May I recommend that the IETF sit down with representatives of the People's Republic of China and the U.S. government and discuss concerns with meetings in both countries -- the issue of censorship in China and arbitrary visa problems in the U.S.
Not to open Internet-related issues, only to establish procedures and agreements that will permit the IETF to meet in both countries without having to sacrifice the open character of its meetings and without having the visa problems that have harmed some individuals in the past.
It is important to both countries and to the the IETF to normalize its meeting relationships.
Gene Gaines
On Fri, Sep 18, 2009 at 3:33 PM, Bernard Aboba <bernard_aboba@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
The IETF does not and cannot make any warranties relating to the political views, manners or behavior of attendees. The attendees are responsible for their own actions, and the IETF has no ability ensure their conformance to local laws or customers. If attendees violate the laws or customs of the host country, they may face consequences -- but they're on their own.
So if the question is whether the IETF should sign any agreement that takes responsibility for the behavior attendees, I'd say that this is a bad idea. It's not really an issue of politics -- I'd say the same thing if the meeting were being held in Palm Beach and the city requested that the IETF take responsibility for ensuring that participants conformed to the dress code (no white after labor day!).
_______________________________________________
Ietf@xxxxxxxx
https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf
_______________________________________________ Ietf@xxxxxxxx https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf