--On Monday, January 30, 2023 19:55 +0200 Lars Eggert
<lars@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> Hi,
>
> let's up-level a bit. This document instructs the IETF LLC to
> try its hardest to make unlimited free remote participation
> available. It leaves the details of how this is done mostly to
> the operational side.
>
> I think this is feature, not a bug. We have too many process
> RFCs that codify operational details, and those parts don't
> age well. I would strongly urge to think twice before adding
> operational aspects to this document, unless absolutely
> necessary.
Agreed so far.
The question in my mind (which I think overlaps with parts of
John Scudder's concerns) is that, if we are going to say,
however vaguely and ambiguously, that the LLC can decide that
fee waivers are costing too much and start limiting their number
and/or limiting the conditions under which they can be approved,
do we want to provide any general guidance? I am not
suggesting trying to prospectively micromanage the LLC nor
getting involved with anything I'd consider an operational
aspect. At the same time and just as an example, suppose the
LLC decides that, for a given meeting, it is possible to have N
fee waivers and they receive 1.5*N or even 2*N waiver requests.
I can think of at least two different general ways to move
forward. One would be to simply conduct a lottery with the
requests and pick the first N drawn to get the waivers. The
other might involve prioritizing, e.g., IESG and IAB members, WG
chairs, document editors, etc., and, if there were less than N
requests from people in those groups, running the lottery on any
waiver slots left.
One could consider other ways to prioritize too: newcomers
versus long-term attendees, gender or geographical balance, and
so on.
I don't think there is any need to go into even that much
detail. However, since the document opens the door to the LLC
making a decision to limit the number of vouchers, I think it is
desirable --maybe even important to the perceived integrity of
the standards process-- that the IETF provide some general
guidance about how the scarcity should be handled, e.g.,
"allocate at random among those who request" or "allocate in a
way that maximizes IETF productivity with the LLC expected to
propose details for community review". Maybe a similarly
general example statement about maximizing diversity of meeting
participation would be appropriate as another choice. But, IMO,
the IETF should be setting those sorts of general principles,
not either leaving it to the LLC without guidance or having the
rule change from one meeting to the next.
In addition, because the document also opens the door to review
of requests to identify abusive behaviors (with, presumably, the
possibility of denying waivers to abusers), I think it might be
useful to be clear that adjusting the number of waivers to be
given out by titration of the criteria for considering someone
abusive is not (or is) an acceptable mechanism. But that may be
less important and closer to operational meddling than the
allocation issue above.
> Related to your second point, I don't quite understand how you
> interpret the establishment of (a guidance for) unlimited
> remote fee waivers as moving us closer to a "pay-to-play
> model". I think it's doing the exact opposite.
>...
Let me try to come back to this in a separate note and see if I
can figure out how to explain better without going on too long.
best,
john
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