Re: [Gendispatch] GENAREA @ IETF 118

[Brian E Carpenter <[e-mail]>]

On 19-Oct-23 15:36, Mark Nottingham wrote:
> 
>> On 19 Oct 2023, at 9:00 am, Brian E Carpenter <[e-mail]> wrote:
>>
>> That said, on the original topic, I think Rob Wilton has hit the nail
>> on the head. So the Gendispatch question is whether there'd be support
>> for a proposal to completely rejig our process documents in that way?
> 
> No, that's a red herring, not the 'original topic'. My interest and my proposal are not in getting an RFC published for the sake of it; let's not be distracted by those concerns.

Well, I don't think that the question of how we control our mess of process documents is a red herring, because it means we are walking in thick mud every time we try to change processes and procedures, but on your point:

> 
> What I *am* proposing is that we need the DISCUSS criteria to be more under community control. Let's compare.
> 
> The current criteria were developed by the IESG. They decided when to do so, 

I don't want this to appear all defensive, but https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/draft-iesg-discuss-criteria/ was exposed to the community and was discussed on [e-mail] in 2005 and 2006. The first request for community comments went out in July 2005**. There were certainly  modifications as a result, but there was no formal Last Call since it wasn't turned into an RFC.

** https://mailarchive.ietf.org/arch/msg/ietf/ja_KrarzgEgbEKOqdUE0E1OiXnY/

> and when to update them subsequently. 

I have no information about subsequent updates.

> They oversaw the process of development, and were the final judge of the outcome. Their discussions about it and the considerations they took into account were effectively private to the IESG. If someone doesn't like the DISPATCH process itself (rather than its outcome), there is no effective avenue for appeal, arguably.
> 
> In contrast, if the DISCUSS criteria were approved by a WG-like process (no matter where they ended up), that would be overseen by a Chair who had a mandate to be independent and unbiased; discussion would be open and on the record; any member of the community could make a suggestion that would be considered by the entire community (or at least, those interested), and an update could be instigated if there were sufficient support within the community. Presumably, the IESG would approve the final output still, but be subject to appeal if they overstep.

For something like this to work, it really needs to be a genuine dialogue between the IESG and the interested subset of the community. Or to say that a bit differently, the IESG needs to be actively engaged in the discussion. I do very much agree that community involvement is necessary. I thought that in 2005 and I still do.

    Brian

> 
> There are, of course, other approaches to this; however a WG-like process is one that we're all familiar with, and we've had some success with RSWG. The extent and lifetime of such a body is open for discussion; I'd be happy if it did this one thing and shut down until a revision is necessary.
> 
> That's what I talked about at GENDISPATCH in San Francisco, with considerable support in the room IMO. It's what I'd like to talk about at GENAREA in Prague.
> 
> Now, of course, we need to figure out how to reflect that community consensus -- an RFC is an obvious choice, but if you really want to reflect it in a policy document on the Web site, so be it.
> 
> Cheers,
> 
> --
> Mark Nottingham   https://www.mnot.net/
>