Re: Harassment, abuse, accountability. and IETF mailing lists

["Murray S. Kucherawy" <[e-mail]>]

On Thu, Jun 2, 2022 at 8:26 PM John C Klensin <[e-mail]> wrote:

> [...]
>
> Even our announcements of new non-WG lists are part of the
> problem.  As a handy example, an announcement appeared today
> titled "New Non-WG Mailing List: cfbl".  It tells the reader
> where the archives are and how to subscribe.  It tells us that
> it is "intended for discussions relating to the Complaint
> Feedback Loop Address Header", but one needs to be rather
> thoroughly immersed in that corner of the ART area (the
> announcement does say it belongs to that area) to have a clue
> about what that is about.  Either you or I could probably could
> figure out where to look but a newcomer, especially one who did
> not know enough to treat "This list belongs IETF area" (sic) as
> a clue, I think it would be pretty hopeless.  It does tell
> anyone who wants additional information to "please contact the
> list administrators". That, unfortunately, just makes things
> worse: No information in the announcement as to who those people
> might be or how to contact/ reach them, etc.   Someone very
> experienced with the IETF might notice that someone named
> "[e-mail]" is copied on the announcement and is not
> the list address itself, but that is not a person's name, it is
> just a hint, it is easily missed, and expecting a newcomer to
> make that inference is, well, unrealistic.  One might reasonably
> try to go to the list's "info" page (disguised in the
> announcement as "To subscribe:") for information about how to
> contact the list administrators, but that page is very similar
> to the 14all list.   In particular, the terms "list
> administrator" or even "administrator" do not even appear on it.
>
> Once upon a time, we required anyone requesting that the IETF
> create or host a list provide a paragraph of description of what
> that list was about, who was expected to participate, and why.
> Apparently that is no longer the case.  If we care about
> openness and transparency, probably not a step in the right
> direction.
>

Speaking for myself and not the IESG:

I was the Area Director that approved this list, so I can clarify what
happened here.

The non-WG list request form includes two fields pertinent to this case.
One of them requests a one-liner to be included on the non-WG
"list-of-lists" page.  It appears that the text that was submitted for this
purpose was replaced with simply "cfbl-address-header", which I agree is
not very descriptive.  I just asked the list manager to update that page
with the one-liner I was given.

The second field asks for a more detailed description, and indicates where
this will be used, in particular in the announcement that's sent to the
community.  The text provided for that field in the form I was sent was
terse, to the point of being unhelpful as John pointed out, and it's my
fault for not catching this and considering where it would be visible.  So,
apologies for that oversight, and I'll be more cautious about it in the
future.  I've asked for something more comprehensive in the way of a
descriptive paragraph. In terms of fixing this, however, there doesn't seem
to be a place where such prose is used outside of the announcement, which
has already been sent, so I'm not sure what to do with it once I have it in
hand.  It doesn't appear to be present on the non-WG lists page or on the
WG's mailman status page, etc.  Perhaps I can get the announcement
re-sent.  At a minimum, I'll send it to the ART area list.

As for whether non-WG lists are any different than WG lists in terms of
management and responsibility, I don't have any reason to think they
warrant any different treatment.  The list administrators should be aware
that they have obligations to manage the list as a WG list would be
managed, that the Note Well applies, and what the remedy procedures are
when problems arise.  I'm generally supportive of the idea of making all of
this more evident in list footers or list management pages where people
might land.  Finally, in the absence of effective management of a list
where problems are happening, I believe suspension or closure of the list
might be warranted until such management can be secured.

-MSK