----- Original Message ----- From: "John Leslie" <john@xxxxxxx> To: "John C Klensin" <john-ietf@xxxxxxx> Cc: <ietf@xxxxxxxx> Sent: Monday, October 24, 2011 2:46 PM > John C Klensin <john-ietf@xxxxxxx> wrote: > > --On Sunday, October 23, 2011 07:05 -0700 "Murray S. Kucherawy" > > <msk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote: > > > >> ... I also am very familiar with the fact that getting work done > >> on lists can be a real challenge: People get sidetracked and can > >> take days, weeks, or even months to answer something that's > >> holding up a working group. > > But _why_ is that something "holding up a working group"? Because they are the one holding the token, usually the editorship of the I-D, and everyone else must wait for a revised version, for a response to LC comments etc. Harking back to Melinda's comment, this is where chairmanship comes in; the good chairs will chivy, poke and prod so that the hold-ups are minimised, or will kick off something else in the meantime. And sometimes WG chairs should prod ADs, sometimes vice versa. What is difficult in our structure is for those without a formal role to insert a chivy without causing offence; this is where face-to-face, with its vastly richer communication channel, is superior. Tom Petch > > >> If you're sitting on a mailing list and someone asks you to > >> provide a document review by some date and you say nothing, > >> there's no indication of whether or not you even got the > >> request. If you're sitting in a meeting room and someone asks > >> you to provide a document review by some date, that person is > >> likely to get an answer from you right away. > > But is that "right-away" answer necessarily useful? > > >> In short: Meetings don't stall, but lists do. > > I have seen many meeting stall. :^( > > Fortunately, they end. ;^) > > We're stuck with human nature here, and human nature tends to > put things off until the "last minute". Meetings "work better" > because they start and end at known times. > > > Murray, fwiw, your analysis doesn't require f2f meetings. If it > > could be done, well-conducted virtual/remote meetings would work > > as well because they, too involve fixed cutoffs, real-time > > responses, and opportunity to confront those who may not be > > responding, etc. > > I bring to your attention an existence proof: the IESG. > > For years they've been doing the vast bulk of entirely-too-much > work over "telechats". They _have_ fixed cutoffs, real-time > responses, and bi-weekly opportunities to confront those who may > not be responding. Et cetera... > > IMHO, we shouldn't dwell on why face-to-face meetings work better: > we should admit they really don't work well enough. > > I follow far too many (heck, one would be too many!) WGs where > the only cutoff is the I-D submission deadline before IETF week. > We're all seeing the ritual announcement in WG lists right now: > "If you'd like to present something, tell us!" > > WG chairs put so much effort into trying to make IETF-week > meetings work well that you really can't blame them for relaxing > a bit after IETF week completes. But too often, the momentum is > lost: WGCs have assigned responsibilities to folks who did show > up; and they too are exhausted by the end of IETF week. Finally, > they are roused by the I-D submission deadline for the next IETF > week. > > :^( > > I follow other WGs where there are Interim Meetings. The result > is much happier -- quite possibly _mostly_ because of the added > cutoff. > > Admittedly, the face-to-face Interims work better than virtual > Interims; but I'm not convinced that would still be the case if > instead of one face-to-face we had three or more virtual Interims. > There is a definite learning-curve working with conferencing > software, but once you've climbed this it works well enough. And > the additional cutoffs, IMHO, accomplish almost as much as the > meetings themselves! ;^) > > My advice is to put more effort into formal scheduling of > Interim meetings (probably mostly virtual Interims). Currently > these are treated as exceptional events needing AD approval: > while I agree AD-approval probably belongs there, I'd wish we > could treat them as "normal" events. > > -- > John Leslie <john@xxxxxxx> > _______________________________________________ > Ietf mailing list > Ietf@xxxxxxxx > https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf > > _______________________________________________ Ietf mailing list Ietf@xxxxxxxx https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf