At 10:29 AM -0700 10/9/09, SM wrote:
...
Section 1.1 of the draft mentions that:
"The IESG may provide an IESG note to an Independent Submission or
IRTF Stream document to explain the specific relationship, if any, to
IETF work."
That's a "may". From what you said, I deduce that you would prefer
that line to say:
The IESG will provide an IESG note to an Independent Submission ...
The reasons for the IESG Note are mentioned in Section 3. None of
them are about a label saying that the RFC is not a product of a WG.
I think may is the right term here. But, if the IESG chooses to
assert this prerogative, I would like to see the note inserted,
without the need for RFC Editor concurrence.
When the RFC series was first established, the need for archival,
searchable, open publication of Internet-related documents was a
good argument for the autonomy of the RFC Editor function.
Moreover, the RFC Editor function pre-dates the existence of the
IETF and the IESG, by many years. But, times change. The
availability of search engines like Google make it possible for
essentially anyone to publish material that is widely accessible,
relatively easy to find, and more or less archival. Also, the vast
majority of the RFCs published for many years are documents
approved by the IESG. Thus it seems reasonable to revisit the
degree of autonomy the RFC Editor enjoys relative to the IESG. The
current proposal does not change the relationship very much in
practice, but I understand that it is an important issue in
principle, and the IETF membership has debated it in this context,
extensively.
An open source advocate once suggested to me that I could use
Geocities to publish material. That site is closing this month.
There are differences between publishing something on your web site
and publishing a RFC. The latter does not require search engine
optimization for wide dissemination. A RFC has intrinsic qualities
because of the way it is produced. There are some RFCs with IESG
notes, such as RFC 4144, which I read as good advice.
When the site closed, do you believe that all of the material
published there will become inaccessible, not archived anywhere? I
doubt that.
The current proposal undermines the independence of the RFC Editor
(ISE in practice). It changes the relationship from one where the
various parties should work together and come to an agreement to a
tussle between the RFC Editor and the IESG. I don't think that an
appeal is a good idea. I didn't object to it as the IESG folks may
feel better if they had that mechanism. However, I do object to
making the outcome mandatory.
The status quo does not mandate that the RFC Editor and the IESG
agree; it allows the RFC Editor to make a unilateral decision to
ignore an IESG note. So, I don't agree with the second part of your
statement above. I do agree that the change diminishes the
independence of the RFC Editor.
Steve
_______________________________________________
Ietf@xxxxxxxx
https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf