Re: StandICT.eu funding on offer

[John C Klensin <[e-mail]>]

--On Friday, May 7, 2021 10:26 -0500 Pete Resnick
<[e-mail]> wrote:

> On 7 May 2021, at 10:14, Andrew G. Malis wrote:
> 
>> I disagree about the charter call. The mailman description
>> for the  general IETF list is "This mailing list is for
>> general topics of  discussion relating to items within the
>> IETF community. This is a  public list for the IETF community
>> to use. Any items posted are  subject to the rules of BCP 78
>> and BCP 79." This posting certainly  fits that
>> description, it's very much of interest to the community.
> 
> But it doesn't fit the IETF list charter, RFC 3005:
> 
>      Inappropriate postings include:
> 
>      - Announcements of conferences, events, or activities
> that are not
>        sponsored or endorsed by the Internet Society or IETF.
> 
> I'm not saying that we can't decide to allow postings like
> this; it might be a very good thing. But we need to explicitly
> make that decision, and explain why this one is OK and other
> similar posts might still be problematic (if so).

FWIW, I concur with Pete.
If the "real" criterion is going to be "well, I think that is
interesting and/or helpful or "the ExecDir gets to post these
things but ordinary mortals do not".. well we just should not do
things that way.  Remember that rules like that came into being
because of concerns about assorted trolls and event promoters
creating excessive noise on the list.   Even though that was
clearly not the case with this announcement, allowing it without
an explicit decision and clear rules invites abuse and endless
debates about edge cases and whether a particular posting is
appropriate.

Two suggestions:

(1) If the LLC considers if sufficiently useful and Jay and/or
Greg think it is worth the time, put up a web page somewhere on
which they, at their discretion, can post announcements that
they think would be of interest to the community.  If people
could subscribe to a notification list that announces changes
when they are made, so far the better (as long as that list is
not ietf@ or ietf-announce@.  People wanting to announce such an
event could send the announcement to them and that would make
whatever decisions are appropriate. [1]

(2) Or, if the IESG thinks this is important enough, allow such
postings as long as two ADs approve of it.  Two to reduce
possible pressure on individual ADs from their employers,
professional affiliations, and friends, to reduce any possible
doubt about motivations, and to make everything a tad more
transparent.

   john