[saag] RFCs vs Standards

[Michael Richardson <[e-mail]>]

Over in saag@, there is a multi-week long debate about whether/how to publish
algorithm allocations which are not the result of IETF consensus.  Some feel
that Specification Required is not strong enough, others feel it is too
strong, with the quasi-temporary nature of I-Ds intruding into the debate.

Stephen Farrell <[e-mail]> wrote:
    > On 30/11/2024 02:17, Eric Rescorla wrote:
    >> Well, it's possible this is about the RFC series, but I'm not yet sure,
    >> because there are two kinds of RFCs one could imagine here:
    >> 1. IETF Stream RFCs
    >> 2. Independent Stream RFCs
    >> Which do you have in mind?

(And not all RFCs in the IETF stream are standards...)

    > All RFCs in the series. But I do agree the two streams above are
    > of most relevance here mostly. IRTF stream RFCs though crop up in
    > these discussions too.

I think that the very-big-tent collective "we" have benefitted greatly from the
multi-decade ambiguity about the RFC series.

For instance, many of us know of (government) RFPs in which RFCs which were not
standards track were cited: many trade agreements require "Performance
Specifications", and bureaucrats usually can't tell what is what. (Nor often,
do they care)

Maybe it's time for us to clean up our own act.
A renewed push to only cite STDxx, and maybe actively characterize documents better.
Some have spoken about having a new series of some kind.

Gosh, it would be nice to get it all sorted before RFC10000.  There probably
isn't time to reach consensus though.