Re: [apps-discuss] On "supporting the publication of this document"

[John C Klensin <[e-mail]>]

--On Tuesday, May 10, 2011 15:46 -0400 Barry Leiba
<[e-mail]> wrote:

>...
> As I said in my off-list note to you, simply the fact that I
> read the document (or, at least, claimed to) and took the time
> to send a comment should be enough to give you valuable
> information -- it's absolutely NOT "useless".  I appreciate
> that you might *also* like more than that, and if I have more
> than that to say, I will.  But the idea that the IESG might
> ignore such comments as "useless" gives me more than a bit of
> fright.

Barry,

>From my point of view, Pete is being explicit, and offering to
be consistent, about something that, to some degree, I think
most ADs do at one thing or another.    Both "explicit" and
"consistent" are good, at least IMO.  In less explicit form, ADs
figure out that, in measuring consensus about the technical
quality of a document, its interactions (or lack thereof) with
other work and protocols, etc., informed opinions from experts
who have studied a document carefully are simply worth more
than, to state the extreme case, endorsements from the clueless.
Most of the time (I hope), when the IESG is doing a technical
evaluation, they are looking at comments and criticisms
(positive or negative), not counting the number of those
comments.  One well-reasoned analysis that identifies a
persuasive showstopper should, and usually does, stop a document
until the problem is remedied no matter how many people say "I
didn't notice any problems".  Worse (and this is where my view
aligns with Ted's "context" comments), unless the practical
definition of "expert" is "someone whom the AD already considers
an expert", people need to give the AD a clue that their
comments should be taken seriously and the best clue is a
carefully-written review statement.  By contrast, "I like it"
isn't a very good clue, one way or the other.

A distinction I don't think Pete made is that the IESG is called
upon to evaluate and determine consensus, not just about
technical quality and relationships, but about interest (and,
ideally, commitment).  Those two determinations are almost
orthogonal.  For the purpose of determining consensus about
interest, a statement such as "I like this and think it should
be published" is actually very helpful, especially for a non-WG
document (for a WG document, there is a presumption of interest
and commitment that arises from getting chartered).  

So, I wouldn't have said "useless".  I might have said "of very
limited value in helping the IESG with its determination of
consensus about technical quality and adequacy of review".

   john