Mike, There sort of was a "central hotel bar" in Maastricht, one which extended to the outside and one which you pretty much had to walk by to get to your hotel room --- even if you were not staying at the NH. However, on Monday night it became painfully obvious that the staff was not capable of handling a crowd as large as the IETF and while things seem to improve the next day and beyond, I think a lot of folks had given up on the NH hotel by then and scattered all over town etc. It would have helped of course if the NH had been bigger, with more rooms and more staff, but that's part of the tradeoff that had to be made. Amsterdam, in comparison would have given us a couple of hotels near the convention center and the rest in town, all costing about $50 per night on average. In retrospect Amsterdam *may* have been a better choice, for some value of "better". The facilities in Hiroshima were not "high capacity" either, but at least it was somewhat easier to get to nearby restaurants, bars, etc. We'll certainly factor in all the input for future venue selections and even explore other models as Bob outlined in his presentation at the plenary. Ole Ole J. Jacobsen Editor and Publisher, The Internet Protocol Journal Cisco Systems Tel: +1 408-527-8972 Mobile: +1 415-370-4628 E-mail: ole@xxxxxxxxx URL: http://www.cisco.com/ipj On Sun, 8 Aug 2010, Michael StJohns wrote: > Hi Bob - > > I appreciate and believe that this is your highest priority, but I > think we may differ on how to best accomplish a successful meeting. > Maastricht for me was an example of the low end of sort of > successful sites and that's primarily because of the conference > center with hotels model rather than the opposite model of a hotel > with a conference center. > > In Maastricht, there wasn't a central hotel bar, no place to happen > upon 3 or 4 disjoint conversations on wide topics, no 11pm discourse > on how to fix the problem that came up in the session earlier that > day. No place to buttonhole Russ or Olaf over a beer after dinner, > etc (although they may appreciate that). > > A great portion of the IETFs success is due to cross fertilization > and serendipity and that has been fed in the past by having a > comfortable place with drinks and food that you pretty much have to > go by to get to your hotel room. Typically, these have been the most > successful (in terms of new ideas and energy) meetings. > > In Maastricht you had that big central room with uncomfortable > chairs and pretty much no reason to be there if you weren't using > the internet or weren't either going to or coming from a WG session. > I saw few random gatherings (but I admit, I probably wouldn't have > been able to tell them from the non-random ones). Compare and > contrast this with Anaheim for example. So, Maastricht was probably > fine if you were narrowly focused on your WG(s), but not so great if > you were interested in how the various problems might interact or > were interested in learning about the IETF itself. > > It's also possible that I'm waxing philosophical for a portion of > IETF culture than is no longer important to the current crop of > participants - but that's life I guess. > > Mike > > > > At 11:16 PM 8/7/2010, Bob Hinden wrote: > >Mike, > > > >Just to be clear, the highest priority in venue selection is to > >find a venue where we can have a successful meeting. We won't go > >anywhere were we don't think we can get the work done. This > >discussion is where to have a meeting, but not at the expense of > >the work itself. > > > >Bob > > _______________________________________________ Ietf mailing list Ietf@xxxxxxxx https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf