Re: In person versus virtual?

[Phillip Hallam-Baker <[e-mail]>]

On Wed, Mar 11, 2020 at 8:07 AM Tim Chown <[e-mail]> wrote:

> > On 11 Mar 2020, at 07:40, Eliot Lear <lear=[e-mail]>
> wrote:
> >
> > You may be referring to a draft I wrote,
> draft-lear-we-gotta-stop-meeting-like-this-00.txt, or maybe to comments
> made by others in various IETF threads.
> >
> > My intuition tells me we should probably not meet 3x per year in person,
> but something less, like 2x, if for no other reason, to save the
> environment.  But my intuition is not enough to make good decisions.  It
> seems to me that some data is required, which is why I wrote that draft.
> Let’s get data, in order to understand what are the most effective
> collaboration modalities for this organization.
> >
> > I was aiming for an experiment some years down the road, but here we
> are.  Let’s make the most of it and collect what data we can.
>
> I think two physical meetings leaving more room for two virtual meetings
> per WG in between would be a good path to follow.  Less travel, less
> carbon, and perhaps four draft deadlines that way rather than three,
> spreading the work over the year better.
>

+1

The way we wrote the SAML specs in OASIS was with bi-weekly con calls and
one or two in person meetings a year.

That model is not necessarily relevant for all IETF work but neither is
what we have today.

Two better attended meetings are likely to be an improvement on the current
three.


Another point to consider here is that many people are going to see a pivot
in the business model of their employers. It is pretty clear that virtual
collaboration is going to be the new focus of the tech world.