Re: [whatwg] New URL Standard from Anne van Kesteren on 2012-09-24 ([e-mail] from September 2012)

[Ian Hickson <[e-mail]>]

On Tue, 23 Oct 2012, Mark Nottingham wrote:
> On 23/10/2012, at 10:16 AM, Ian Hickson <[e-mail]> wrote:
> > 
> > I can't speak for Anne, but having experienced the IETF via the hybi 
> > work, my own opinion is that the main reason I wouldn't work with the 
> > IETF is that the community these days values consensus over technical 
> > value and running code, and the culture in the IETF doesn't value the 
> > kind of specification style that IMHO leads to better interop. For 
> > example, this very thraed -- we're having to argue to convince people 
> > that defining error handling is even a valuable thing to do.
> 
> Wait - who's making that argument?

Me.


> References, please.

This very thread is evidence enough, but see also the complete disinterest 
in fixing the URL specs, or the reaction abarth got from MIME sniffing, or 
the disaster that was hybi, or this complete disinterest in fixing the 
problem with encodings:

   http://mail.apps.ietf.org/ietf/charsets/threads.html#01830
   http://mail.apps.ietf.org/ietf/charsets/threads.html#02027
   http://mail.apps.ietf.org/ietf/charsets/threads.html#02034

...or the way IANA registrations for MIME types get handled, or HTTP bis' 
reaction to browser feedback, or the way process is put ahead of progress 
(there's no way to fix an RFC once it's published, even errata are often 
rejected), or the lack of any testing culture...

I understand that you disagree that most of those were a problem. But the 
original question was "why don't you work at IETF", and that's the answer. 
It may be that you conclude that it's a good thing, therefore, that I and 
others don't work at the IETF, but in that case you shouldn't complain 
when we go and do stuff outside the IETF.

-- 
Ian Hickson               U+1047E                )\._.,--....,'``.    fL
http://ln.hixie.ch/       U+263A                /,   _.. \   _\  ;`._ ,.
Things that are impossible just take longer.   `._.-(,_..'--(,_..'`-.;.'