably a better way of framing the problem than "the IAB 
chair has too much to do".

Let me suggest that instead of delegating the IAB chair responsibilities 
we, instead, change the ex-officio status that the various chairs 
currently have to observer status, change the organizational appointees 
to permit (require?) appointment from their appointing organizations, 
and  also add two or three additional permanent members to the IAOC, 
those members to be selected in alternate years by the Nomcom.

To head off a few arguments against:

1) "But that reduces the IAB's influence on the IAOC".  Answer (1): 
Members of the IAOC serve as individuals.  It's unclear that a different 
member of the IAB will vote directly as the IAB chair wants them to vote 
in any case.  Answer(2): As John noted, the environments that existed 
when we created the IAOC and that exist now differ.  Does the original 
power structure still make sense (e.g. with an IAB, ISOC and IESG 
effectively owning 6 votes of 8?).

2) "Doesn't a larger IAOC mean a more unwieldy organization". Answer:  
The ex-officio chairs now move to observer status and can attend as they 
wish.  The number of voting members remains the same.  The members 
appointed by/related to a specific organization get reduced to 3 of 7 or 
3 of 8 voting members.  Ideally, the appointed organizational voting 
members have the IAOC as one of their primary tasks and would address 
the concern that the "IAB chair has too much to do".

AIRC, any change to the composition of the IAOC is also going to end up 
affecting the membership of the IETF trust as well.

Later, Mike

---

From: Ted Hardie <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 2 Feb 2016 13:57:36 -0800

On Tue, Feb 2, 2016 at 1:02 PM, Bob Hinden <[email-masked]> wrote:

> I agree with Brian’s comments about this having to update BCP 101 and
> think it get too much into how the IAB currently organizes itself.
>
> The document reads like the IAB Chair position on the IAOC will be
> replaced by an committee (aka IAB Program).  The person in this role is a
> voting member of the IAOC and IETF Trust, and needs to be able to exercise
> their judgement in real time.  It’s going to be a problem operationally if
> they have to consult the committee before voting.  I think this needs some
> more work in the document.
>
>
​I'm happy to work with the other authors to adjust the language on this,
because that's not the intent.  The intent is to have the program lead be
the voting member and to be able to exercise appropriate judgement in real
time.  The other program members are there to provide advice based on their
commitment to keep up with the *public* information from the IAOC (so not
its internal correspondence, but the public reports, RFPs, minutes, etc.).

If you have specific language you'd like to see in a revision, please let
us know.​

> The description in the draft of what this committee does seem like a
> subset of the IAOC and Trust responsibilities (one example, it doesn’t
> include meeting venue decisions).  It’s a lot more than just reviewing
> “correspondence”, it's also about how the IAOC  works toward decisions.  I
> don’t know if that was intentional or not.  I would think not, but it’s not
> clear.
>
> Also, I suspect in practice that the IAB chair doesn’t spend a lot of time
> reviwing things like RFPs, IAOC and Trust minutes, and other reports, so
> moving this to the IAB committee isn’t that important.  They are there for
> the bigger issues.
>
> While I understand the motivation behind this, I think that the current
> structure for the IAOC and IETF Trust has worked well when we face
> significant issues.  The IANA transition is the latest of these, but it’s
> clear there will be more.  I think it’s been very important that IAB chair
> is directly involved in how the IAOC responds to IETF and Internet
> community issues. Not having the IAB Chair directly involved has downsides
> that are not described in the document.
>
>
​While I agree that it is very important that the IAB ​has to be invested
in how the IAOC responds to the IETF and Internet community issues (like
the IANA transition), it already responds to many similar issues with the
advice and help of a program.  The RSOC, mentioned in the draft, is one.
To take another, there is also a long-standing progam on IANA evolution,
which has provided a great deal of insight on the transition.

> Further, it seems to me that the next phase of the IANA transition where
> the implementation starts is going to see a bigger load on the IAOC and
> IETF Trust.  A lot of decisions will have to be made and having the IAB
> Chair at the table is going to be important.
>
> ​The trade-offs here, in a nutshell, are: we can provide the Chair and
limit the time the chair spends at the table; choose a chair specifically
be​cause they have the support to devote all their time to the job; or
split the work so that the IAB gives its attention to this matter through
someone identified as best suited to the specific job.  It's not clear we
can get everything at once and even if we can in some particular historical
moment, it's not at all clear that we can count on it as a baseline.

Thanks for your review,

Ted

---

From: John C Klensin <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 02 Feb 2016 17:15:55 -0500

--On Tuesday, February 02, 2016 16:45 -0500 Michael StJohns
<[email-masked]> wrote:

> Let me suggest that instead of delegating the IAB chair
> responsibilities we, instead, change the ex-officio status
> that the various chairs currently have to observer status,
> change the organizational appointees to permit (require?)
> appointment from their appointing organizations, and  also add
> two or three additional permanent members to the IAOC, those
> members to be selected in alternate years by the Nomcom.

>...
> 2) "Doesn't a larger IAOC mean a more unwieldy organization".
> Answer:  The ex-officio chairs now move to observer status and
> can attend as they wish.  The number of voting members remains
> the same.  The members appointed by/related to a specific
> organization get reduced to 3 of 7 or 3 of 8 voting members.
> Ideally, the appointed organizational voting members have the
> IAOC as one of their primary tasks and would address the
> concern that the "IAB chair has too much to do".

At least for me, this has a lot of appeal.   The other advantage
of the observer idea is that the three key people stay on the
mailing list so that, if something significant comes up, they
are in a good position to complain to the rest of the IAOC
and/or to bring the matter to the attention of the bodies they
lead or the whole community.

While I think I understand Bob Hinden's reasoning about the IAB
Chair being "directly involved" in certain discussions and
decisions, it seems to me that the IAOC (and IETF Trust) are
primarily administrative bodies.  If they need to make
significant policy decisions, those decisions should be made in
consultation with the community (and reflecting community
consensus) and not by assertion of some inherent powers.  Having
the IAB (and even IETF and ISOC) Chairs as observers should be
more than sufficient to ensure the community is consulted when
needed, perhaps even more effective than the present arrangement.

Mike's model would presumably also expand the number of people
eligible to serve as IAOC and IETF Trust Chair, which is
probably also A Good Thing.

   john

---

From: Lou Berger <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 2 Feb 2016 17:36:23 -0500

Ted,

On 2/2/2016 4:57 PM, Ted Hardie wrote:
> On Tue, Feb 2, 2016 at 1:02 PM, Bob Hinden <[email-masked]
> <mailto:[email-masked]>> wrote:
>
>     I agree with Brian’s comments about this having to update BCP 101
>     and think it get too much into how the IAB currently organizes itself.
>
>     replaced by an committee (aka IAB Program).  The person in this
>     role is a voting member of the IAOC and IETF Trust, and needs to
>     be able to exercise their judgement in real time.  It’s going to
>     be a problem operationally if they have to consult the committee
>     before voting.  I think this needs some more work in the document.
>
>
> ​ I'm happy to work with the other authors to adjust the language on
> this, because that's not the intent.  The intent is to have the
> program lead be the voting member and to be able to exercise
> appropriate judgement in real time.  The other program members are
> there to provide advice based on their commitment to keep up with the
> *public* information from the IAOC (so not its internal
> correspondence, but the public reports, RFPs, minutes, etc.).
>
> If you have specific language you'd like to see in a revision, please
> let us know.​

To be specific:

   The program members will be responsible to review all public
   correspondence of the IAOC to the community.  This would include
   reviews of requests for proposals at that point at which they are
   made public, along with the public minutes of the IAOC meetings and
   any other reports which the IAOC may be produced.

To me, this sounds like the new IAB program will approve all 
communication from the IAOC. If this your intent, okay it says what you 
intended.  If not, I think you should add some words on the objective
of the review. Perhaps something like "...IAOC to the community and 
provide feedback to the IAB appointed IAOC members."

Lou

---

From: Ted Hardie <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 2 Feb 2016 14:49:05 -0800

> provide feedback to the IAB appointed IAOC members."
​Thanks for the text; I've sent something off to Russ and Andrew for
the next version.

Ted​

---

From: Brian E Carpenter <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 3 Feb 2016 15:30:30 +1300

Hi,

I chose to respond to Eliot's message, but I have read all the other comments so far
as well. My thoughts are below.

> it reduces the impact when the chair departs the board.

I think that for the specific case of the IAB Chair's IAOC seat, changing
it to be any voting member (except the IETF Chair) is fine, and giving the
IAB Chair a non-voting observer status is fine too. In this case, delegation
is good; I can't see a significant downside, even during the IANA transition
and the other big change that's coming, i.e. the new RFC format.

I think the IETF Chair slot is a different matter. Yes, the IETF Chair is
also the IESG Chair, but I don't believe s/he is in the IAOC on behalf of
the IESG. On the contrary, it's on behalf of the IETF. I think it's
exactly right that the IETF Chair votes in the IAOC, because nobody
else has the same overview, and also because I believe that any IETF Chair
who did not closely track the IAOC's business would be irresponsible.

I think the ISOC President slot is also a different matter, and a bit
tricky. I don't think we can declare our "funding agency" to be a non-voting
member. Also, we (the IETF) don't define ISOC's internal structure or its
methods of appointment. So it's hard for us to define who could replace the
ISOC President as a voting IAOC member and Trustee. However, I'm assuming
we wouldn't want it to be a staff appointment.

   Brian

---

From: Russ Housley <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 3 Feb 2016 10:47:22 -0500

> who did not closely track the IAOC's business would be irresponsible.

This document does not discuss the IETF Chair's seat at all.  A few years ago, we had a discussion about that on the [email-masked] list, and the community made it clear at that time that the IETF Chair needed to have a voting seat on the IAOC.

Russ

---

From: "Leslie Daigle" <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 03 Feb 2016 13:42:24 -0500

As this impacts more than just the IAB, it seems to me that this is 
incomplete without a (consensual) consideration of what the IAOC needs 
from the IAB representation.

This job is more than a liaison role, so some consideration of actual 
skillset and ability to represent the IAB view, act on behalf of the IAB 
when appropriate,  and carry matters back to the IAB for timely and 
appropriate review seem kind of key factors.  Also, if it’s not an ex 
officio position, it would seem reasonable to outline a mechanism 
whereby the IAOC could indicate to the IAB that things were not 
working/a replacement was needed.  At the same time, lack of churn is 
useful to the IAOC’s internal functioning, so some level of term 
commitment would be useful, ISTM.

(Speaking purely for myself, of course, and not from my role as a member 
of the IAOC).

If, on the other hand, that seems like too much work, then perhaps the 
“IAB Chair has too many things to do” is a fig leaf to cover some 
IAB internal politicking, which would be a shame.  There’s plenty of 
work that needs doing.

Leslie.

-- 

-------------------------------------------------------------------
Leslie Daigle
Principal, ThinkingCat Enterprises
[email-masked]
-------------------------------------------------------------------

---

From: Ted Hardie <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 3 Feb 2016 11:28:22 -0800

On Wed, Feb 3, 2016 at 10:42 AM, Leslie Daigle <[email-masked]>
wrote:

> incomplete without a (consensual) consideration of what the IAOC needs from
> the IAB representation.
>
>
​So, I had been looking at this from the framing in RFC 4071, which seems
more like "what the community needs from X and Y for the IAOC".  If that's
not the right framing, I'd be happy to adjust, but I'm a little unclear on
how to do so. What would the form of the consideration of what the IAOC
needs be?​

> appropriate review seem kind of key factors.

​In general the IAB is trying to make those abilities more general, rather
than having only the chair be able to represent the IAB, carry matters back
to the IAB, etc.​

Also, if it’s not an ex officio position, it would seem reasonable to
> outline a mechanism whereby the IAOC could indicate to the IAB that things
> were not working/a replacement was needed.  At the same time, lack of churn
> is useful to the IAOC’s internal functioning, so some level of term
> ​

​This document would have it remain an ex officio position, but shift the
office from "IAB Chair" to "Program Lead for the relevant program."  Mike's
proposal is different there.​

(Speaking purely for myself, of course, and not from my role as a member of
> the IAOC).
> “IAB Chair has too many things to do” is a fig leaf to cover some IAB
> internal politicking, which would be a shame.  There’s plenty of work that
> needs doing.
>
>
The document arose out of ​discussions in the IAB about Chair devolution in
the face of time pressures.  This is touched on in the minutes here:

https://www.iab.org/documents/minutes/minutes-2015/iab-minutes-2015-11-01/

As I said in my response, the IAB has not actually formally reviewed this
document yet, so it is the opinion of the authors, not the IAB.  Because
this would update a BCP, it will eventually need to be considered by the
IETF as a whole in any case.

regards,

Ted

---

From: Brian E Carpenter <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 4 Feb 2016 11:08:02 +1300

Ted,
On 04/02/2016 08:28, Ted Hardie wrote:
...
> office from "IAB Chair" to "Program Lead for the relevant program." 

It isn't appropriate to specify that in the update to BCP 101. The IAB happens
to organise its work in "programs" at the moment; that is entirely the IAB's
business. The relevant change to BCP 101 is to replace "The IAB Chair" by
"A voting member of the IAB, other than the IETF Chair, formally designated
by the IAB prior to the First IETF" or words to that effect.

   Brian

---

From: Andrew Sullivan <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 3 Feb 2016 17:33:46 -0500

Hi,

This is speaking as myself, coloured with my experiences.  Before I
start, I'll echo what Ted said: this is a draft in the early stages,
and we appreciate the review.

On Tue, Feb 02, 2016 at 01:02:33PM -0800, Bob Hinden wrote:
 
> I think it’s been very important that IAB chair is directly involved
>in how the IAOC responds to IETF and Internet community issues. Not
>having the IAB Chair directly involved has downsides that are not
>described in the document.

I think it is super-important that someone on the IAB is following
those matters closely.  What is not clear to me is why it needs to be
the _chair_.

The idea that it must be the chair suggests that the IAB chair has
some special status that the rest of the IAB does not.  Speaking for
myself, but with the experience of just under a year, I do not
conceive of the chair that way.

I think the chair is a service job.  The chair is there to do a few
formal things.  Also, because other organizations seem to believe in
hierarchies, it's useful to have someone you can wheel out as "the
chair".  But at least on the IABs where I've been appointed, the IAB
works really hard to find consensus.  For my part, I have been
extremely keen to ensure that when I speak with the chair hat on, it's
in line with such understanding as I've already tried to get from the
IAB.  I would trust any of my colleagues to do the same.

I think that the way the chair is appointed is in line with this.  The
IAB chair can be removed by the IAB at any time.  There is no
independent power in it, and I don't think we need for there to be.

I believe that the IETF in general, and the IAB in its mode as an IETF
activity, are better off when more state is distributed.  Certainly,
we sometimes need people who, when it is time to make a decision, are
empowered to make that decision and able to rely on the body that
asked them to make such decisions.  But that doesn't need to be the
IAB chair in every case, and this is one where I think we might get a
benefit if we didn't require the chair.
 
> Further, it seems to me that the next phase of the IANA transition
> where the implementation starts is going to see a bigger load on the
> IAOC and IETF Trust.  A lot of decisions will have to be made and
> having the IAB Chair at the table is going to be important.

It's important to note that the document doesn't say, "Not the chair."
It just says, "Needn't be."

Best regards,

A

-- 
Andrew Sullivan
[email-masked]

---

From: Dave Crocker <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 3 Feb 2016 15:53:06 -0800

On 2/3/2016 2:33 PM, Andrew Sullivan wrote:
> the_chair_.

The word "following" is the essential disparity.  It casts the IAB's 
role as basically passive monitoring.  Note, however, that there have 
already been some comments about the need for real-time decision-making. 
  That's not 'following'.

(In case it hasn't been mentioned, this is at least the second time 
there has been an effort to replace the IAB Chair's ex-officio role with 
a surrogate.  Arguably, there have been at least two.  One was de facto, 
with the surrogate having 'guest' role in the IAOC.  The second was an 
actual proposal.)

The current proposal offers odd motivations.  The logic offered in 
Section 3 of the draft mostly reduces to "the IAB chair is busy" and 
"IAB programs have been useful, so let's invoke that model for an 
operational management position"...

One question is, among the range of activities an IAB Chair does, what 
makes IAOC participation sufficiently low priority to warrant handing it 
to someone else?

Worse, the proposal seems to think that an IAB committee doing review is 
somehow equivalent to one, continuing, deeply knowledge person actually 
/participating/ in the IAOC's decision-making.  (That, at least, is what 
Section 2 of the draft opens with, noting the designation of a program 
'lead' as the sitting IAOC member, almost as an after-thought.)

There is an real dilemma here -- and maybe more than one -- and 
resolving it/them requires some care.

The job of overseeing administrative activity for an organization isn't 
all that sexy, but the organization dies if it isn't done properly.  So 
choices for who to have in positions on the committee should attend to 
background and skillset.  This is an operations job and operations is 
different from design or development.

Start with the question:  Why were the IAOC/Trust originally formulated 
with the ex-officio voting members?  I believe the answer is what has 
already been noted in this thread:  each one of those folk carry deep 
context.  Deeper than most surrogates are likely to have. With great 
regularity, IAOC decisions really do require quite a bit of context and 
quite a bit of community-oriented thinking. The I* Chairs aren't the 
only ones embodying those attributes, but they are the only ones 
embodying them reliably.

Then note that having such a high percentage of the IAOC be the 
overloaded ex-officio folk means that there are precious few 
alternatives for IAOC chair or IETF Trust chair, or for leading 
IAOC-based activities.

My suggestion a few years back, after being on the IAOC for awhile, was 
to keep the ex-officio folk on tap, for their knowledge, but move them 
to non-voting positions, and then specify 3 other folk to do the voting. 
(I think this matches St. John's current suggestion.)  In effect, that's 
a superset of what's being put forward here, but then it's trying to 
respond to multiple issues.  My proposal was dismissed as resulting in 
too many people on the IAOC/Trust. After repeatedly watching the 
challenge of getting candidates for IAOC and Trust chairs and for active 
IAOC member participation in efforts, I'll offer that it's better to 
have a reasonable-sized pool of active participants.

(As for the draft's form:  An effort to make changes here should 
certainly separate the process of populating the IAOC from any internal 
steps taken within any of the bodies feeding bodies to the IAOC.)

On 2/2/2016 6:30 PM, Brian E Carpenter wrote:
> I think the IETF Chair slot is a different matter. Yes, the IETF
> Chair is also the IESG Chair, but I don't believe s/he is in the IAOC
> on behalf of the IESG.

The concept that any voting member of the IAOC is 'representing' anyone 
other than the entire IETF strikes me as odd and during my time on the 
IAOC I don't recall anyone appearing to have a more narrow focus of concern.

> I think the ISOC President slot is also a different matter, and a
> bit tricky. I don't think we can declare our "funding agency" to be
> a non-voting member.

Arguably, they shouldn't be voting members, but then neither should 
anyone on staff.  In both cases, having a vote invites potential 
conflict of interest situations.  (Reminder:  CoI is about the 
/potential/ for conflict in goals from the organizational positions; 
it's not about specific people.)

And just to offer some variety: the ISOC and staff representatives often 
are the only ones with much direct management experience...

d/

---

From: "John Levine" <[email-masked]>
Date: 4 Feb 2016 01:28:36 -0000

>makes IAOC participation sufficiently low priority to warrant handing it 

I'd look at it another way: is the IAOC sufficiently unlike the IAB
chair's other activities that it would make sense to send someone with
more experience or interest in it?

While I have the greatest respect for the IAB chair, if someone else
has more interest or experience in making budgets and hotel conference
management and trademark license law, why not let them do it and
report back to the IAB?

R's,
John

---

From: Andrew Sullivan <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 3 Feb 2016 20:39:01 -0500

Hi Dave,

On Wed, Feb 03, 2016 at 03:53:06PM -0800, Dave Crocker wrote:
> 
> The word "following" is the essential disparity.  It casts the IAB's role as
> basically passive monitoring.  Note, however, that there have already been
> some comments about the need for real-time decision-making.  That's not
> 'following'.

You seem to have elided the very part of my message where I said,
"Certainly, we sometimes need people who, when it is time to make a
decision, are empowered to make that decision and able to rely on the
body that asked them to make such decisions.  But that doesn't need to
be the IAB chair in every case, and this is one where I think we might
get a benefit if we didn't require the chair."  I suppose I could have
used a word other than "following", but the point was that we need
someone who is fully up to speed on things.  That is to say…

> /participating/ in the IAOC's decision-making.

… one, continuing, deeply knowledgeable person.  If it's important to
you to distinguish between "following" and "participating" here, I'm
happy to grant it.  But none of that gets to the problem that is
really bothering me, which is …

> the ex-officio voting members?  I believe the answer is what has already
> been noted in this thread:  each one of those folk carry deep context.
> Deeper than most surrogates are likely to have. With great regularity, IAOC
> decisions really do require quite a bit of context and quite a bit of
> community-oriented thinking. The I* Chairs aren't the only ones embodying
> those attributes, but they are the only ones embodying them reliably.

