> The problem is not that ADs have nasty intentions. It's that the > otherwise-essential job of quality assurance has been taken to the > extreme of having ADs block completed work that has been developed in > all the proper ways. This includes AD vetos (which are > euphemistically called "discuss") with non-normative issues or > requirements for lists of adjunct -- ie, not required -- work. Speaking from personal experience as an AD for four years, I found it extremely difficult to use the "discuss" mechanism to block shoddy work by working groups. There was considerable pressure from certain other ADs to accept work that clearly did not meet RFC 2026 criteria, and if an AD tried to push back on such work with "discuss" the likely response was that the "shepherding" AD and/or WG would sit on it for several months or years, make no substantive changes, and blame the "discussing" AD for blocking their work. In the end the document would usually get approved without the problems being fixed. I understand that WGs that have been working for several years tend to be exhausted and burned out and have difficulty doing good technical work at all - and even more difficulty with a "reset" that would revisit old technical decisions even if those were poor decisions. So in my mind, the problem isn't so much with the IESG process for final approval of those documents - the problem is that WGs are allowed to spend years pursuing approaches that have serious technical flaws without any cross-area review or pushback. Keith _______________________________________________ Ietf@xxxxxxxx https://www1.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf