Re: [hrpc] Possible options for a HRPC research publication

[Stéphane Couture <[e-mail]>]

Hi all,

That is a good discussion. However, I suggest that you keep it open a bit
more as it is currently (this long weekend) a holiday for many people, and
others might want to jump in later.

Here are some inputs :

- I agree with the perspective that RFC writing should be at the core of
this research group. It is,I think, the way to go to engage with IETF
technical community and enhance the discussion about human rights and
internet protocols.

- However, if we keep a consensus-base approach, I think there is work to
be done to clarify or at least do some pedagogy about what exactly
“consensus” means in the case of HRTF. It’s one thing to get consensus from
200 people on every words of a document, and another thing to have a
consensus that the document respects our common standard of quality by
going through different editorial steps. We could decide for instance, that
if three people support the document and no one express strong opposition,
that the document is considered to reach consensus. But this is just an
example.

- However (again), if we are interested to get more involvement from
academic researchers, it is important to recognize that RFC is a weird
document, especially from a social science perspective. First, it is a
steep learning curve to ask people to use github and Markdown language to
start writing.  Second, it is difficult to categorize this research output
in our CV: while the process of RFC writing – as it is now – does require
multiple reviews and is quite demanding, it is still difficult to qualify
this document as “double blind peer reviewed article”. Personally, I
justify my contribution to RFC, not as a research output, but foremost as a
way to engage with the community which is also important, but not the same
as publishing an article.

- With all this said, I think we should also consider HRPC as a space that
has more generative potential than just RFC writing. This is already the
case : there is the hrpc website (https://hrpc.io) which includes, among
other things the short documentary “A net of rights” which is not an RFC
(and by the way, my student made a French translation of the subtitles,
which I need to share). An idea I would propose would be to make have a
blog - on this website or elsewhere - that would allows sharing less
demanding individual texts that could, in turn contribute back to RFC
writing (a kind of circularity). We could also use this site – and HRPC RG
- to promote other related projects/publications, and facilitate
collaboration.

Anyway, that’s my view based on my observations and my experience with
draft-association.

Best,

Stéphane Couture




Le ven. 10 avr. 2020, à 13 h 55, farzaneh badii <[e-mail]>
a écrit :

> Hi Mallory
>
> By document I didn't really mean anything in specific just meant the
> submissions to the group.
> Thank you for the offer to send our work to the group for review, the
> reason we haven't asked the group for comments is that we are yet to
> develop it further..
>
> We received great constructive comments during the session in Prague,
> last year and thank you for the opportunity. I don't think we submitted it
> as an Internet draft. And it was beneficial for us and I think the
> attendees enjoyed the conversation too. I characterize the conversation as
> a more collegial conversation than the community trying to prove us wrong.
>
> I was not saying that RG functions like that (rushing to publish). The
> fact that you are looking for a solution to keep submissions published but
> also not characterize all of them as RFCs  or look into other kinds of RFCs
> and streams attest to it. I was just trying to relay what I think the risks
> are based on my very limited knowledge about the processes.
>
> On Fri, Apr 10, 2020 at 9:45 AM Mallory Knodel <[e-mail]> wrote:
>
>> Hi Farzaneh,
>>
>> By "the document" I assume you mean draft-political, to which you
>> yourself wrote and presented a differing view in response. Is your document
>> still something you think this group should attend to and work on? Was it
>> revised after the latest rounds of feedback in Prague and on the list? Or
>> perhaps it's been published elsewhere (please share link)? I'd suggest you
>> start a separate thread on this.
>>
>> "without the rush to creating an RFC out of every opinion and manifesto."
>>
>> Anyone actively participating in this group would know there has been no
>> rushing to anything on behalf of this research group; nor is this at all a
>> fair characterisation of our RG's current work items.
>>
>> -Mallory
>>
>> On Thu, Apr 9, 2020 at 4:09 PM farzaneh badii <[e-mail]>
>> wrote:
>>
>>> Sure but not every enthusiastic academic piece qualifies as an RFC. Half
>>> baked conceptual ideas that need years of development and their
>>> implementation is doubtful too and there is no consensus around them should
>>> not just be pushed through unless there are fundamental and clear
>>> substantive changes in the document. The evolution of concepts must be
>>> clear with strong empirical analysis. Or it has to be narrower without
>>> grand theoretical and philosophical claims.  Otherwise publishing a piece
>>> as RFC is merely giving lip service to human rights. I don't know how this
>>> process is going to play out but maybe academics can layout their  concepts
>>> and ideas in the non-RFC track and  RG can consider what needs to be
>>> transferred to the RFC track. I think academics are in need of good
>>> feedback to build on what they have, and the non-RFC track should include
>>> ways to receive feedback from the IETF community so that they can improve
>>> their pieces and be published without the rush to creating an RFC out of
>>> every opinion and manifesto.
>>>
>>> Farzaneh
>>>
>>>
>>> On Thu, Apr 9, 2020 at 3:36 PM Paul Wouters <[e-mail]> wrote:
>>>
>>>> On Wed, 8 Apr 2020, Niels ten Oever wrote:
>>>>
>>>> > The publication in the RFC-series and the connected exposure to, and
>>>> interaction with, the technical community in the IRTF and IETF is for me
>>>> the main reason to work and publish here.
>>>>
>>>> I agree with Niels. Publishing an RFC is needed so that the IETF
>>>> community takes human rights considerations more seriously.
>>>>
>>>> Paul
>>>>
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>>>>
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>>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> Mallory Knodel
>> CTO, Center for Democracy and Technology
>> gpg fingerprint :: E3EB 63E0 65A3 B240 BCD9 B071 0C32 A271 BD3C C780
>>
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