Re: [Gendispatch] I-D Action: draft-halpern-gendispatch-antitrust-01.txt

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

On 23-Nov-21 05:44, Joel M. Halpern wrote:
> While there are some participants for whom competition law is not an
> issue, there are many participants for whom it is an issue.


I have always felt it was relevant to me, whether or not I worked for
a large IT company. How can it *not* be relevant to anyone who is
actively participating in discussions with multiple companies? Suppose
somebody from company A asks you to tell somebody from company B
about A's pricing policy? Surely, doing that would be illegal.
  
> The intended approach is a short statements that highlights a very few
> aspects of competition law that should be kept in mind by anyone to whom
> they apply.


Which is (I think) everybody, because of the above thought experiment.

>   From where I sit, it is important to have the note well pointer as it
> is very difficult to claim we as a community have made an effort to
> inform people about the issue if we bury the results in an informational
> RFC no one ever hears about.


I agree. The reason I think this should not be a BCP is because it is
in no way a change to the IETF's rules. But there is a sound argument
that a warning should be given.

    Brian
  
> We (the co-authors) are still trying to work out the wording for the
> much shorter approach.
> 
> Yours,
> Joel
> 
> On 11/22/2021 11:37 AM, Stephen Farrell wrote:
>>
>> Hi,
>>
>> I'm not that convinced we need to do anything but no
>> harm having the discussion, so seems reasonable for
>> you and/or Joel to make a modified proposal.
>>
>> On 22/11/2021 15:28, Brad Biddle wrote:
>>> I recommend that that we develop an explicit statement that addresses
>>> antitrust compliance, and that we reference that statement in the Note
>>> Well text that is routinely shown to participants.
>>
>> If you do do the above, please take into account that
>> competition law is not at all a direct issue for a lot
>> of IETF participants and we don't want to ever give the
>> impression that those for whom competition law etc is
>> a direct issue are more important participants. (For me
>> that's a reason to not put that in the Note Well text
>> which is already getting way too cumbersome.)
>>
>> Cheers,
>> S.
>