Re: The Evils of Informational RFC's

[Dave CROCKER <[e-mail]>]

> I fail to find any of the justifications in RFC 4846 all that persuasive.
> Choosing a few examples:
...
> Nowadays, vendors have web sites that describe their protocols.


These are frequent lines of argumentation against publishing anything other than 
formal IETF documents.  What they represent is a misunderstanding of the 
established role of the RFC series.  Publishing formal IETF documents is only 
part of the benefit provided to the community for the last 40 years.

Take a look back over that record.  Its structure and publication arc describe a 
culture, not just a set of technologies.

A healthy community culture is difficult to engineer and fragile to maintain. 
Typically, it's creation is an unintended consequence and it is destroyed 
similarly.  Mess with it not just at your own peril, but at the peril of that 
community.

There is no crisis or even problem that is creating different circumstances than 
we have had over the last 40 years.  We have flourished, not just survived, with 
this horribly flawed publishing model.  Note, for example, that alternative 
publishing might be more convenient now, but it is not new. In other words, it 
ain't broke, so let's stop calling for repair.

We would spend our time better by focusing on creating our own specifications 
more efficiently and with better and quicker community uptake.  Worrying about 
non-IETF Informational IETFs distracts from that.

d/
-- 

   Dave Crocker
   Brandenburg InternetWorking
   bbiw.net