… this.  I don't think it is healthy, for the IAB or for the
community, that we act as though the way to make this all work well is
to have some _one_ who has all the state.  I think in the case of the
IAB we should distribute the state more widely.  I think it makes for
a more effective and useful body.  It also is a practical effect of
taking seriously our usual claims that we work by consensus, that we
reject kings and presidents, and so on.

As part of that move, we also get the happy benefit that more people
can be considered for IAB chair, because it will entail a smaller time
donation by whoever ends up as the chair.  From the point of view of
organizational diversity, that seems to me to be a significant
advantage too.

> My suggestion a few years back, after being on the IAOC for awhile,
> was to keep the ex-officio folk on tap, for their knowledge, but
> move them to non-voting positions, and then specify 3 other folk to
> do the voting. (I think this matches St. John's current suggestion.)

I also think it matches, but it seems to me that this will either be
ineffective or else it will just add more cooks to the kitchen:

    • If the _ex officio_ people are not really expected to be paying
      attention, then the expertise you are hoping to get won't be
      available: every time you need the supposed special knowledge of
      one of those people, you'll end up having to read them in
      entirely to the issue.  That's no different than having someone
      go back to consult with others on an issue.

    • If the _ex officio_ people are expected to be participating as
      enthusiastically as they are at present (I would like to think
      that I'm holding up my end of the log in the IAOC and Trust, but
      my colleagues there should feel free to correct me), then all we
      get are more committee members.  In my experience, it is a rare
      administrative task that is made either more efficient or better
      delivered by adding more people to the committee.  Perhaps your
      experience differs.

I'm sorry that the draft apparently reads as some sort of complaint
that the IAB chair is too busy to do this.  We'll try to fix that in a
revision.  Now, it's true that there is a time burden; and it's
certainly true this year that, because of events in another
organization, the time commitment has been a little greater than I
(and my employer) had expected.  It's also true that previous IAB
chairs have noted this as a problem.  But it's not the main problem,
in my view.  The main problem is that we think there should be one
person in the middle of all these different things.  It has struck me
more than once that if someone brought us a system with a giant single
state-exchange mechanism in the middle, many of us would immediately
say, "Won't scale, and too brittle and vulnerable."  Yet we seem to
think it a good feature in the organization.  I'm arguing that we can
try another way.

Best regards,

A

-- 
Andrew Sullivan
[email-masked]

---

From: Michael StJohns <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 3 Feb 2016 22:31:14 -0500

On 2/3/2016 8:39 PM, Andrew Sullivan wrote:
> But that doesn't need to
> get a benefit if we didn't require the chair."

Hi Andrew - I don't necessarily disagree with this - but, the IAOC and 
the IETF trust are linked in a very interesting way.  While it might be 
useful (and doable) to provide a "pluggable" IAOC  IAB member, because 
of the way the trust is currently structured I don't think that's a 
useful approach.

> Individuals shall be eligible to be Trustees only for so long as they 
> are Eligible Persons. 

> "Eligible Person" means, subject to Section 6.1, a then-current member 
> of the IAOC, duly appointed and in good standing in accordance with 
> the procedures of the IAOC established pursuant to IETF document BCP 
> 101, RFC 4071 (April 2005), and any duly approved successor documents, 
> updates or amendments thereto, including the RFC issued to update 
> BCP-101 to reflect the establishment of this Trust.

The IAB, IETF and ISOC chairs are members of both the trust and the IAOC 
- the latter on an ex-officio basis and the former based on their 
membership on the IAOC and their concurrence to serve as a trustee.

The position of the IAB, IETF and ISOC chairs are more or less stable.  
The IETF chair generally changes no more than once every two years, the 
IAB chair no more than once a year.  That stability is useful for both 
the IAOC and the trust - indeed, BCP101 has the appointed members 
serving for 2 years.  If you desire to swap the IAB chair for some other 
member of the IAB, you will need to address that stability issue, and, 
given that BCP101 is NOT an IAB document, you will have to convince the 
community that your proposed changes are in the best interest of the 
community, and not just in the best interests of the IAB or the IAB chair.

You *do* have a tool under IAB control to assign an IAB member to the 
IAOC: the IAB (per BCP 101) appoints one member of the IAOC. Generally, 
you've gone to the community for this member, but there appears to be no 
requirement in BCP101 that you do this, you could instead appoint the 
member from the body of the IAB with no community approval required.

In any event, the preamble of the draft should address the following:

1) Why should the IAB continue to have an ex-officio member?  What 
interests of the IETF are served by allowing an ex-officio member from 
the IAB?
2) Why should the IAB ex-officio member not necessarily be the IAB 
chair?  How does the selection of the non-IAB chair ex-officio member 
occur in a way that serves the IETF's interests?
3) What is the term of any non-chair ex-officio member?   Do they carry 
over if their term on the IAB ends?  May they be replaced at the IAB 
chair's pleasure?
4) Should the IAB continue to have the power to appoint two voting 
members?  Do the conditions that were in place at the inception of the 
IAOC still argue for the current voting structure of the IAOC and IETF 
Trust?

The draft addresses the benefits - sort of - to the IAB's concept of its 
new structure (e.g. programs), but other than noting that a non-IAB 
chair may be more capable in the financial realm, doesn't really address 
the rest of these.

I'd suggest reforming this document as proposed language changes to 
BCP101 and let the community whack on it that way.   The changes to 
BCP101 can't be a standalone document without explaining how BCP101 
changes and the full impact of those changes.  The body of the draft 
should propose chapter and line changes to BCP101 along the lines of  
"Section xx of BCP101 (RFCxxx) is deleted and replaced with the 
following text"....

Alternately, open up the current RFC for changes and publish the 
successor document.

Later, Mike

---

From: John C Klensin <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 04 Feb 2016 00:01:17 -0500

Andrew,

A few more observations inline below, but, coming back to
something I said earlier, I'm much more interested in the
question of whether the IAOC is being effective today and how we
can make it more so than I am in how the IAB organizes itself.
In part because of the worked example I cited earlier (and some
others), I don't see the IAOC as working well.   I'd be happy to
be contradicted but, from the outside, it looks as if part of
the problem is too large a percentage of the membership being
stretched too thin.   

I am also completely unsympathetic to arguments that we have to
have the IAB Chair (and the IETF Chair, etc.) as members of the
IETF Trust, therefore we can't take them off the IAOC.  First,
I'm not persuaded it is true, partially because I'm not aware of
any mysterious induction ritual for either role in which someone
comes around with magical IPR and/or financial oil and sprinkles
it over new IAB and IETF Chairs, thereby blessing them with
extensive knowledge and wisdom in those areas.   It was perhaps
just too long ago, but I'm sure no one treated me to any such
process of anointment.     More important, the decision to
constitute the IETF Trust by making the Trustees the membership
of the IAOC occurred at a particular time and under particular
(perhaps even peculiar) circumstances.   The period during which
we couldn't change those arrangements expired years ago.  I
don't remember the issue being discussed, at least in recent
years, but it appears to me that, the occasional request to
create a derived work from an IETF document aside, most of the
responsibilities of the Trust and Trustees are strategic, which
most of the IOAC's rule is, as the name implies, administrative
functions, budgeting, and managing the IAD and other contractual
functions.  It appears to me that argues much more strongly for
separating the two than for making one less effective in order
to preserve the "same membership" relationship.

More inline below.

--On Wednesday, February 03, 2016 20:39 -0500 Andrew Sullivan
<[email-masked]> wrote:

> community, that we act as though the way to make this all work
> well is to have some _one_ who has all the state.  I think in
> the case of the IAB we should distribute the state more
> widely.  I think it makes for a more effective and useful
> body.  It also is a practical effect of taking seriously our
> usual claims that we work by consensus, that we reject kings
> and presidents, and so on.

I think this is key.   I also believe that, when the Nomcom is
evaluating the interests and skill set for the IETF Chair and
the IAB is evaluating the interests and skill set for the IAB
Chair, "has the knowledge, interest, and commitment to be a
really good IAOC member" does not head the list and indeed may
be far enough down on the list to not be very significant...
especially in an environment in which those positions have to be
filled from a pool that is very limited for other reasons.

> As part of that move, we also get the happy benefit that more
> people can be considered for IAB chair, because it will entail
> a smaller time donation by whoever ends up as the chair.  From
> the point of view of organizational diversity, that seems to
> me to be a significant advantage too.

Exactly.

>> My suggestion a few years back, after being on the IAOC for
>> awhile, was to keep the ex-officio folk on tap, for their
>> knowledge, but move them to non-voting positions, and then
>> specify 3 other folk to do the voting. (I think this matches
>> St. John's current suggestion.)
> 
> I also think it matches, but it seems to me that this will
> either be ineffective or else it will just add more cooks to
> the kitchen:
> 
>     • If the _ex officio_ people are not really expected to
> be paying       attention, then the expertise you are hoping
> to get won't be       available: every time you need the
> supposed special knowledge of       one of those people,
> you'll end up having to read them in       entirely to the
> issue.  That's no different than having someone       go back
> to consult with others on an issue.
> 
>     • If the _ex officio_ people are expected to be
> participating as       enthusiastically as they are at present
> (I would like to think       that I'm holding up my end of the
> log in the IAOC and Trust, but       my colleagues there
> should feel free to correct me), then all we       get are
> more committee members.  In my experience, it is a rare
> administrative task that is made either more efficient or
> better       delivered by adding more people to the committee.
> Perhaps your       experience differs.

I think the above is true, but I interpreted Mike's proposal in
the context of some of the other things being said at the same
time as wanting the _ex officio_ people (or at least the IETF
and IAB Chairs) as observers, not merely "non voting members".
That would imply a model closer to your first one, membership in
the mailing list, but no expectation of active participation...
but an ability to step in if they saw it as needed, e.g., if
something was going wrong.   It also implies absolutely no
expectation of their bringing special expertise or perspective
-- expertise and perspective that could come from anyone on the
relevant other bodies who was really interested -- to the IAOC
on a regular basis.   

If we separated the IAOC and the Trust, I could see advantages
to leaving the two Chairs as voting Trustees, but decoupling
them from the IAOC entirely, replacing them with designees from
the IAB and IESG membership.

> The main
> problem is that we think there should be one person in the
> middle of all these different things.

Exactly.  As I suggested earlier, there really were good reasons
for this when we set the IAOC (and then the Trust) up, but most
or all of those reasons are long past.

> It has struck me more
> than once that if someone brought us a system with a giant
> single state-exchange mechanism in the middle, many of us
> would immediately say, "Won't scale, and too brittle and
> vulnerable."  Yet we seem to think it a good feature in the
> organization.  I'm arguing that we can try another way.

