[78attendees] We gotta stop meeting like this (was: We'll meet again...)

[Andrew Sullivan <[e-mail]>]

Ok, the subject is too strong for what I really want to say, but I
couldn't resist.  Sorry.

On Thu, Aug 12, 2010 at 01:21:13PM -0400, Ted Lemon wrote:
> 
> But my own experience at least is that if I get that crazily
> involved with that many working groups, I wind up being ineffective
> in the working groups I came to the meeting to participate in.

That sounds like it's skirting the territorry in which the benefits of
having a Big Giant Meeting are wearing off.  And given the number of
bits that are spilled after every meeting noting the large number of
deficiencies with the most recent venue (or responding with "worked
for me"), I am also starting to wonder whether the benefits of the
supposed cross-pollination are worth the cost.

As a single bit of information (keeping in mind that the plural of
anecdote is not "data"), we DNSEXT chairs tried very hard this time to
have a session especially dedicated to those application and other
people -- the consumers of the DNS -- to tell us whether we're even
approaching the mark on a bit of work that we've been contemplating
taking on.  We held a one hour session just for this.  We announced
it, and sent an extra note to the apps-discuss list in the hopes of
drumming up interest.

Nothin' doin'.  When I looked out over the faces in the room on
Wednesday morning, I saw an awful lot of familiar faces.  And at the
mic, I heard only familiar voices.  Same in the jabber room.  So how
much "cross-pollination" is there, anyway?

Maybe the problem is with the very idea of three IETF meetings a year,
and we could solve a lot of the complaints by focussing on areas or
specific WGs or something.

A

-- 
Andrew Sullivan
[e-mail]
Shinkuro, Inc.