>>>>> On Sun, 20 Sep 2009 18:42:36 -0700, Randall Gellens <randy@xxxxxxxxxxxx> said:
RG> (1) The law and associated hotel rule Marshall quoted could be
RG> violated by what may appear to IETF participants as technical
RG> discussion. For example, the manipulation/censorship of Internet
RG> traffic by or under orders of the Chinese government is well known. If
RG> this were to be mentioned or discussed during the IETF, perhaps in the
RG> context of encryption, tunneling, web proxy, DNS, or some other
RG> technical area, we could run be violating the law and hence the
RG> rule.
I've had similar thoughts: what happens when the lines are blurred?
Where are the lines exactly in the first place? I think many potential
technical conversations will be conversations that could be viewed as
anti-government because the IETF frequently develops technology to get
around middle-box impediments.
What would happen to those discussions?
1) they would happen anyway, and nothing would happen (yay!)
(regardless of whether they went "unnoticed" or "weren't offensive")
2) thew would happen anyway, and would get "shut down"
3) they wouldn't happen because of fear
The problem isn't just one of "can we have it". The mere existence of
the policy may prevent people from voicing a comment they might in
another venue. A single missing comment or discussion due to fear would
be a bad thing.
--
Wes Hardaker
Cobham Analytic Solutions
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