Hi,
As requested by Lloyd, this initial suggestion is being made public.
Thanks,
Dhruv on behalf of the SAA team
-------- Forwarded Message --------
Subject: Initial suggestion from the IETF SAA
Date: Tue, 6 Apr 2021 08:09:14 +0530
From: IETF Sergeant at Arms <saa@xxxxxxxx>
Reply-To: saa@xxxxxxxx
Organization: IETF
To: Lloyd W <lloyd.wood=40yahoo.co.uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Hi Lloyd,
I am writing to you on behalf of the sergeant-at-arms (SAA) team for
ietf@xxxxxxxx. This message has been vetted with others on the SAA team,
which is described in more detail at [1].
We are reaching out to you because of your recent message to
ietf@xxxxxxxx [2]. The message contained the following language:
Establishing the TERM workgroup gives Niels and his colleagues a space
in which to practise and better their authoritarian thought policing
(sorry, 'governance'), out of the general view, in a safe area away from
disturbance.
which the SAA team considers unprofessional commentary [3] for being a
personal attack. Please try to avoid using this kind of language on
ietf@xxxxxxxx in the future. We are happy to discuss suggestions for how
to convey the same message in an appropriate way if you would like to
discuss that.
We consider this an initial suggestion. We do not believe your message
is part of a pattern of abuse that would warrant the restriction of your
posting rights. If we see such a pattern emerge, we will get back in
touch with you to suggest that you voluntarily take a break from posting
to the list.
If you wish for us to make this message public, please let us know and
we will re-send it with ietf@xxxxxxxx on cc.
Thanks,
Dhruv Dhody
[1] https://www.ietf.org/how/lists/discussion/
[2] https://mailarchive.ietf.org/arch/msg/ietf/y8en2dH7bYfYOCbBKj-Ovr1Wkd8/
[3] https://github.com/ietf/saa/blob/master/unprofessional-commentary.md
On 06/04/21 5:57 am, Lloyd W wrote:
I agree: TERM will not be a technical workgroup, and will not be
conducting technical discussion.
It's worth noting that TERM is specifically being chartered initially to
produce an INFORMATIONAL document sans BCP tag, which sort-of gets
around the BCP would-affect-all-IETF problem. Why, those aren't
recommendations at all. Not binding on the IETF or how it works. Nothing
to see here.
I'm sure we can all think of documents, throughout history, that started
out as simply for information, and turned into something else entirely.
And I'd like to point out the CAPS standards keywords used throughout
draft-knodel-terminology, which are not at all appropriate in
informational documents that cannot make such recommendations. Really,
starting out as informational is a minor speedbump on the road to
success, and the controlling aspirations of that document are quite clear.
Establishing the TERM workgroup gives Niels and his colleagues a space
in which to practise and better their authoritarian thought policing
(sorry, 'governance'), out of the general view, in a safe area away from
disturbance. Think of TERM as the Protocol Police Academy. They're
citizens on patrol!
If you have opinions on TERM's formation, please do submit them to
iesg@xxxxxxxx before that deadline. Today.
thanks
Lloyd Wood
lloyd.wood@xxxxxxxxxxx
On 6 Apr 2021, at 09:12, Michael StJohns <mstjohns@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
For some reason I can't find the original announcement, so I'll just
do this bare.
Given the general language of RFC 2418, my best take is that _*it's
inappropriate for the IETF to charter a working group on this
topic*_. It's not a technical topic, and it does not fit the general
WG model.
To my best recollection (which means I may have missed one), we've
never chartered a WG solely for the purpose of writing documents that
purport to modify the way the IETF does business. Such documents have
usually come either as IESG / IAB authored/sponsored BCPs. Indeed,
BCP 95 was just such a document. WGs have been (should be?) for
technical activities related to specifying how the Internet works.
<minirant>Technical WGs at least have the possibility of achieving
consensus based on the analysis of tradeoffs of hard facts and good
analysis. A "WG" such as TERM may fail of achieving even WG
consensus, let alone community consensus (especially given the current
ongoing discussions) and there will be no fall back to fact analysis
possible. I can't see any way an appeal could be managed in those
circumstances and I strongly suggest we do not try to place this in
the WG model.</minirant>
Since the proposed charter for Term will effect more than just the
standards process (e.g. it potentially effects all of the current and
future RFC streams), it would appear this should be handled either as
an IAB activity (either authored, or referred to a workshop), or
deferred until the RFCED group completes its work and can have this
assigned as a work item.
My first preference is to do this as an IAB Workshop report with no
BCP tag and with as dispassionate an analysis and output language as
possible. E.g. explanatory language vs directive.
Mike
