Re: Last Call: <draft-dawkins-iesg-one-or-more-04.txt> (Increasing the Number of Area Directors in an IETF Area) to Best Current Practice

[Jari Arkko <[e-mail]>]

Stewart,

> I agree with the principle of this draft and agree that the IESG should
> have the flexibility to structure the size of areas and the set the number
> of ADs per area at an appropriate level.

Thanks.

> I do have a concern that when the number of ADs falls to one as there
> can be issues of conflict of interest that need technical expertise to
> resolve. There is also the issue of there being no natural AD for IETF
> participants to turn to in such circumstances. It would be useful if
> the proposed BCP gave a little guidance to cover such circumstances
> such as considering the, perhaps temporary, merging of areas so
> that there were three responsible ADs rather than just one.

You mention one factor, but there are others, such as having someone to talk to, ability to deal with events like someone being sick or on vacation, and so on. Yet we’ve had one AD areas. And most ADs tend to have multiple areas of expertise from what I can see, even if their primary expertise is on one area. I think the IETF and the IESG are generally aware of these tradeoffs and issues. Anyway, we are not considering the creation of additional single-AD areas at this time :-)

Jari