Re: [Manycouches] Daniel presentation @ 113 - virtual interim meetings

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

--On Tuesday, April 12, 2022 14:41 -0700 Fred Baker
<[e-mail]> wrote:

> 
> 
>> On Apr 12, 2022, at 8:51 AM, Joel M. Halpern
>> <[e-mail]> wrote:
>> 
>> Trimmed, to comment on one possibility raised by Eliot.
>> Joel
>> 
>> On 4/12/2022 11:29 AM, Eliot Lear wrote:
>> ...
>>>  * Mandatory virtual interim meetings at a certain tempo
>> ...
>> 
>> Actually, I would prefer fewer virtual per-WG interim
>> meetingss.   As a person who participates in a lot of IETF
>> working groups, and also in other SDOs, regular virtual
>> interim meetings are a pain.  Regular virtual interim
>> meetings in the sweet spot that people like for international
>> calls makes everything collide.  Having interims when there
>> is actually a need for discussion on a specific topic makes
>> good sense.  But interim meetings at a "certain tempo".
>> Please, no.
>> 
>> Yours,
>> Joel
> 
> I concur. The point of plenary meetings is, in part, to
> justify the travel expense, and the point of meetings at all
> is to enable people to talk with each other face to face.
> Regular face to face interims would mean that many people
> would simply not find the expense justified, and virtual
> interims prevent the face to face conversations that need to
> be had.

To take this a step further, one of the IETF's main strengths
lies in the ability of people to look in on and participate in
work outside their main area of expertise, activities that often
start on a drop-in basis.  I think we could continue (or resume)
that with fewer meetings a year as long as we renew our strong
commitment to doing most of our work on mailing lists and to
focus there and on occasional meetings.  At least for the WG's
I'm following (fewer than years ago, see below), many virtual
interims often act as substitutes for that mailing list work,
possibly leading to getting more work done but at the price of
broad participation (at least sometimes due to the choice of
times for those meetings).  Except, perhaps, for people with
unlimited travel budgets and the ability to spend most of their
time on the IETF, f2f interims would likely be even worse,
resulting in participants making tradeoffs between traveling to
and participating in those interims because the are most
involved with (or sponsored for) the WGs holding them and other
WGs to which they could be contributing broader perspectives
and/or the plenary meetings themselves.

I think we could get by with two, or possibly even one, f2f
plenary meeting a year without much damage... but only if we
recommitted to trying to get as much done as possible on mailing
lists, minimized the number of interims (with no f2f ones except
under the most unusual or circumstances), and thought carefully
about some all-online plenary-type sessions. 

I think it would also be wise to think carefully about how much
work we are taking on and, in particular, how broad the
commitment needs to be to spin up a WG.  Especially with fewer
f2f meetings and more reliance on interims that people need to
be really committed to the WG to attend (even online), we could
easily see increasing numbers of WG where almost all of the
participants share a single point of view on the relevant issues
and how they should be addressed.  The IETF adds almost no value
to such groups other than endorsements of their conclusions.
Perhaps things have evolved to the point that people want the
IETF to be in that business, but I'm not enthused.  In any
event, I think we need to consider the possibility that an IETF
that needs to rely on fewer traditional in-person meetings -- no
matter the mix of online and hybrid ones--   simply cannot
sustain the amount and quality of work on which the IETF built
its reputation.

In addition, if we go in that direction, or even stay with the
current "hybrid" model, I'd encourage the IESG to think about
reinstating a meeting pattern we dropped many years ago, I
believe under pressure from too many WGs.  That was to start the
meetings of with a Monday morning plenary that summarized
important issues for the week and even included reports from
each Area about what they were doing and focusing on.   HotRFC
has taken over a bit of that job, but I suggest is a patch
rather than a replacement for an opportunity for the community
to get a general understanding of what is being worked on and
for individuals to make decisions about how to invest their time
(ideally with a less crowded agenda).

best,
   john