Re: Venue Selection Objectives and Criteria was Re: Hotel situation

["George, Wes" <[e-mail]>]

Ray, I really appreciate this info, I think it goes a long way to explain
the challenges the IAOC and IAD face in meeting our needs for space. I
have a few clarifying questions, inline below.



On 12/18/15, 3:49 PM, "ietf on behalf of Ray Pelletier"
<[e-mail] on behalf of [e-mail]> wrote:
>
>The following are the objectives desired in the selection of an IETF
>meeting venue:
>
>   1. Advancing standards development
>   2. Facilitating participation by active contributors
>   3. Encouraging new contributors
>   4. Sharing the travel pain; balancing travel time and expense across
>the regions from
>where IETF participants are based.
>
>The is the list of the criteria that is evaluated when selecting a venue.
>This is not in any priority order.

WG] Are these primary objectives and the below criteria published anywhere
(other than our email archive)? The IAOC Venue Selection page has links to
two slide presentations that do not cover this information specifically,
so I believe the answer to be no. I think that it should be present on
that page.
Other questions that should be clearly answered on that page: How are
these criteria defined, updated, rationalized, and by whom? Is there an
objective evaluation method so that we can see how well IAOC feels a given
venue meets those stated criteria?
Perhaps the IAOC should formally review these priorities with the
community periodically (via a survey or meeting discussion) to ensure that
they are optimizing for the right set of variables. Consensus will of
course be rough, but making that method for providing input available to
those not on IAOC provides a very useful method for feedback so that
people feel like their concerns are being heard and the process is more
transparent. Like it or not, that review happens informally every time you
get a bunch of questions when people aren't happy with the venue, hotel
availability, etc. so let's just acknowledge that it's important and plan
accordingly.

>4.  The Guest Rooms at the headquarters hotel must be sufficient
>in number, have an adequate network, or the Hotel will accept
>the IETF network, and within close proximity to venue.

WG] "sufficient in number" needs further definition, including the
internal carving of any block for IETF staff and volunteer leadership. For
example, identifying goals in terms of total number of rooms across all
hotels, rooms in HQ hotel, etc, maybe expressed as a percentage of past
attendance. Since IETF room blocks also tend to have different
rates/classes of room, the desired ratio of standard rooms vs upgraded
rooms (or as others have noted, how that is affected by block reservations
for I* as a percentage of available rooms).

>
>6.  The Cost of guest rooms, meeting space, food and beverage
>must be affordable.

WG] affordable should be clearly defined. I've heard in the past we try to
stick to the US Gov't per diem standards, but I'm not sure if that's a
hard rule or not. Given the problems we've had finding venues in Asia, and
previous discussion that partially blames room rates for this,
understanding what the IAOC considers an unacceptable threshold for room
rates is important, including the above consideration about the types of
rooms and their cost differential. Additionally, when dealing with venues
that are both hotel and conference center, there is always a relationship
between the room block rate and the cost of meeting space, catering, etc
(see examples elsewhere about IEEE offering a registration discount to
those staying in the venue room block and thus subsidizing the cost of
meeting space). While we can't publicly disclose individual contracts, the
intended balance between these costs should be clearly stated, since it
has direct effect on the registration fees vs other costs, and is
something that the community should be able to provide feedback on.

>
>9.  Travel is a consideration, ease of access and number of
>hops.  Travel to the venue should be reasonably acceptable
>based on cost, time, and burden for participants traveling from
>multiple regions.   Also, are there other travel barriers to
>entry, e.g., visas?

WG] Above, you also mention "sharing travel pain" as a primary objective.
Is this a quantitative goal, or a qualitative one i.e. just generally
trying to maintain fairness through 1-1-1? We have good data on where IETF
participants are coming from. Seems that we could estimate the average
cost or time of travel from the top N source locations or regions (e.g.
APAC, AUS/NZ, {Eastern, Central, Western}-{North America, Europe}, SA to
get a sense of how well we're doing over time. I don't want suggest
needless analysis, as I know this takes work, but I do think that it may
help IAOC to put some numerical justification behind our choices,
especially when people cry foul because we're "always making them travel
long/expensive distances to participate" - this is an area where a lot of
assertions are made with largely anecdotal evidence to support them, and
having real numbers helps. This would also provide good justification if
we end up returning to a smaller set of destinations repeatedly if they
can be shown to be a good balance of time and travel cost for the majority
of the IETF participant base.


Thanks,

Wes George

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