And I'm arguing that doing things differently is long overdue.

     john

p.s. While I think the IAB should organize this (like most other
things) any way it sees fit, I don't see it as a good match for
the Program model, partially for the reasons Dave cites.    I
think your document should just say that that IAB selects
someone from its membership (as distinct from the IAB's current
appointment to the IAOC who has traditionally not been from the
IAB membership and who has no charge to bring an IAB perspective
to the IAOC/Trust or keep the IAB informed when issues of IAB
interest show up on the IAOC/Trust agenda).   Whether that
person has Program support or some other setup seems to me to be
an internal IAB matter and of much less interest.

---

From: Dave Crocker <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 4 Feb 2016 06:18:05 -0800

Andrew,

> You seem to have elided the very part of my message where I said,

I assume folk have the original.  Quoted text is for setting context to 
the response.

> really bothering me, which is …

The problem I cited was that the the need for a continuing participant, 
with appropriate context from outside the IAOC and from within, is key 
to the basis for the current ex-officio model.  Any effort to change the 
model needs to explain the ability to satisfy the functional goals of 
the position.

Also, the current draft is attempting to change a defined position for 
the IAOC/Trust but casts itself, instead, as making an IAB change.  You 
need to cast a proposal in terms of the IAOC and the IETF Trust, not in 
terms of the IAB.

And to establish a linkage to a separate sub-thread:  I think it would 
be quite a good thing to start with a discussion of 
deficiencies/limityations of IAOC and IETF Trust operations and views of 
how to improve its operation.  No, this needn't be comprehensive, 
attempting to boil the IAOC/Trust ocean.  The essence of the current 
proposal is an concern about staffing the IAOC/Trust.  That's a 
perfectly reasonable point of focus, to narrow the discussion.

> IAB we should distribute the state more widely.

Distribution of knowledge and responsibility.  At the level of 
granularity you and the draft have offered, the usual result for such an 
approach is an operation with poor context and little accountability. 
It makes up for this by also being slow and frustrating for everyone 
involved.

>  I think it makes for
> a more effective and useful body.

Please provide examples for an operations-related efforts like this that 
demonstrate this result.  (And to anticipate the possible retort that I 
need to do the same for my assertion I'll offer that you folks are 
proposing the change, so you folk need to substantiate its operational 
superiority.)

   It also is a practical effect of
> reject kings and presidents, and so on.

So, rather than having one level of diverse-participation committee 
decision-making (the IAOC or the IETF Trust), you are proposing that we 
have two levels, namely the existing one plus the IAB program.  And you 
think that will produce improved results.  Why not just make all IETF 
decision-making be consensus-based by the IETF itself?  I offer that, 
not a strawman, reductio ad absurdum extreme, but as the natural 
conclusion to the justification you've just given.

>        get are more committee members.

You've forced things into two choices, when there actually are more.

>  The main problem is that we think there should be one

The error in that analysis is that the IAOC/Trust is (are?) already an 
entity composed of a diverse sampling from the community that provides 
representation.  Adding another layer with more of the same doesn't 
obviously provide benefit and does obviously add to complexity and delay.

Suggestion:  A number of people have separately offered some very basic 
concerns about the proposal.  These concerns are not fixed with just 
better writing of the draft.  They call for re-thinking the issues and 
re-casting a proposal in terms of those issues.

Again, I think that it would be consonant among those separately-offered 
concerns to cast the proposal in terms of the IAOC/Trust, rather than in 
terms of the IAB.

d/

---

From: Ted Hardie <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 4 Feb 2016 10:10:41 -0800

​Comments in-line.

Ted​

On Wed, Feb 3, 2016 at 7:31 PM, Michael StJohns <[email-masked]>
wrote:

> Hi Andrew - I don't necessarily disagree with this - but, the IAOC and the
> IETF trust are linked in a very interesting way.  While it might be useful
> (and doable) to provide a "pluggable" IAOC  IAB member, because of the way
> the trust is currently structured I don't think that's a useful approach.
>
> Individuals shall be eligible to be Trustees only for so long as they are
>> Eligible Persons.
>>
>
> "Eligible Person" means, subject to Section 6.1, a then-current member of
>> the IAOC, duly appointed and in good standing in accordance with the
>> procedures of the IAOC established pursuant to IETF document BCP 101, RFC
>> 4071 (April 2005), and any duly approved successor documents, updates or
>> amendments thereto, including the RFC issued to update BCP-101 to reflect
>> the establishment of this Trust.
>>
>
> The IAB, IETF and ISOC chairs are members of both the trust and the IAOC -
> the latter on an ex-officio basis and the former based on their membership
> on the IAOC and their concurrence to serve as a trustee.
>
> The IETF chair generally changes no more than once every two years, the IAB
> chair no more than once a year.  That stability is useful for both the IAOC
> and the trust - indeed, BCP101 has the appointed members serving for 2
> years.  If you desire to swap the IAB chair for some other member of the
> IAB, you will need to address that stability issue, and, given that BCP101
> is NOT an IAB document, you will have to convince the community that your
> proposed changes are in the best interest of the community, and not just in
> the best interests of the IAB or the IAB chair.
>

​
​So, there is a bit of conflict in advice here.  On the one hand, folks
have said that the update to BCP 101 should say nothing more than that the
IAB will appoint someone, since the rest of this is internal machinery to
the IAB.  But I think your point that any document describing the change
needs to address​ the stability (and overall benefit) is a good one.  In
the working copy of the draft, I've added the following as a hint of how we
might handle that:

After community discussion, it is likely that this document will
be split into two distinct parts:  one which updates the IAOC
membership section of the relevant BCP and another which
describes the IAB’s program.

​After we've had the community discussion on the joint document, in other
words, I think we may be able to pull it apart.

Secondly, as I was considering the "internal mechanics" vs. external
expectation question, it struck me that there was a situation which could
easily arise now that would test this same situation in a slightly
different way.   Imagine for a moment that an IAB wanted to appoint two
co-chairs rather than a single chair.  That might be because an ongoing
chair had parental leave coming up, for general time management, or because
of the general point Andrew made before about the IAB acting without or
presidents. RFC 2850 currently says "select one", but an update to that to
allow co-chairs would then require the internal mechanics for how the ex
officio memberships were handled to be part of the udpated charter (which
is a BCP).  So the end result after community discussion would actually be
a document that updates both BCP 101 and BCP 39.  To meet community needs
for certainty here, in other words, we may actually need the IAB mechanics
for this have the form of a BCP.  Maybe not, but I don't think we should
rule it out entirely.

​Lastly, I think it would be useful for you to write up your proposal as
well; it makes trade-offs that are different from the ones we put forward,
and it would be useful to have them spelled out in a draft.
​
regards,

Ted

---

From: Brian E Carpenter <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 5 Feb 2016 08:22:14 +1300

On one particular issue:
On 04/02/2016 18:01, John C Klensin wrote:
...
> More important, the decision to

Logically that is certainly true, although membership of the
two bodies should probably overlap for practical reasons. However,
I think another (unwritten) argument back in 2005 was simply
to avoid adding yet another appointment process for the Trust,
twisting the arms of another set of volunteers, and so on. That
argument still seems valid.

    Brian

P.S. I don't remember an anointment ceremony either. It was more
like baptism by fire.

---

From: Andrew Sullivan <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 5 Feb 2016 19:26:49 -0500

Hi,

> The position of the IAB, IETF and ISOC chairs are more or less stable.

The IETF and ISOC chairs have nothing to do with this draft, so I'll
set that aside.  The position of IAB member is more stable than IAB
chair, since the IAB chair is always appointed for one year.  

> IAB, you will need to address that stability issue,

Surely, then, the way to do this is for the IAB to appoint someone for
a year, since that is the expected lifetime of the _ex officio_
membership anyway?

> and, given that BCP101

Yes, which is why the draft is not intending to be an IAB stream
document.  I thought that was obvious.

> You *do* have a tool under IAB control to assign an IAB member to the IAOC:

But that's irrelevant to the current draft, which is not about the
person the IAB appoints but about an appointment that currently
happens as an accident of some other position.

> 2) Why should the IAB ex-officio member not necessarily be the IAB chair?
> How does the selection of the non-IAB chair ex-officio member occur in a way
> that serves the IETF's interests?

I don't understand why people keep putting the burden of proof that
way.  Why should the IAB _ex officio_ member be the IAB chair? BCP101
makes no effort to justify that, as near as I can tell, and actually
calls out a reason not to do this: " While there are no hard rules
regarding how the IAB and the IESG should select members of the IAOC,
such appointees need not be current IAB or IESG members (and probably
should not be, if only to avoid overloading the existing leadership)."

In any case, I think there's more than one reform that might be nice,
and it seems to me that those who think we need to solve a different
problem than the one Ted, Russ, and I are suggesting ought to produce
their own draft, so that different approaches can be evaluated.

Best regards,

A

-- 
Andrew Sullivan
[email-masked]

---

From: "Scott O. Bradner" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 6 Feb 2016 06:26:27 -0500

one comment

> On Feb 5, 2016, at 7:26 PM, Andrew Sullivan <[email-masked]> wrote:
> 
> 

it was (and is) no accident

that was the design

Scott

---

From: Eliot Lear <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 6 Feb 2016 16:54:19 +0100

Hi Scott,

> it was (and is) no accident

Ok, but running code has demonstrated that that it ought to change.  See
other comments.

Eliot

---

From: Michael StJohns <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 6 Feb 2016 11:25:29 -0500

Hi Andrew -

Before I get into your body text, I'm going to do some level setting.

There are actually two questions to be asked and answered with respect 
to the IAB and the IAOC:

   1) How many members of the IAOC should the IAB appoint?
   2) What constraints should be applied to those appointments?

The possibilities as I see them:

  --- Status quo:
The IAB appoints two members one of which shares the body and term of 
the IAB chair, the other has no constraints other than being appointed 
for two years.
     [Narrative:  This is the original and current model and assumes 
that there is benefit to the IAB and the IAOC of having the IAB chair as 
a member of the IAOC]

--- Draft proposes
The IAB appoints two members one of which shall be an IAB member and the 
other with no constraints.  Note that the draft does not address the 
term of the IAB member on the IAOC, nor whether the member can be 
replaced by the IAB whenever they want.
    [Narrative:  The IAB chair has a lot on his plate and the IAOC isn't 
as important to the IAB as other things, but the IAB would like to 
continue to appoint two members including one from the IAB.]

--- Other possibilities.
  The IAB appoints no members.
    [Narrative:  The IAB has little or no relevance with respect to the 
administration of the IETF and the IETF would probably be better off if 
the two members currently appointed by the IAB were appointed by the 
Nomcom on the standard two year basis.]

   The IAB appoints one member with no constraints other than the two 
year term.  The IAB MAY appoint an IAB member to the IAOC, however that 
member will serve for the full two year term even if their IAB term ends.
   [Narrative:  The IAB has only minor relevance with respect to the 
administration of the IETF and it makes sense to let the IAB decide how 
involved they want to be.]

   The IAB appoints one member with the constraint that the member is 
from the IAB and serves a one year term at each appointment.
   [Narrative:  The IAB has some occasional relevance with respect to 
the administration of the IETF and the IETF feels that having a 
permanent IAB member benefits both the IAOC and the IAB]

Note that I generally believe that "benefits the IAB" generally comes 
down to "we hear what's going on and we get a vote" rather than anything 
broader.  "Benefits the IAOC" generally comes down to "having the IAB 
chair here means that we get buy-in and some of his time to deal with 
the niggling details" or something similar.   These are actually 
somewhat quid pro quo things and we probably shouldn't sever the 
relationship between them without understand what each side gains/loses.

For the options above, I'm actually leaning towards either no IAB 
appointees or one IAB member appointee.  Basically, its no longer clear 
why the IAB should be selecting two members of the IAOC.

More inline below:

> chair, since the IAB chair is always appointed for one year.
The "nothing to do with this draft" is a bit of sophistry as the IAB, 
IETF and ISOC were given the exact same setup in how they related to the 
IAOC (e.g. chair plus one appointee).  If you're readdressing whether or 
not the IAB chair should serve on the IAOC, it's probable that we should 
also take a look at the other ex-officio positions as they have the same 
original basis as the IAB.  Yes, this is a draft from the IAB - but it 
probably shouldn't be.

The draft does not discuss the term of the IAB member on the IAOC. What 
happens if you appoint someone with only 6 months left on their IAB 
term?    Can the IAB replace the person at any time?  Given that the IAB 
can replace program chairs at any time and you've got the ex-officio 
member being the program chair, it would be useful to make this explicit.

> a year, since that is the expected lifetime of the _ex officio_

Yup.  Add it to the draft.  I would also say that you can't appoint 
someone to the IAOC who has less than a year left on the IAB.
> document.  I thought that was obvious.

Let's see.  The document does not purport to modify BCP101; the only 
reference to the IAOC RFC is in the introduction and only to explain how 
the IAOC was born; there is no reference to text in the BCP that would 
need to be modified; and all you talk about is the IAB...

How is "not an IAB stream" document obvious except through these 
discussions?

> happens as an accident of some other position.

See my comments above.  If you're going to open up the question of 
"who", I think that the question of "how many" is also relevant.

> should not be, if only to avoid overloading the existing leadership)."

Hmm... apples and oranges.  The section you quoted applies to the 
non-ex-officio members.

With respect to the rest - of course you always have to justify changes, 
and like it or not, this is a change from the status quo.

Think of this as a contract negotiation - its probably the closest 
analog.   I understand that you want to do something that provides you 
(in your persona as IAB chair) an immediate benefit by reducing your 
responsibilities.  I'm asking "what's in it for the rest of us?"   What 
is the benefit to the IETF for making the change?  (And related to this, 
what is the benefit to the IETF for letting the IAB retain the power to 
appoint two members of the IAOC?)

> their own draft, so that different approaches can be evaluated.

I saw Ted's comment.   It reminded me of a time where I was buying a car 
and I made an offer and the sales manager suggested I make a higher 
offer rather than them making a counter offer.   I see no need to argue 
against myself.

I'm perfectly happy if you only want to address the IAB stuff, BUT, this 
draft in its current form is inadequate to do that.  It needs to address 
changes to BCP101 and provide specific text changes to that document so 
the rest of us can figure out both what you're proposing and whether or 
not - taken as a whole - that will work for the IAOC and the IETF.

Later, Mike

---

From: Brian E Carpenter <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 7 Feb 2016 08:06:45 +1300

Mike,

The IAB has oversight responsibility for the RFC Editor. The IAOC oversees
the IAD, who manages contracts for the community, including the RFC editing
contracts. I therefore believe that having a voting IAB member among the voting
members of the IAOC is appropriate. Otherwise the IAB doesn't have a clear
"chain of command" (or, alternatively, "the buck stops here") linkage to
that aspect of the RFC Editor.

A similar argument shows why the IAB should be directly linked to the
IETF Trust, which holds the rights in RFCs and may come to hold the rights in
IANA data.

Neither argument shows that the person needs to be the IAB Chair, IMHO.

I regard this as quite disjoint from how the ordinary members of the IAOC
are appointed. Splitting that job between the IESG, the IAB and the Nomcom
was a fairly arbitrary choice, but I think the Nomcom has a big enough
job already.

    Brian

On 07/02/2016 05:25, Michael StJohns wrote:
> There are actually two questions to be asked and answered with respect to the IAB and the IAOC:
> 
> The IAB appoints two members one of which shares the body and term of the IAB chair, the other has no constraints other than
> being appointed for two years.
>     [Narrative:  This is the original and current model and assumes that there is benefit to the IAB and the IAOC of having the
> IAB chair as a member of the IAOC]
> 
> --- Draft proposes
> The IAB appoints two members one of which shall be an IAB member and the other with no constraints.  Note that the draft does
> not address the term of the IAB member on the IAOC, nor whether the member can be replaced by the IAB whenever they want.
>    [Narrative:  The IAB chair has a lot on his plate and the IAOC isn't as important to the IAB as other things, but the IAB
> would like to continue to appoint two members including one from the IAB.]
> 
> --- Other possibilities.
>    [Narrative:  The IAB has little or no relevance with respect to the administration of the IETF and the IETF would probably be
> better off if the two members currently appointed by the IAB were appointed by the Nomcom on the standard two year basis.]
> 
>   The IAB appoints one member with no constraints other than the two year term.  The IAB MAY appoint an IAB member to the IAOC,
> however that member will serve for the full two year term even if their IAB term ends.
>   [Narrative:  The IAB has only minor relevance with respect to the administration of the IETF and it makes sense to let the IAB
> decide how involved they want to be.]
> 
>   The IAB appoints one member with the constraint that the member is from the IAB and serves a one year term at each appointment.
>   [Narrative:  The IAB has some occasional relevance with respect to the administration of the IETF and the IETF feels that
> having a permanent IAB member benefits both the IAOC and the IAB]
> 
> 
> Note that I generally believe that "benefits the IAB" generally comes down to "we hear what's going on and we get a vote" rather
> than anything broader.  "Benefits the IAOC" generally comes down to "having the IAB chair here means that we get buy-in and some
> of his time to deal with the niggling details" or something similar.   These are actually somewhat quid pro quo things and we
> probably shouldn't sever the relationship between them without understand what each side gains/loses.
> 
> For the options above, I'm actually leaning towards either no IAB appointees or one IAB member appointee.  Basically, its no
> longer clear why the IAB should be selecting two members of the IAOC.
> 
> More inline below:
> 
> 
> 
> The "nothing to do with this draft" is a bit of sophistry as the IAB, IETF and ISOC were given the exact same setup in how they
> related to the IAOC (e.g. chair plus one appointee).  If you're readdressing whether or not the IAB chair should serve on the
> IAOC, it's probable that we should also take a look at the other ex-officio positions as they have the same original basis as
> the IAB.  Yes, this is a draft from the IAB - but it probably shouldn't be.
> 
> 
> The draft does not discuss the term of the IAB member on the IAOC. What happens if you appoint someone with only 6 months left
> on their IAB term?    Can the IAB replace the person at any time?  Given that the IAB can replace program chairs at any time and
> you've got the ex-officio member being the program chair, it would be useful to make this explicit.
> 
> Yup.  Add it to the draft.  I would also say that you can't appoint someone to the IAOC who has less than a year left on the IAB.
>>
>>> and, given that BCP101
> Let's see.  The document does not purport to modify BCP101; the only reference to the IAOC RFC is in the introduction and only
> to explain how the IAOC was born; there is no reference to text in the BCP that would need to be modified; and all you talk
> about is the IAB...
> 
> How is "not an IAB stream" document obvious except through these discussions?
> 
>>
> See my comments above.  If you're going to open up the question of "who", I think that the question of "how many" is also relevant.
> 
>>
> Hmm... apples and oranges.  The section you quoted applies to the non-ex-officio members.
> 
> With respect to the rest - of course you always have to justify changes, and like it or not, this is a change from the status quo.
> 
> Think of this as a contract negotiation - its probably the closest analog.   I understand that you want to do something that
> provides you (in your persona as IAB chair) an immediate benefit by reducing your responsibilities.  I'm asking "what's in it
> for the rest of us?"   What is the benefit to the IETF for making the change?  (And related to this, what is the benefit to the
> IETF for letting the IAB retain the power to appoint two members of the IAOC?)
> 
>>
> I saw Ted's comment.   It reminded me of a time where I was buying a car and I made an offer and the sales manager suggested I
> make a higher offer rather than them making a counter offer.   I see no need to argue against myself.
> 
> I'm perfectly happy if you only want to address the IAB stuff, BUT, this draft in its current form is inadequate to do that.  It
> needs to address changes to BCP101 and provide specific text changes to that document so the rest of us can figure out both what
> you're proposing and whether or not - taken as a whole - that will work for the IAOC and the IETF.
> 
> Later, Mike
> 
> 
> 
>>
>> Best regards,
>>
>> A
>>
> 
>

---

From: Michael StJohns <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 6 Feb 2016 15:47:48 -0500

See below

> was a fairly arbitrary choice, but I think the Nomcom has a big enough

Hi Brian -

IMO, I think you've made a good argument for retaining at least one IAB 
member on the IAOC, an incomplete argument for why that member need not 
be the IAB chair and a very poor argument as to why the IAB should 
continue to appoint a second person.

WRT the incomplete argument I'd ask the current (and past members) of 
the IAOC to comment on the following questions (to paraphrase Leslie's 
note quite a bit):

     Are there specific benefits to the IAOC to having the IAB chair 
continue as a member of the IAOC that would not be met if he/she were 
replaced by another member of the IAB?
     Are there specific issues the IAOC might encounter if the IAB chair 
were not a member of the IAOC and how could those issues be mitigated?
     [If you were still on the IAOC,] Would you object to the change and 
for what reasons?

So far I *think* I haven't seen anyone currently on the IAOC comment on 
the above.

For the poor argument related to why the IAB should continue to appoint 
a second person - seriously??  "The Nomcom has a big enough job 
already".   I might find this a reasonable argument if (and pretty much 
only if) the Nomcom weren't already required to (advertise for and 
interview and ) appoint an IAOC member every term.   AFAICT, having the 
Nomcom change that to two (or even three) per year and removing the need 
for the other two (or three - not quite sure about ISOC) bodies to 
advertise, interview, and select would reduce the workload on the IAB, 
IESG and maybe ISOC without actually increasing the workload of the 
Nomcom much if at all. [This is based on the observation that the same 
people will probably apply to the IAB, IESG and Nomcom solicitations and 
if all three bodies are doing their jobs in a complete manner similar to 
what the Nomcom should be doing, that seems like a lot of redundancy in 
the process.]

Later, Mike

---

From: "Scott O. Bradner" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 6 Feb 2016 16:17:08 -0500

from this IAOC member’s point of view  - maybe distorted by the specific issues the IAOC has been dealing with of late

> On Feb 6, 2016, at 3:47 PM, Michael StJohns <[email-masked]> wrote:
> 
> 
> WRT the incomplete argument I'd ask the current (and past members) of the IAOC to comment on the following questions (to paraphrase Leslie's note quite a bit):
> 
>    Are there specific benefits to the IAOC to having the IAB chair continue as a member of the IAOC that would not be met if he/she were replaced by another member of the IAB?

yes, a major (but not majority) topic in the last year has been about internet governance and what impacts the changes
in IANA management might have on the IETF and on the IETF Trust - it seems that, at least for the last two IAB chairs, the
IAB chair has been the IAB point person on these topics and the chair’s direct knowledge of what has been going on has
been quite helpful

having the IAB chair on the IAOC might not make much difference in other topics, such as the specifics of the RFC editor task set, or
meeting locations, if another IAB member with knowledge of the topics were to replace the chair

there is a image factor - that the IAB considers the IAOC important enough to ensure that the IAOC role is part of the chair’s
task set projects a somewhat different image than having another IAB member - not a huge issue but a factor

>    Are there specific issues the IAOC might encounter if the IAB chair were not a member of the IAOC and how could those issues be mitigated?

I see this question as redundant with the first one

>    [If you were still on the IAOC,] Would you object to the change and for what reasons?

yes, see above

Scott

---

From: Eliot Lear <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 6 Feb 2016 23:08:39 +0100

Scott,

We are going to disagree on this, I'm afraid.

> IAB chair has been the IAB point person on these topics and the chair’s direct knowledge of what has been going on has

Maybe (and I stress *maybe)* to the IAOC- *not* to the IAB nor to the
chair.  And this is a self-fulfilling prophecy.  If the chair is
required to sit on the IAOC the concentration of responsibility by
definition makes him the go to person for a LOT of things, and not just
IANA.  Moreover, it's not like the IAOC is barred from inviting *anyone*
to talk with them at their meetings.

> meeting locations, if another IAB member with knowledge of the topics were to replace the chair

And this is the point: on any given topic someone else might be more
expert.  Take for instance the RFC series.  There are two people who are
probably better equipped to speak on that matter right now than the
chair himself (no offense to Andrew).  Joe Hildebrand oversees the RSOC
program.  The IAOC would be foolish not to speak to him about the RFC
Editor in terms of their responsibilities in that regard.

> task set projects a somewhat different image than having another IAB member - not a huge issue but a factor

Would it help the image of the IAOC if they ended up in a situation
where they had an absentee chair because his time didn't permit him to
participate in the IAOC in any active way?   I'm not saying that
happened while I was on the IAB, but it could and my understanding is
that it HAS happened on the IAOC with other groups.  At that point,
short of replacing the chair, neither the IAB nor the IAOC would be in a
position to correct the situation.  And the IAB is not likely to replace
a chair for such reasons (a) due to inertia and (b) taking into account
what that person's priorities were on behalf of the board.

Finally there is the matter of good governance.  Bodies should be
allowed to choose for themselves who they have represent them at other
bodies.  That provides them the flexibility to take advantage of the
time and skills of each individual who is serving.  That, by the way,
makes the chair job *more* attractive.  Otherwise the time commitment
requirements become a serious concern.

Eliot

---

From: Andrew Sullivan <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 6 Feb 2016 17:16:03 -0500

On Sat, Feb 06, 2016 at 11:25:29AM -0500, Michael StJohns wrote:
> For the options above, I'm actually leaning towards either no IAB appointees
> or one IAB member appointee.  Basically, its no longer clear why the IAB
> should be selecting two members of the IAOC.

I think the "selecting two members" is a bit of a red herring here.
One of those members is required to be an IAB member; at the moment,
it's the chair.  I think this is a reasonable thing to do because the
IAB is in many ways the foreign office of the IETF, and that
inevitably entails interactions that might have administrative
consequences.  The RFC Editor function and the IANA function are two
obvious examples, though basically anything that might entail
expenditures and over which the IAB has oversight falls into this
category.  I think we shouldn't forget that in this discussion.  I
won't speak for the other authors, but this is at least why I was only
focussing on one narrow issue: who from the IAB ought to be on the
IAOC?  Today it's the chair, and all the proposal is intended to do, I
think, is to alter that so that it might be the chair and it might be
someone else, depending on the circumstances.

> happens if you appoint someone with only 6 months left on their IAB term?

Given that IAB terms all end at the same time, the "only 6 months"
case is identical regardless of whether it's the chair or someone
else.  So I don't understand the concern here.

> Can the IAB replace the person at any time?

Under the current rules, the answer is yes.  That is, the IAB chair
can be removed at any time by the IAB, so the IAOC member could be
too.  We should add that.

> Yup.  Add it to the draft.  I would also say that you can't appoint someone
> to the IAOC who has less than a year left on the IAB.

There's no such restriction today (the chair can be any member of the
IAB).  So why change that?

> How is "not an IAB stream" document obvious except through these

Apologies, then.  I guess I figured that, since this obviously had to
update BCP 101, it was also obvious it couldn't be IAB stream.
Speaking for myself, I confess I was surprised this attracted the
notice it did.  We thought to upload it so that the IAB could look at
it before drawing community attention to it, so it's possible that not
all the details were as mature as one might like.  That is, however,
why we have the ease of publication in the I-D repository.

> See my comments above.  If you're going to open up the question of "who", I
> think that the question of "how many" is also relevant.

I really think these are separate issues, because of the IAB
responsibilities for some of the stuff the IAOC and IAD have to
provide.  I'm perfectly prepared to have a separate discussion of
whether the IAB ought to be appointing someone who need not be an IAB
member, but I'd like to keep those issues separated.

> Hmm... apples and oranges.  The section you quoted applies to the

Yes, and it's the only discussion of such selection criteria at all.
Yet the very same reasoning doesn't apply in this case? 

> I understand that you want to do something that provides you (in your
> persona as IAB chair) an immediate benefit by reducing your
> responsibilities.

I don't think it does really provide an immediate benefit, or even a
long term one.  I suppose it might reduce a phone call or trip or two,
but that stuff is now already budgetted for me; and my employer is
anyway unlikely to fund my participation long enough for this change
to take effect, so it probably won't help me personally at all.

> I'm asking "what's in it for the rest of us?"  What is the benefit
> to the IETF for making the change?

I think the benefit is exactly as I've already suggested.  It would
reduce somewhat the things an IAB chair needs to do, thereby possibly
increasing the number of candidates and therefore possibly helping IAB
(and thereby IETF) diversity.  It would also reduce the centrality of
the one person who happens to be IAB chair in a given year; this I
regard as much more important, because it gets us away from any hint
of a "presidents and kings" model.

Best regards,

A

-- 
Andrew Sullivan
[email-masked]

---

From: Andrew Sullivan <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 6 Feb 2016 17:32:02 -0500

[as ever in this discussion, as myself only]

> IAB chair has been the IAB point person on these topics and the chair’s direct knowledge of what has been going on has

I will note that this is mostly an accident: both Russ and I were
already closely engaged in the IANA evolution program.  I was the IANA
program lead.  Russ was the lucky winner of one ICG appointment from
the IAB -- an appointment for which I was emphatically told by my
management that I could not be a candidate, perhaps because when they
agreed to fund my appointment to the IAB they had the impression that
the IAB chair had to do all those additional things, instead of IAB
members.  I really do not think that the IANA transition is the
central issue here -- either on the time-demand side, or on the
plugged-in side.

Others in the IAB have been quite happy to delegate attention to the
IANA transition to the IANA evolution program, yet I think any of my
IAB colleagues this year would have been successful chairs.  Whether
the IAOC would have been best served by someone who'd been paying less
attention historically to IANA, however, is another question, and one
the draft is intended to address.

> task set projects a somewhat different image than having another IAB member - not a huge issue but a factor

I can see just as much an argument in the other direction -- that the
IAB considers the IAOC important enough to dedicate a support program
and some designated IAB member to it, instead of just having the chair
inherit the duty as a matter of course.  Moreover, the above again
suggests that the IAB chair is special.  I just don't see it.  The
difference between what I do today as IAB chair and what I did last
year as a mere IAB member strikes me as rather little in practice; and
where the differences are apparent they mostly come down to the fact
that we keep pretending the chair is somehow more important than other
IAB members (so, for instance, my employer is more indulgent of time
commitments because I have the "chair" gold star next to my name).
I'm arguing that, as an organization, we say we have a commitment to
the chair not being more important.  So let's act that way.

Best regards,

A

-- 
Andrew Sullivan
[email-masked]

---

From: Suzanne Woolf <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 6 Feb 2016 18:52:39 -0500

Leslie,

On Feb 3, 2016, at 1:42 PM, Leslie Daigle <[email-masked]> wrote:

> 
> As this impacts more than just the IAB, it seems to me that this is incomplete without a (consensual) consideration of what the IAOC needs from the IAB representation.

This seems pretty important to me. I'm getting the sense that "IAB chair" as the ex officio IAB appointee is actually a sort of shorthand or placeholder for some requirements that weren't spelled out because it was assumed they were included in the chair role. 

People have started to review those elsewhere in the thread.

> This job is more than a liaison role, so some consideration of actual skillset and ability to represent the IAB view, act on behalf of the IAB when appropriate,  and carry matters back to the IAB for timely and appropriate review seem kind of key factors.  Also, if it’s not an ex officio position, it would seem reasonable to outline a mechanism whereby the IAOC could indicate to the IAB that things were not working/a replacement was needed.  At the same time, lack of churn is useful to the IAOC’s internal functioning, so some level of term commitment would be useful, ISTM.

This is also quite helpful. It seems likely to me that the IAB representative role is somewhat different to an IAB-appointed person to function in the same capacity as all other IAOC members, for reasons having to do with the IAB oversight role, but it would be helpful to have those details of the function spelled out rather than incorporated indirectly by specifying "IAB chair."

> If, on the other hand, that seems like too much work, then perhaps the “IAB Chair has too many things to do” is a fig leaf to cover some IAB internal politicking, which would be a shame.  There’s plenty of work that needs doing.

My support for this proposal is because I want to be sure the IAB is meeting its chartered responsibilities to the community as effectively as possible, where the community we're supposed to serve includes (is of course not limited to) the IETF, each other and an effective IAB. 

In other words, I think there's benefit here for everyone-- the IAB has more flexibility in managing its responsibilities, the IAOC can accept the IAB member most able to take on the "liaison+" role you described even if it's someone who's unavailable to be IAB chair, and none of us is barred from placing the IAB chair in the role if that's actually the best case.

I particularly don't think it's entirely for the benefit of the IAB chair, present or future.

thanks,
Suzanne

---

From: Michael StJohns <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 6 Feb 2016 19:21:07 -0500

On 2/6/2016 5:16 PM, Andrew Sullivan wrote:
> it's the chair.

Are you saying that the IAB does not select the IAB chair?  The IAB 
selects two members.  You could also logically say that the IAB chair is 
selected as a result of he/she being selected as an IAOC member.

In contrast, the IESG selects only one member.  The IETF chair, also an 
ex-officio member, gets selected by the Nomcom.    The IESG does get to 
confirm the other two IAOC members selected by the Nomcom.

I think the numbers are correct here - the IAB selects two members.

>   I think this is a reasonable thing to do
What is a reasonable thing to do?  Select two members?  Or select one 
IAB member not the chair to serve on the IAOC?

>   because the

As I pointed out, under the current rules, if you want another IAB 
member (other than the chair) to serve on the IAOC you need only appoint 
an IAB member with your current second choice.  I would expect that the 
IAOC might prefer that you as chair attend most meetings, but would be 
happy to have an IAB member watching the store for the chair.

> else.  So I don't understand the concern here.

Ummm... are we talking about the same IAB?  There are 12 members of the 
IAB, 6 of which terms end this coming IETF meeting and 6 the third 
meeting after that.   So say you appoint Mary Barnes to your 
"replacement for the chair" slot effective today?

> can be removed at any time by the IAB, so the IAOC member could be

We should NOT add that.  This is what I meant about stability.  As of 
right now to the best of my knowledge, you as IAB chair have the least 
stable term of anyone on the IAOC.  If you want to get off and put 
someone else on, then we should probably make sure that the new persons 
term is no less stable.  And while its true that the IAB chair position 
can change at any time, I believe (I'm to tired right now to confirm 
this) the IAB's own documents generally restrict that to a single 
election immediately after the new class takes its position each year.  
So the term does tend to be at least a year. And effectively, there are 
few IAB chairs who have served less than two or three years, so I'm less 
concerned about any given IAB chair swapping off the IAOC in less than a 
year or even two.

> IAB).  So why change that?

See above.  Effectively, the chair position tends to be multi-year stable.

> why we have the ease of publication in the I-D repository.

I'm actually quite surprised that you didn't have a chat with the IAOC 
and bring them in on the discussion before throwing things out as an ID....

> member, but I'd like to keep those issues separated.

Why?   If we're going to change the basis on which the IAB is 
represented on the IAOC, we should evaluate ALL the relationships 
between the IAOC and the IAB at once as they probably interact.

> Yet the very same reasoning doesn't apply in this case?

Not really.  As Scott noted in his most recent email, there's a power of 
position related to the IAB and IESG and ISOC board chair positions that 
pretty much outweighs (or moots is probably a better word) such 
selection criteria.

> to take effect, so it probably won't help me personally at all.

Fair point.  But I think you have at least another year on the IAB 
you've committed to AIRC?  If we all agreed upon this it could be done 
quickly.

> of a "presidents and kings" model.
I kind of doubt the deletion of IAOC duties from the IAB chair's plate 
is going to make that job more attractive due to less work. It might 
make it more attractive due to not being on the IAOC - which is at its 
core a hard and pretty much thankless job.   And taking you/chair off 
the IAOC is not really going to do much to "reduce the centrality" of 
the IAB chair.

But that's really not a benefit "for the rest of us" per se.

Later, Mike

---

From: Brian E Carpenter <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 7 Feb 2016 13:29:03 +1300

Sorry to prolong this correspondence but I have a couple of comments below on Mike's
comments.

As background, here is what I consider to be a key extract from RFC 4071:

"3.3.  Relationship of the IAOC to Existing IETF Leadership

   The IAOC is directly accountable to the IETF community for the
   performance of the IASA.  However, the nature of the IAOC's work
   involves treating the IESG and IAB as major internal customers of the
   administrative support services.  The IAOC and the IAD should not
   consider their work successful unless the IESG and IAB are also
   satisfied with the administrative support that the IETF is receiving."

I suspect that this is why giving the IESG and IAB each an ex officio
seat and the power to appoint one member seemed natural in 2004/2005.

On 07/02/2016 09:47, Michael StJohns wrote:
> IMO, I think you've made a good argument for retaining at least one IAB member on the IAOC, an incomplete argument for why that
> member need not be the IAB chair and a very poor argument as to why the IAB should continue to appoint a second person.
> 
>     Are there specific benefits to the IAOC to having the IAB chair continue as a member of the IAOC that would not be met if
> he/she were replaced by another member of the IAB?
> So far I *think* I haven't seen anyone currently on the IAOC comment on the above.
> 
> For the poor argument related to why the IAB should continue to appoint a second person - seriously??  "The Nomcom has a big
> enough job already".   I might find this a reasonable argument if (and pretty much only if) the Nomcom weren't already required
> to (advertise for and interview and ) appoint an IAOC member every term.   AFAICT, having the Nomcom change that to two (or even
> three) per year and removing the need for the other two (or three - not quite sure about ISOC) bodies to advertise, interview,
> and select would reduce the workload on the IAB, IESG and maybe ISOC without actually increasing the workload of the Nomcom much
> if at all. [This is based on the observation that the same people will probably apply to the IAB, IESG and Nomcom solicitations
> and if all three bodies are doing their jobs in a complete manner similar to what the Nomcom should be doing, that seems like a
> lot of redundancy in the process.]

That's a valid point. In fact, iirc, it quickly proved necessary to have some
private communication, made tricky by the confidentiality of the Nomcom process,
to avoid oversights in the IAOC selection process. I'm not against opening
up that discussion, but we'd need to hear what several past Nomcom Chairs think
about it. It is of course orthogonal to the draft under discussion.

    Brian

---

From: Brian E Carpenter <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 7 Feb 2016 13:40:57 +1300

On 07/02/2016 13:21, Michael StJohns wrote:
> Are you saying that the IAB does not select the IAB chair?  The IAB selects two members.  You could also logically say that the
> IAB chair is selected as a result of he/she being selected as an IAOC member.
> 
> In contrast, the IESG selects only one member.  The IETF chair, also an ex-officio member, gets selected by the Nomcom.    The
> IESG does get to confirm the other two IAOC members selected by the Nomcom.
> 
> What is a reasonable thing to do?  Select two members?  Or select one IAB member not the chair to serve on the IAOC?
> 
>>   because the
> As I pointed out, under the current rules, if you want another IAB member (other than the chair) to serve on the IAOC you need
> only appoint an IAB member with your current second choice.  I would expect that the IAOC might prefer that you as chair attend
> most meetings, but would be happy to have an IAB member watching the store for the chair.
> 
> 
>>
> Ummm... are we talking about the same IAB?  There are 12 members of the IAB, 6 of which terms end this coming IETF meeting and 6
> the third meeting after that.   So say you appoint Mary Barnes to your "replacement for the chair" slot effective today?
> 
> 
>>
> We should NOT add that.  This is what I meant about stability.  As of right now to the best of my knowledge, you as IAB chair
> have the least stable term of anyone on the IAOC.  If you want to get off and put someone else on, then we should probably make
> sure that the new persons term is no less stable.  And while its true that the IAB chair position can change at any time, I
> believe (I'm to tired right now to confirm this) the IAB's own documents generally restrict that to a single election
> immediately after the new class takes its position each year. 

https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc2850#section-3.1

It isn't specified but in practice it is at the First IETF of the year. However, the IAB can
fire its chair at any time (and we didn't bother to spell out partial-term arrangements,
assuming that common sense would prevail).

   Brian

> So the term does tend to be at least a year. And effectively,
> there are few IAB chairs who have served less than two or three years, so I'm less concerned about any given IAB chair swapping
> off the IAOC in less than a year or even two.
> 
> 
>>
> I'm actually quite surprised that you didn't have a chat with the IAOC and bring them in on the discussion before throwing
> things out as an ID....
> 
>>
> Why?   If we're going to change the basis on which the IAB is represented on the IAOC, we should evaluate ALL the relationships
> Not really.  As Scott noted in his most recent email, there's a power of position related to the IAB and IESG and ISOC board
> chair positions that pretty much outweighs (or moots is probably a better word) such selection criteria.
> 
>>
> Fair point.  But I think you have at least another year on the IAB you've committed to AIRC?  If we all agreed upon this it
> could be done quickly.
> 
> 
> 
>>
> I kind of doubt the deletion of IAOC duties from the IAB chair's plate is going to make that job more attractive due to less
> work. It might make it more attractive due to not being on the IAOC - which is at its core a hard and pretty much thankless
> job.   And taking you/chair off the IAOC is not really going to do much to "reduce the centrality" of the IAB chair.
>

---

From: Joe Hildebrand <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 9 Feb 2016 14:57:10 -0700

> On Feb 6, 2016, at 3:08 PM, Eliot Lear <[email-masked]> wrote:
> 
> 
> And this is the point: on any given topic someone else might be more expert.  Take for instance the RFC series.  There are two people who are probably better equipped to speak on that matter right now than the chair himself (no offense to Andrew).  Joe Hildebrand oversees the RSOC program.  The IAOC would be foolish not to speak to him about the RFC Editor in terms of their responsibilities in that regard.

Quick clarification: Robert Sparks is currently the IAB lead for the RSOC.  I don't think your point here is impacted by this detail.

Of course, I do have opinions about overseeing the RFC Series, which is why I originally put my name in the hat for RSOC, and continue to serve there.  I'd be happy to talk to anyone in the community about that, including the RSOC.  I'd imagine Robert feels similarly.

-- 
Joe Hildebrand

---

From: Jari Arkko <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 10 Feb 2016 13:13:03 +0200

> I don't think it is healthy, for the IAB or for the
> to have some _one_ who has all the state.

I agree with that.

And while the I* chairs have a lot of context, they are by no means the people with all the context, and the available context varies by person. As an example, while I am up to date at the high level on all topics, the detailed level of knowledge varies a lot. Whether you are completely plugged into the details of sponsorships, meeting arrangements, IANA transition, tools, IETF IT system… varies by person. And this also applies to Andrew and potential other people in the IAB that could have a role in the IAOC.

