> Maybe IETF should be thinking about what actions and > policies, uniformly applied, will result in the most accurate > representation of its work to the community. In my experience, the best action to take would be to advise, or teach, people how to handle media interviews. Back when I used to regularly talk to journalists I had no problem with their articles because I planned the interviews in advance. I made sure that I had no more than two or three key points to make, I prepared a sound bite or two, and I repeated myself. There is an art in taking complex technical material and explaining it in layman's terms, but that is exactly what you must do with journalists if you want them to accurately represent your message. Even journalists who cover technology are not technologists themselves. Their specialty is writing and they can only write what you CLEARLY and consistently explain to them. It can be especially hard for people with a deep technical understanding of something, complete with a multitude of corner cases, to summarize in laymans' terms and gloss over the details. That's why I agree with Keith that some IETF action would be beneficial here. Note that one way to approach the issue is to hold official press conferences at which only accredited members of the press can ask questions. By doing this you focus attention on a few people who would, hopefully, prepare for the event and understand how to explain the work to ordinary people like journalists and their readers. This doesn't prevent the press from attending other meetings and it doesn't prevent IETF members from talking to the press. What it does do is hold out the carrot of quality communication, and one hopes that the press will appreciate the effort and make full use of it. Indeed, the invitations should explicitly solicit clarifying questions about anything that the journalist has already begun working on. --Michael Dillon _______________________________________________ Ietf@xxxxxxxx https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf