Re: Update on feedback on US-based meetings, and IETF 102

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

--On Thursday, April 13, 2017 01:00 +0100 Stephen Farrell
<[e-mail]> wrote:

>...
> Is that my bias in reading the list traffic or did I miss some
> mail, or is it possible that the (public) list traffic and
> (relatively private) survey responses are less similar that
> your mail implies?
> 
> That last wouldn't be surprising, but I'd hope that in that
> case some of the people who filled in the survey who adamantly
> said we ought continue to meet in the US would be willing to
> justify that on the list. If none were, then I think the IAOC
> ought consider that as a relevant input in their decision
> making. (Not as a winning argument, but as a relevant thing.)

Stephen (and others, with a specific nod to Randy's and Tom's
comments):

As least a few of us interpreted the IAOC as requesting comments
to their special list, found the "cities" and "US meetings"
inquiries inseparable, and decided to adhere to that request.
Dismissing our comments because we did so seems inappropriate.
In addition, some relevant comments were made during the
Mtgvenue session in Chicago and presumably recorded in its
minutes; especially if the request was for advice to the IAOC
rather than a general discussion, it hardly seemed necessary to
repeat those comments here.

However, to reprise while trying to remain brief:

(1) We are living in very unstable times in which reliable
predictions of the long-term future, or even the future for the
3 to 5 years out that the IAOC thinks the community has told it
to plan meetings, is even more difficult than usual. There are
strong reasons, connected to our traditional criteria such as
locations near where concentrations of the participants live and
appropriate facilities, for meeting in the US, and we should
avoid meeting in the US only if the circumstances and logic make
sense.

(2) I don't believe in canceling, or refusing to hold, meetings
in a particular location to make a political point or to punish
a government that we see as behaving badly, if only for the
purely pragmatic reason that few governments are likely to pay
any attention at all to where we do or do not hold meetings.
Certainly the US is not one of the exceptions.   However, if we
do make decisions on that basis --and some of the on-list
comments have sounded very much like that-- then we'd better be
ready to schedule meetings for those countries, on
shorter-than-usual notice if necessary, to reward them if the
policies are changed.

(3) Circumstances change.  Not just political circumstances (who
would have predicted a year ago that the US would be in its
present state now?), but there is always a risk of hotel or
neighborhood remodeling or construction and natural and
human-made disasters that could severely impede a meeting or
attendance at it.  It seems to me to be very important that we
think through the circumstances under which we would pull the
plug on a venue on short notice -- whether to try to find a
different location or to go largely or entirely remote -- and,
as others suggested during the mtgvenue session, that we keep
that set of discussions rather separate from how we do
longer-term meeting planning.

(4) I have no idea how to predict likely US policies toward
visitors (or residents traveling outside the country and trying
to return) six months out, much less three to five years in the
future.  The government's sudden policy reversals in several
other areas in the last two weeks should add to everyone's
uncertainty, as should the possibility that the courts will
continue to block obnoxious policies and punish those who
profile and harass selected visitors.   The threats to require
passwords, inspection of phones, and similar nonsense of people
who are now covered by visa waivers may turn out to be a real
issues or as hollow as promises to brand China a currency
manipulator turned into during the last 48 hours or so.

Equally important, it is impossible to predict British policies
as Brexit evolves nor what other countries might do in
retaliation or response to those policies, US actions, etc.
Given other forces in the world, I think it would be unwise to
place large bets on the Schengen agreements being unchanged
three or five years from now, especially where holders of non-EU
passports are concerned.  Similar issues apply in Asia: for
example, I hope that we won't see sufficient destabilization on
the Korean Peninsula to make a meeting in Seoul or even Busan
inadvisable, but, if the macho chest-pounding, posturing, and
implicit threats by assorted crazy-spectrum people continues,
one never knows.   I think it is pretty safe to suggest that it
would be unwise to plan a meeting for Damascus or Aleppo three
years from now, but no one has seriously proposed either city.  

However, within sensible limits (with the two Syrian examples
mentioned as examples of non-sensible cases), I'm opposed to
making _any_ changes in our long-term meeting plans based on
rapidly changing political considerations, including but not
limited to events in the US or UK in the last year.  Again, I
think it is important to monitor things as meetings get close
and to have some community consensus about the circumstances
under which we would make significant changes in meeting plans,
but deciding to hold (or not hold) a meeting in the US based on
fears or fantasies about what has happened in the last six
months (or overconfidence about how those things will play 9ut)
and where those things might lead makes no sense to me.

best,
    john