--On Friday, 01 October, 2004 20:09 +0200 Eliot Lear <lear@xxxxxxxxx> wrote: > Kai Henningsen wrote: >> Only Harald disagrees with that, because that is certainly >> not the question his poll asked - there was no "neither" >> option. > > Nor need there be. If the leadership is down to these two > choices and one of them is going to be The One<tm>, then you > might as well run with those two choices. Even if the > leadership want to know hypothetically which one is best, > there is still no need to have to state "I don't like either". Eliot, I have hoped to not have to get into this explicitly, and have been talked out of it (or talked myself out of it) several times. But part of your note calls for a response. "The Leadership" (the reason I'm capitalizing that term will be clear below) has only the authority that the IETF community, rather explicitly, gives them. We have, for example, given the IESG rather broad authority to interpret the standards process and to determine community consensus on what should be standardized. Even there, that distinction is important -- the IESG has no authority to make or proclaim standards on their own and has not attempted to do so. But, to take the IESG as an example, there is nothing in the various procedural documents that gives them _any_ authority to reorganize the IETF, create new organizations, etc. Without such authority, there is rather little difference between * Harald (whom I'm picking out only because of the chair he occupies, not because of anything he has or has not done) standing up and saying "I am the IETF Chair. With IESG and IAB support, I have decided X" and * Joe Blow (a hypothetical person) standing up and saying "I am the Bozo. With the support of a dozen or two of my close friends, I have decided Y" Now, I'm actually a big fan of leadership (small "l"). Without it, especially in a complex discussion, there are high odds of everyone going off wandering in the weeds. So I appreciate the efforts and good intentions of Leslie, Harald, the IAB and IESG, and those they have worked with, to draw these issues together into coherent form and to offer good summaries and advice to the community on what _The Community_ should decide. Those efforts to summarize the issues and delineate and differentiate choices have been at least moderately successful in some parts of this and, in my personal opinion, rather disappointing in others (as has been pointed out, my producing a summary of an even more complex discussion and not being able to get it under 360 lines is not a sign that we have understood all of the issues in a crisp way). > Everyone has had plenty of airtime on this issue. > > Decisions, please. But I get very concerned, partially because of my doubts about the extensive training and experience of most of the IAB and IESG in organizational behavior and structures, enterprise-level management, large-organization budget management, contracting and handling multiple subcontractors with interlocking tasks and critical deadlines, etc., when someone says something that sounds to me like "ok, start behaving like the King(s) (or Tyrant(s)) you are and decide for us". We need either clear community consensus on where we are headed, or clear community consensus that the IESG and/or IAB (or their Chairs) really should have decision authority for the community in this non-standards area. I suggest we have neither at the moment, although community consensus seems to be becoming more clear on some parts of the issues. john _______________________________________________ Ietf@xxxxxxxx https://www1.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf