[Diversity] draft-crocker-diversity-conduct-01

[S Moonesamy <[e-mail]>]

Hi Narelle, Dave,

I read draft-crocker-diversity-conduct-01.  I am not thinking clearly 
as I write this.  Quoting from Section 2.1:

   "The same people from the same education and experience will all
    too readily bring the same ideas forward and subject them to the
    same analysis, thus diminishing the likelihood for new ideas and
    methods to emerge, or underlying problems to be noted."

Another problem is if the new people are given to believe that it is 
appropriate to think like the same people.  In other words, what is 
being fostered is a culture which prevents new ideas from emerging.

   "Nomcom is itself a potentially diverse group of IETF participants,
    chosen almost at random."

That should, in theory, prevent the problem(s) mentioned about from 
happening.  I rephrase the quoted text as:

    Nomcom is itself a potentially diverse group of IETF attendees,
    chosen almost at random.

and some text from the draft:

    in the late 1980s, participation in the group became fully open,
    permitting attendance by anyone in the United States.

The above would not be a problem as most of the people who might wish 
to participate are from the United States and the cost of the airfare 
and hotel would not be too expensive.  As more people from the rest 
of the world take an interest in participating the cost ends up being 
too expensive for some people, whether they are from the United 
States or from other countries.  This is where attendance becomes 
dependent upon working for a corporation.

Rephrasing text again:

    Nomcom is itself a potentially diverse group of corporate IETF
    attendees, chosen almost at random.

Even though the selection is still random the results would be skewed 
as the population is no longer diverse.  It is unlikely that the 
selection process would encourage varying attributes among members 
and that is what triggered the diversity debate.

It is difficult to attain a balance (Section 3.4).  Mailing list 
participation is more onerous.  The cost is, unfortunately, not 
quantified.  I'll go off-topic here (feel free to ignore).  The IETF 
measures RFC authorship.  The IETF does not measure reviews.  A 
person may bring in a new idea.  A significant amount of the work 
might be from other persons, i.e. the reviewers.  The external view 
is that the author wrote everything.

The value of a contribution (Section 3.6) is a subjective 
assessment.  The point in the second sentence is about the 
contribution triggering a negative reaction.  It took me some time to 
realize that I was reading "contribution" in an IETF sense instead of 
the way it was (likely) intended.

I agree that "obtaining meaningful diversity requires more than 
generic good will and statements of principle".  This is where the 
fear of retribution comes in.

Regards,
S. Moonesamy