Re: Virtual BOFs

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

--On Sunday, January 10, 2016 07:40 +1300 Brian E Carpenter
<[e-mail]> wrote:

>> (4) "Couldn't make a determination, due eitherto lack of
>> attendance by key people or some technical issue.".   As with
>> (3), little has been lost and we can always hold a physical
>> BOF under traditional rules if needed.
> 
> Speaking from the time-zone-challenged corner, I see a high
> risk of hitting (4) rather frequently. Of course you can argue
> that there is also a high risk of hitting (4) with face2face
> BOFs at unpopular destinations.

Yes.  I could also suggest that the virtual plan gives more
flexibility of scheduling to accommodate people who are
"normally" time-zone-challenged or even of holding two sessions
at different times and collecting information from both.  (4)
may certainly happen and, again, if it does, it seems to me that
we gain some small amount of information and don't lose much.
We will clearly have to experiment and learn as we go along but
it seems to me that, if we don't need just about everyone in the
same physical room at the same time, it opens up all sorts of
possibilities.

> That said, it does seem worth a try.

thx.

   john

p.s. I read Phillip's note, but I see most of the issues he has
raised as more "bad charter", "bad WG management", "failure of
the IESG to supervise adequately", or even "not enough
mechanisms for feedback by the broader community into how a WG
is going" and not specifically BOF problems.  There is an issue,
IMO, with WGs feeling that, having been chartered, they have
"rights" to have anything they emit standardized, but it is,
again, a different issue from the BOF one, whether the BOFs are
in-person or virtual.   As to the substance of his claims, if
people in the community believe that the system is being
"worked" or otherwise used abusively, I hope they are having
detailed discussions with Nomcoms about specific behavior (or
non-performance) and their consequences and appealing when
needed.  Personally, I've found carefully-constructed appeals,
especially about matters that are within scope but have not been
adequately and/or fairly considered to be very effective and
educational for all concerned.  Sometimes I wish we had more of
them.