Re: [81attendees] are we getting complacent? Good job!

[Gregory Mirsky <[e-mail]>]

Dear Fred and All,
I recall that policy to shift IETF meeting outside of the USA was explained by difficulties getting visas that too many attendees have experienced. I wonder if anything has been done or can be done to ease the process (IETF is certainly not a World Cup but even Russia is committed to ease visa process to those travelling to watch games in 2018).

Regards,
Greg
 
-----Original Message-----
From: [e-mail] [mailto:[e-mail]] On Behalf Of Fred Baker
Sent: Monday, August 01, 2011 5:02 PM
To: David Kessens
Cc: [e-mail]
Subject: Re: [81attendees] are we getting complacent? Good job!


On Aug 1, 2011, at 4:30 PM, David Kessens wrote:
>> Seriously, given that we're committed to having meetings all over the 
>> world, do these details really rise to the level of things that the 
>> planning staff needs to think about?
> 
> You might call them details, but if you end up spending pretty much 
> the same amount of time and money traveling within north america, as 
> compared to traveling to asia or europe, there is very little meaning 
> left to trying to spread the pain of travel around by having a meeting 
> schedule that schedules meetings in three different regions.

Speaking from the perspective of one one the IAOC's "meetings" committee, they actually do.

Right now, we are in discussions regarding meetings in Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, Viet Nam, and various other places in Southeastern Asia. Singapore: we have been quoted $368/night for hotels, and that's not the highest price. Kuala Lumpur: the immigration officer can refuse entry to any person deemed "scruffy" (yes, that's the actual word used). Viet Nam: who, from the IETF, comes from there? IPv6 Operations, which I co-chair, has been offered a f2f interim meeting in Argentina. Wonderful offer; who would actually come? Does it serve the community?

You may not think we do, but we actually think pretty hard about the facilities available, the costs, and whether it serves the community. And yes, we do think about how much time the average person spends in transit, and the price of transit.

That said, in an organization with O(1500) people attending and O(4000) people posting on mailing lists or contributing to Internet Drafts, when one person or another says "but (wah!) I want you to optimize for me!"... we don't. We try to move the meetings so that from time to time, if "I" am working in the IETF the meeting is somewhat "close" to "me", and we try to make it not too bad for everyone else. But we don't go nuts trying to over-optimize.
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