Re: The Next Generation

[John C Klensin <[e-mail]>]

Keith,

This is a note I would normally probably send privately, but I
hope it will be helpful to others.

Inline.

--On Wednesday, September 4, 2019 15:22 -0400 Keith Moore
<[e-mail]> wrote:

> John,
> 
> I respect your efforts, and those of Kathleen and others, to
> mentor new people.  I wouldn't mind helping myself, but new
> people are generally not visible to me unless I attend
> meetings, which is problematic both for reasons of expense and
> reasons of stress. The thought of spending thousands of
> dollars to participate in what has often become an extremely
> dysfunctional discussion environment (though this does vary
> from one WG to another), and endure more abuse in the process,
> is just too depressing.   But if there were some other way
> to connect new people to remote participants, that might be
> helpful, and that's why I asked about other efforts.

First of all, I've been attending, on average, one meeting a
year or less for that last several years.   That may be more
than you are getting too, but probably not a lot more.

So, the place where I'm seeing those newcomers is that I track
several mailing lists including, but not limited to, the IETF
one (as, I assume, do you -- and there is probably some overlap
between the lists I follow and those that you do).  What I've
found in the last 30 or so years with the IETF is that the point
at which newcomers most need assistance is whether they start
posting about things they consider substantive and relevant on
mailing lists.   The newcomers who show up at meetings before
reading and maybe posting to mailing list are not hopeless, but
the ones who are likely to bring value to the IETF do, as a
consequence of how we work, show up on the mailing lists,
whether before their first f2f meeting or after it.   That is
the point at which I have been reaching out, so whether I attend
meetings is more or less irrelevant (although, if I do attend a
meeting and find someone wandering around looking lost, I am
likely to offer directions or other hand).

I wish I thought that asking the IESG, or even whatever the EDU
team is called now, to come up with new ideas and procedures in
this area would be helpful, but history suggests otherwise.  If
you come up with ideas and push them, I'm more optimistic (but,
FWIW, I've been pushing for inclusion of not-at-the-f2f-meetings
mentors/guides, whether for in-meetings newcomers or those who
are also remote, for years with very little practical traction).
So I do my thing, Kathleen does her thing, and I invite you and
anyone else with the right concerns and background to join us by
doing yours.

> And I respect your right, and others' rights, to make
> individual judgments and choices about how to best further
> IETF's mission. If you choose to do work more
> behind-the-scenes I wish you well in your efforts.   We
> certainly need lots of help of various kinds. Meanwhile it's
> increasingly clear that some IETF leaders' actions (promoting
> censorship for arbitrary reasons and also overtly promoting
> discrimination) are having a chilling effect on IETF's ability
> to do sound technical work, and exacerbate the very toxicity
> that some leaders claim to be trying to remedy.   I have
> seen no sign that these efforts have been curtailed.   Until
> they are curtailed, I believe it will continue to be necessary
> to call them out.   But I remain hopeful that the problems
> will be addressed.  And I will also continue to try to
> recognize positive developments that come to my attention.

As you or others may have deduced from comments I've made on
other threads, I have started wondering whether the IETF is
beginning to suffer from some age-related degenerative disease
or whether our fundamental models for getting things done are
appropriate for a rapidly-developing Internet in which most of
the protocols and technology are new but not so well suited to a
more mature Internet with more mature technologies and
protocols.  If that were really the case, then several of the
things you comment on above (and interpret the way you do) are
just symptoms and, even if they could be fixed, doing so would
amount to playing whack-a-mole with other symptoms.   Now, if
and when I become convinced of that, I will presumably stop
putting effort into newcomers, protocol and procedural
development efforts in the IETF, and so on, so you can assume I
have not quite degenerated into terminal pessimism.  Yet.

>From that standpoint, your paragraph immediately above disturbs
me, not necessarily because I disagree with your description of
the problems (I agree with some, but not all, of it) but because
you seem to be writing in a passive, wait for something to
happen, style, e.g., "until they are curtailed" and "will be
addressed".  You've been around for a long time and know how
things work.  You've been a document author, IIR a WG Chair, and
an AD.   You've had good ideas about how to fix problems in the
past and, I assume, still do.   Do what we've both told
newcomers to do over the years, e.g., "don't just complain on a
list, write up a proposal in I-D form so that a serious and
focused discussion can occur".  If there are multiple drafts
around that address issues for which there is consensus in the
community that they really are problems, maybe it is time to use
the option in REFC 2026 that we've never used: an appeal to the
ISOC BoT on the grounds that the procedures (and the IESG
interpretation of them) are inconsistent with fairness.  If you
want to, you know how to do that too.

If none of that appeals, perhaps you might be figuring out how
to convince the Nomcom to change things.   Or perhaps you should
put your name forward for, e.g., the IAB and convince the Nomcom
that you could do that job effectively without attending
meetings and that anyone who claims that a large travel budget
is necessary for effective participation is part of the problem
and should not be in the leadership.

If you think you are being abused (not just disagreed with), I
hope you have tried the ombudsteam.  No process is perfect, but
that one has been, in my experience, quite good.

One thing I'm fairly sure of is that, if those of us who have a
lot of experience simply sit around, describing problems,
bemoaning our fate, and waiting for someone else to make things
happen,  the odds of significant improvement are low.
 
> You mentioned remembering when I first came to IETF.   What
> I remember about my first meeting (St. Louis) is being
> pleasantly surprised, even shocked, at how eager the
> participants were to have a new and well-informed participant,
> and how welcome my input was in the discussions that we had
> that week.   It was a complete contrast to today's
> environment of general hostility.   Of course conditions are
> different now, but so is the organization.
 
> I think the biggest problem we have is that we've lost the
> sense of collaborating for a common purpose.    I don't see
> how we can restore that as long as the leadership promotes
> divisiveness.

I hesitate to suggest that there may be some international
trends of that sort because it would really sadden me if our
leadership had become part of those trends.  But, again, some of
those things --including the differences you believe you see
(not disagreeing, just trying to not comment) -- are part of the
reason for the organizational degenerative disease hypothesis.
If we believe that such a disease has set in and become
irreversible, than the one really constructive discussion is
where work should be steered while there is still a choice.  

best,
   john