Content-Type: text/plain; charset=windows-1252
Subject: Proposed Project: IETF Administrative Support 2.0 
Mime-Version: 1.0 (Mac OS X Mail 7.3 \(1878.6\))
From: IETF Chair <chair@ietf.org>
Date: Thu, 3 Nov 2016 16:48:41 +0200
Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable
Message-Id: <E90EB6E2-DAF0-40F1-943C-A74406B73EC9@ietf.org>
To: IETF Announcement List <ietf-announce@ietf.org>
Archived-At: <https://mailarchive.ietf.org/arch/msg/ietf-announce/p2qREABaoXZYFmrSW8KUKKH9YTI>
Cc: IETF discussion list <ietf@ietf.org>
Precedence: list
Reply-To: ietf@ietf.org, chair@ietf.org


The arrangements relating to administrative support for the IETF (IASA, =
RFC 4071) were created more than ten years ago, when the IETF initially =
took charge of its own administration. The arrangements have served the =
IETF well, but there=92s been considerable change in the necessary =
tasks, in the world around us, and our own expectations since the =
creation of the IASA. Looking forward, this is a good time to ask what =
administrative arrangements best support the IETF in the next ten years.

I am planning to start a project to assess those arrangements. Included =
in this project are the various challenges and frustrations* we=92ve =
experienced along the way, but we also need to ask the bigger questions =
about how the organisations are structured. The project should assess =
what kind of support we need in the coming years, from the point of view =
of the community, IESG, IAB, IAOC, Trust, and partners (such as ISOC, =
long-term hosts or contractors). Areas to look at include structure, =
financing & sponsorship arrangements, organisation, and ways of working.

This project is to be done to serve the IETF community, hence the final =
determination of results and actions will rest on the community. =
Obviously there is a role for the IAOC & Trust in particular to provide =
direction in what they see is appropriate. And likewise for the the IESG =
and IAB in their respective roles, or ISOC for discussion of the =
relationship and arrangements with IETF. But I feel that the IETF chair =
needs to own the project and be responsible for ensuring that the =
community views are what finally determines the actions.

At this point, the project is a proposal, and I am soliciting feedback =
on the overall plan. Would be happy to revise per feedback. We will be =
working to create specific mailing lists for the substantial discussion =
later, but for setting up the project the proper place for discussion is =
probably here at ietf@ietf.org.

Here are stages of the project that I see:

Stage 1: Background documentation
- documenting the evolution of the IASA system implementation from 2005 =
to 2016 (an initial version in draft-daigle-iasa-retrospective)
- sharing this background information with the community for review & =
update

Stage 2: Collecting input on challenges and requirements
- understanding the situation from the IAOC internal perspective
- understanding the situation from the IAB and IESG perspective
- discussion in the community about the challenges and changed =
requirements
- discussion with ISOC about the challenges and changed requirements
- discussion with the long term hosts about the challenges and changed =
requirements
- discussion with contractors about the challenges and changed =
requirements
- the collection effort is facilitated by a design team (it is to be =
determined if the same team or different teams will be used in stages =
2-4)
- setting up a new working group for the discussions is also necessary
- IAOC/IESG/IAB assistance will also be needed in the facilitation and =
discussion

Stage 3: Analysis and documentation
- collect acquired information
- discuss in the community
- the analysis effort is again to be facilitated by a design team

Stage 4: Proposed improvements
- suggest improvements that would address the key challenges
- initial proposals created with the help of a design team, the results =
to be discussed in the community

Stage 5: Discussion of the improvements
- community discussion

Stage 6: Specification and execution
- specify the changes in RFCs, agreements
- execute the changes

I have not yet assigned timelines for the stages, but the idea is to =
start the project in 2016 and use the winter and spring 2017 for the =
discussions, main results to be put in place sometime in 2017.

Jari Arkko, IETF Chair

(*) Some of these issues have been prominently visible in the IETF =
community, such as the discussions about early community involvement in =
making meeting site decisions. Others are internal to IASA operations, =
such as workload due to increasing IETF responsibilities. There are also =
structural question marks, such as the way that we select people to =
serve as board members, or the partial separation between the IAOC and =
the Trust.