Re: IETF 112 will be a fully online meeting

[Brian Carpenter <[e-mail]>]

The virus travels by international flights, without bothering to check in.
That makes large international meetings a rather special case. Having
invented the Internet, we'd be a bit strange not to use it.

Regards,
    Brian Carpenter
    (via tiny screen & keyboard)

On Mon, 6 Sep 2021, 20:47 Maisonneuve, Julien (Nokia - FR/Paris-Saclay), <
[e-mail]> wrote:

> Things are worse globally, but not so bad in many places.
>
> Should we avoid anything that can spread the disease and remain in our
> dwellings relying on deliveries because the situation is bad in many places
> ? Most governments have taken another approach (vaccination, masks, gel,
> some distancing) and allow near-normal life. Surely IETF can learn from
> their example.
>
> Julien.
>
>
>
> *From:* ietf <[e-mail]> *On Behalf Of *Michael Speer
> *Sent:* Saturday, September 4, 2021 8:50 PM
> *To:* John C Klensin <[e-mail]>
> *Cc:* IETF list <[e-mail]>; JORDI PALET MARTINEZ <jordi.palet=
> [e-mail]>
> *Subject:* Re: IETF 112 will be a fully online meeting
>
>
>
> Wow!  Guys we are in a global pandemic!  Common sense says take the least
> amount of risk possible for everyone concerned.  Things are now worse
> globally, so why meet in person and spread the disease even further?
>
>
>
> On Sat, Sep 4, 2021 at 08:50 John C Klensin <[e-mail]> wrote:
>
> Spencer,
>
> Your characterization of my comments is correct.   The thing you
> left out is that most existing such insurance politics contain,
> often in fine print, provisions that the insured party is not
> allowed to be egregiously stupid and/or to ignore clear legal or
> equivalent advice.
>
> To extend your example into the ridiculous, suppose that, in
> addition to declaring consensus, you told the proponents of the
> losing proposal to go jump in the lake, a lake that you knew was
> infested by deadly and fles-eating bacteria, viruses, or
> animals.  Suppose they followed your advice and their heirs or
> companies then sued.  Whether the insurance company would pay up
> or defend you would probably depend on the company and the
> policy but, if they did, they would almost certainly try to
> recover costs (at least) from you and/or whomever was
> responsible for putting you in that position.  And then the
> various lawyers would get rich trying to settle the issue of
> whether you were the stupid and irresponsible one for making
> such a suggestion or whether the parties who ended up in the
> lake were responsible because treating your advice as anything
> but metaphor were the stupid ones.
>
> See Jay's note and, again, changing the organizational location
> of the IETF would not change things very much because the issues
> from the standpoint of the insurers don't change much even if
> explicit government policies do.
>
> best,
>     john
>
>
>
>
> --On Saturday, September 4, 2021 10:20 -0500 Spencer Dawkins at
> IETF <[e-mail]> wrote:
>
> > I'm current with the downthread discussion as of me typing
> > this, but I'm backing up to John's email, because it mentioned
> > an important point, that I happen to know a little, but only a
> > little, about, and my experience has been that much of the
> > community isn't aware of (and people don't even know that
> > they're not aware of it, because the topic doesn't come up in
> > discussions very often).
> >
> > John, please feel free to correct me if I'm misrepresenting
> > what you said here.
> >
> > On Thu, Sep 2, 2021 at 2:02 AM John C Klensin
> > <[e-mail]> wrote:
> >
> >> IANAL, but I have spent some time dealing with insurance
> >> companies, including special risk underwriters, and trying to
> >> understand the statistical risk assessments on which
> >> willingness to insure and rates are ultimately based. While
> >> neither RFC 8717 nor 8718 appear to mention insurance among
> >> the criteria, I suppose it is safe to assume that, were an
> >> insurer come to the IETF and say, e.g., "if one of your
> >> meetings turns into a superspreader event, there will be no
> >> coverage for either the LLC or individual IESG or LLC Board
> >> members being sued over the irresponsible decision", there
> >> would be no f2f meeting.
> >
> >
> > When I went through WG chair training in the late 1990s for
> > the first time, I was told (in a different world, of course -
> > Steve Coya and Jeff Schiller were doing the training, IIRC)
> > that ISOC provided insurance for (at least, not sure who else)
> > WG chairs, in case they were sued because of decisions they
> > made as part of their responsibilities.
> >
> > So,
> >
> >    - if my working group considered two individual-draft
> > proposals, and
> >    - one was adopted and the other was not, and
> >    - the proponents of the proposal that was NOT adopted sued
> > me as the    working group chair that made that decision
> > and/or declared consensus on    that decision,
> >
> > there was an insurance policy that covered me making that
> > decision.
> >
> > (I'm not sure if this is even true these days, because I
> > haven't wondered about insurance in nearly two decades, but
> > stay with me here).
> >
> > If there's a similar situation in place these days, and it
> > covers (for instance) IESG members and LLC members who would
> > be involved in making venue decisions as part of their
> > responsibilities, I can EASILY imagine an insurance company
> > saying "ya know, defending people who might send hundreds of
> > people into harm's way because of a careless decision they
> > make during the Age of Plague either isn't something we want
> > to do, or we need to talk about how much we'll charge to
> > defend them for making those decisions, and the price isn't
> > going down".
> >
> > I THINK that's what John is saying here, and because there are
> > people on this list who likely are more current than I am, I
> > won't try to do more than provide background from my past
> > understanding.
> >
> > But, please, continue.
> >
> > Best,
> >
> > Spencer
>
>