Date: Wed, 9 Sep 2009 09:53:42 -0400
From: "Polk, William T." <william.polk@xxxxxxxx>
Message-ID: <C6CD2BA6.1483B%tim.polk@xxxxxxxx>
| IMHO, the RFC series (as comprised by the four document streams) is not
| similar to IEEE Transactions on Networking or the NY Times. I am not sure
| that there is really a close analog out there.
It is an independent publisher publishing material submitted to it - the
NY Times analogy isn't close, as they create much of their own material,
which neither IEEE Transactions, nor the RFC editor do (or not much of,
indexes and stuff like that excepted), but aside from that, there shouldn't
be a lot of difference.
| The better question is, if IEEE was distributing the output of the IETF in
| its series of standards publications
You're operating under the mistaken impression that the RFC series is
IETF standards - it isn't - some of he RFCs are IETF standards, others
are other IETF publications, and others have nothing to do with the IETF
at all. It is just a document series that the IETF happens to use as
a place to publish its output.
If there was a document series and publisher that was exclusively for
IETF standards, then we wouldn't be publishing anything else there at all,
and the question of notes would be irrelevant - that would be closer to the
way IEEE and ISO standards are published - but that is not what the RFC
series is now, or ever has been.
| And are we really helping anyone by not clarifying the relationship between
| the document and other RFCs? Shouldn't we provide this information as a
| service to the reader?
Many times that is reasonable, probably, and no-one is suggesting that
the RFC editor always refuse to publish IESG notes (though some of us
don't believe the IESG should very often, if at all, request one) - the
question isn't what happens when an IESG note is appropriate, the question
is what happens when it isn't - and who gets to decide.
kre
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