Hi John,
[removed iesg@xxxxxxxx from the Cc]
At 09:42 AM 27-12-2020, John C Klensin wrote:
I think there is something interesting to be learned from the
last couple of weeks of these postings. My recollection is
that, when Thomas started his version of the summaries, the main
IETF list was an active forum for discussions of issues of
importance to the IETF and the Internet. One could often get a
sense of important issues being considered by the IETF just by
reading that list, attending plenaries, and, before we dropped
them, overview reports from each Area at the plenaries or in
Proceedings. Yes, there was noise on it too, but the list was
active and those more substantive discussions were going on. A
decade ago, I could not have imagined a week in which there were
only three postings (which occurred last week) or one in which
there were 15 postings, each from a different person (this week).
There was a message about what those so-called summaries around
2003. Over time, the initial intent was forgotten. It could be said
that it was turned into an announcement to the IETF of the failure
by individuals (somewhat like RFC 6701, Section 4.d) to conform to
unwritten rules. For what it is worth, the overview reports from the
different Areas was likely well before that time.
Perhaps that is a good sign, i.e., that the list traffic is not
dominated by a few people posting rants and counter-rants in
quick succession. But that behavior still occurs on IETF lists
Yes.
I'm watching (and, subjectively, I think it has gotten worse
overall in recent years), so perhaps we have just shifted it
elsewhere. This is, I think obviously, not just about the
separation of Last Call discussions although those sometimes
lead to more general ones that now do not show up anywhere else,
but to larger trends of pushing topics that might be of general
interest into silos for which one has to make a specific
commitment to sign up for a list and follow.
There were other changes over the years, e.g. the blogging
initiative. I'd say that it is more a matter of communication style
[1], as determined by the current administration.
The separate Last Call mailing list might be useful for the pursuit
of economic interests. However, pushing discussions which could be
of wider interest to a topic-specific mailing list is not ideal.
Regards,
S. Moonesamy
1. Wes discussed that on another thread.
