Re: actions related to improving IETF meeting selections

[<[e-mail]>]

>Thanks so much for your efforts on both Singapore meeting and improving future IETF meeting selections. You have done an excellent work on respecting various opinions and making a >necessary compromise. 

+1 


>Regarding to diversity among future IETF meeting selections, there are actually multiple meanings of diversity. But in my opinion, the most important task for IETF organizer should be to >get and keep high quality and consistent contributors. Arising the awareness of IETF in wider areas, attracting more diversity people (particularly, if these people would not join the follow->up IETF meetings) are much less important than the convenience for our majority consistent participants. Therefore, the most important diversity should be geography diversity among the >current majority consistent participants. Consequently, I strongly support 1+1+1 policy. One potential option is that we may have a set of side/secondary IETF meetings apart from the >three main IETF meetings per years. They could be hold out of main areas to serve the other diversity purposes.
Sheng, I find the idea of "secondary or side" meetings very intriguing.   I think this may be a path for regions who do not have a large set of participants (yet).   I would like to see this idea elaborated upon.   What are your thoughts?
Nalini
 
>-----Original Message-----
>From: ietf [mailto:[e-mail]] On Behalf Of IETF Chair
>Sent: Wednesday, June 08, 2016 9:58 PM
>To: IETF Announcement List
>Cc: [e-mail]; [e-mail] Discussion
>Subject: actions related to improving IETF meeting selections
>
>
>The discussion about the Singapore meeting has been difficult for us. The IETF
>needs a meeting that we are generally happy with. Various past mistakes and
>new learnings aside, we are now in a situation where no decision in this space
>will be perfect. We knew that no matter what choice is made, there will be
>groups of people who feel they are unfairly impacted.
>
>But perhaps the most important things are that, long-term, the community
>gets to carefully weigh what they expect from meeting locations, that we all
>learn from more about the various challenges discussed, we are an open
>organisation for everybody including minorities, and that we improve our
>processes going forward. It is also crucial that the IETF remains an
>organisation that can do its technical work, and be open to all of our global
>participants in a fair manner. And obviously be capable of arranging our
>operations in the real world, in areas that our participants come from.
>
>What follows is what we are proposing as additional onward work to address
>the issues highlighted in this discussion:
>
>o  The IAOC as well as members of the community have asked me to
>charter a working group to continue the discussion of the detailed meeting
>criteria document (draft-baker-mtgvenue-iaoc-venue-selection-process). All
>criteria are on the table for discussion. The working group proposal is being
>reviewed by the IESG, and will be out for community review shortly. A WG
>meeting in Berlin is planned.
>
>o  Develop a BCP that defines the community-backed, official policy for the
>overall strategy of geographic meeting distribution (our current strategy is
>referred to as 1-1-1*). An initial draft for this is in the works.
>
>o  Arrange a special session in Berlin to discuss the role of human rights,
>visas, and other aspects of international meeting arrangements. We have
>begun to work to find outside experts in this space who can join a
>conversation. (If you have suggestions, let us know.)
>
>o  Continue the new practice of informing the community of potential
>future meeting destinations, and collecting “crowd-sourced” input on their
>suitability.
>
>o  Commit to a proper, informed process to identify issues that any
>subgroup (including but not only the LGBTQ community) has with our site
>selections.
>
>o  Commit to returning to the 1-1-1* meeting model — or what the
>eventual BCP policy is -- for Asia for the remainder of the decade. For the last
>decade, we’ve only met there 4 times.
>
>o  Commit to holding all other currently planned meetings as they are, and
>focusing on making the most appropriate decisions about future meetings, as
>informed by community input.
>
>o  While we do not believe that we should respond to the current
>discussions merely with a suggestion of conducting our meeting virtually, it is
>a clear direction that IETF and other organisations will be using more virtual
>collaboration tools in the future. The IESG has discussed taking initial steps
>with regards to bigger virtual meetings. Experiences from this could drive
>further efforts.
>
>Jari Arkko, IETF Chair