Jari

---

From: Jari Arkko <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 10 Feb 2016 13:38:40 +0200

>>   Are there specific benefits to the IAOC to having the IAB chair continue as a member of the IAOC that would not be met if he/she were replaced by another member of the IAB?

Having an understanding and the connections related to (some of the) important topics for the IAOC is a requirement, IMO. Of course the IAB chair is not the only one who can have these qualities. Some of the things that are important at the moment include meetings, IETF finances and sponsorships, IANA transition, tools, RFC series, and secretariat/RFC editor operations.

> IAB chair has been the IAB point person on these topics and the chair’s direct knowledge of what has been going on has

This is very true. On the other hand, there’s been other IAB members with perhaps different but still major personal involvement in the IANA topic (two ICG members, head of the IAB IANA program, a WG chair, document editor…) And another WG chair on this topic is on the IAOC.

I think Andrew has been the perfect person for connecting IANA-related information to the IAOC. And driving the topic in general. However, that is to some extent our own organisational choice, not something that can inherently be done only that way. And in any case it has been a team effort with IETF/IAB/ICG/IANAPLAN/IANAprog chairs and the program and WG members.

Jari

---

From: Jari Arkko <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 10 Feb 2016 14:08:45 +0200

John,

> I'm much more interested in the

I’ve been thinking about this topic recently :-)

And it certainly is worthwhile to consider evaluating how well our arrangements work.

There are many things to think about, of course. In my mind relaxing the rules on which IAB person should be involved is a good thing but it is a small thing.

There’s the way we make decisions and the teams who are involved in that. I’m personally not a big fan of the magic knowledge through the all-knowing IAOC model; I think it is more about us having the appropriate teams (subcommittees in IAOC terminology) be the experts and make the proposed decisions, and the IAOC’s role is due diligence, to confirm those decisions, and to oversee that those teams and our staff are working well.

There are other organisational questions. But those are not the only ones, one could ask about resources as well. I can observe a long-term trend where the official IETF services grow (volunteer things move to commercial platform or new services are needed). I can also observe a short-term trend where the workload has increased due to various one-off situations, such as the new RFC format tools work, IANA transition, starting up the hackathon series, training for the ombudsteam, people changes in sponsorship arrangements at ISOC, and so on.

Jari

---

From: John C Klensin <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 10 Feb 2016 09:23:55 -0500

--On Wednesday, February 10, 2016 14:08 +0200 Jari Arkko
<[email-masked]> wrote:

>> question of whether the IAOC is being effective today and how
>> we can make it more so than I am in how the IAB organizes
>> itself. In part because of the worked example I cited earlier
>> (and some others), I don't see the IAOC as working well.
>> I'd be happy to be contradicted but, from the outside, it
>> looks as if part of the problem is too large a percentage of
>> the membership being stretched too thin.
> 
> I've been thinking about this topic recently :-)
> 
> There are many things to think about, of course. In my mind
> relaxing the rules on which IAB person should be involved is a
> good thing but it is a small thing.

Absolutely.   At the same time, it is an easily-identified issue
and one that is easy to correct if the community isn't so
completely satisfied with the status quo that changes are
impossible.  You've seen my comments on another possible small
change.

> There's the way we make decisions and the teams who are
> involved in that. I'm personally not a big fan of the magic
> knowledge through the all-knowing IAOC model; I think it is
> more about us having the appropriate teams (subcommittees in
> IAOC terminology) be the experts and make the proposed
> decisions, and the IAOC's role is due diligence, to confirm
> those decisions, and to oversee that those teams and our staff
> are working well.

That would work for me if there were a lot more transparency and
clear evidence of oversight.   Without that -- and I suggest
those elements have been badly lacking -- more committee
structure and more de facto delegation of fundamental policy
decisions to staff turn into a mechanism for reduced or
non-existent accountability.

The Buenos Aires decision, independent of its merits, seems to
be an example in which each of the groups involved seems to have
a different story about who pushed and made the decision and
why.  One can claim that, because the community was asked, it
was a community decision, but there was a good deal of
information that was not supplied to the community when it was
asked that anyone who had done even a superficial investigation
of the Buenos Aires environment would have known about.  Again,
I'm not suggesting that the decision was the wrong one, only
that the way the IAOC handled it suggests lack of transparency
and accountability.

Similarly, there is the issue of (possibly redacted) contracts,
something many of us believe that BCP 101 requires and that the
IAOC and/or IAD promised the community repeatedly.  They have
never appeared wrt hotels and rarely appeared on a timely basis
for anything else.  Speaking from a very high level perspective,
either the IAOC has concluded that those postings are
inappropriate and/or unnecessary but has been unwilling to face
the community with that conclusion or there has been failure in
priorities and/or oversight.  Either case suggests issues with
transparency and/or accountability.

I think both of those are just symptoms and examples, less
important in themselves than as pointers to trends and patterns.

I also see another more general problem and it is what motivates
me to poke at the IAB (and other) positions.  Once upon a time,
in the not-quite-mythical past, most IETF "leadership" positions
were considered something one took on, for a while and as an
obligation to the community, not because of some individual,
corporate, or symbolic motivation.  That both promoted and
required efforts to keep the jobs as small (and resource
non-intensive) as possible and people often served a term or
two, decided they had put their time in, and moved on.    There
are lots of good reasons (and a few bad ones) why we've shifted
away from that model, but I think understanding that there has
been a shift --at least in philosophy -- is important.

That historical model is especially important to IAOC positions
because, whatever one might tell a sponsor or put on a CV
notwithstanding, IAOC positions (should) have no influence on
things under consideration for standardization or even, with the
exception of IPR-tuning from the Trust, the standards process
itself.  Given that, if the IAOC is to succeed (and we consider
openness and transparency, not just "having the trains run on
time" as part of success), it is important that its members
(probably with two exceptions) be as committed those roles as a
service to the community as possible.  That means not having
anyone there (modulo those exceptions) who feels stuck with the
job as a consequence of some other role, and _that_ is one of
the things that makes the IAB Chair-related discussion important.

> There are other organisational questions. But those are not
> the only ones, one could ask about resources as well. I can
> observe a long-term trend where the official IETF services
> grow (volunteer things move to commercial platform or new
> services are needed). I can also observe a short-term trend
> where the workload has increased due to various one-off
> situations, such as the new RFC format tools work, IANA
> transition, starting up the hackathon series, training for the
> ombudsteam, people changes in sponsorship arrangements at
> ISOC, and so on.

Yes, certainly.   However, at the same time, the community
expects the IAOC to be able to say "too much at one time, we
need to put some of these things off" and to discuss those
choices, choices that may amount to the tradeoff between doing a
few things well and doing more things but not as well, openly
and with community knowledge and possibly involvement.

I also suggest that, while many of us have observed the same
trends and combinations you talk about above, it is not easily
possible to discern from, e.g., IAOC minutes or plenary
presentations, that the IAOC is considering them and the
tradeoffs and taking those choices seriously.  I assume that is
insufficient transparency rather than no discussions, but
insufficient transparency isn't good either.

The above may suggest that it is time for the community to do a
complete review of the whole IASA structure, what the
assumptions were behind BCP 101 and how those assumptions have
worked out.  I don't see the energy for that.  I hope there is
sufficient energy to do some tuning within the structure rather
than our all having to wait until things get a lot worse before
asking the hard questions and doing something.

best,
     john

---

From: Barry Leiba <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 10 Feb 2016 22:46:59 -0500

> Let me suggest that instead of delegating the IAB chair responsibilities we,
> instead, change the ex-officio status that the various chairs currently have
> to observer status, change the organizational appointees to permit
> (require?) appointment from their appointing organizations, and  also add
> two or three additional permanent members to the IAOC, those members to be
> selected in alternate years by the Nomcom.

First, I think it would be entirely reasonable to add two voting
members to the IAOC for a couple of reasons:

1. Temporary absences will be less disruptive.  I'm not sure how much
of an issue that has actually been on the IAOC, though, so I don't
know how important this is.

2. Adding two NomCom-selected voting members would increase the pool
of potential IAOC chairs to seven (from five).  Making sure there's
someone on the IAOC who is eligible to chair, willing to chair, and
capable of chairing is sometimes a difficult issue now.

Now, a variant here:
In addition to that, the IESG has chatted in the past about ceding its
appointment to the NomCom, and there was significant support in the
IESG for such a move (which, yes, would require updating RFC 4071).
Our thought in the discussion was twofold:

1. RFC 4071 explicitly says that we are not appointing an IAOC member
to represent the IESG in any way: we're making the appointment, and
the IAB is making theirs, but once the appointments are made those
members act in the same way as the NomCom-appointed ones.

2. The idea that the IESG should have its own appointment because it
will look at the candidates differently and will pick with different
criteria than the NomCom would is valid in theory, but has little or
no applicability in practice.  In many ways, it would be better to let
the NomCom balance its choices while selecting two (or even three)
IAOC members at the same time.

There could be one difficulty: If we were to move both the IESG and
IAB appointments to the NomCom *and* add two new NomCom appointments,
the NomComs would be selecting three IAOC members each year.  Finding
suitable candidates would be a challenge.  A big one.  On the other
hand, the IESG's list of candidates usually includes the incumbent and
the volunteers that the NomCom didn't select, so, again, there isn't a
real change there in practice.

Barry

---

From: Spencer Dawkins at IETF <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 10 Feb 2016 23:20:59 -0600

I'm agreeing with Barry, with one addition ...

On Wed, Feb 10, 2016 at 9:46 PM, Barry Leiba <[email-masked]>
wrote:

> we,

I'm remembering being on either the IESG or the IAB during a race condition
with Nomcom because the volunteer lists overlapped significantly (as in,
all but one person under consideration were on both lists), and whichever
body I was on was holding up naming its appointee because we didn't know
who Nomcom was going to pick, and we couldn't ask. We really were
duplicating almost all of Nomcom's work, and the people willing to serve
were filling out two sets of questionnaires which, I suspect, included a
lot of information requested in both places.

So I'm thinking "no real change in practice" is even more true.

Spencer

p.s. I note that if you're on Nomcom, selecting candidates for confirmation
is your only responsibility, while if you're on either the IAB or IESG,
it's competing with other responsibilities, but perhaps other folk
multi-task better than I do ...

---

From: Dave Crocker <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 11 Feb 2016 07:13:09 -0800

> So I'm thinking "no real change in practice" is even more true.

The rationale and the result for the IAOC is in line with what I tried 
to propose some years ago, when I was on the IAOC.  (As I recall, the 
primary argument against it, within the IAOC, was that it would make the 
group too large.)

In terms of the added load on Nomcom, I suspect it's a problem.  Enough 
of a problem to make me think that it might be worth dividing up 
Nomcom's load to have to different dates for delivering nominations.

d/