--On Saturday, July 27, 2013 08:38 +1200 Brian E Carpenter <brian.e.carpenter@xxxxxxxxx> wrote: > And there is a "Training" section in the meeting materials > page. It's empty... but thanks to somebody for putting it > there. All we need to do is figure out how to pre-load it. And to remember that link appears on the main meeting page because it isn't on either of the agenda pages. I suggest again that these little treasure hunts work better for very experienced participants and regular participants who are very patient about searching for information, but much less well for newcomers, remote-only participants, and the diverse and curious potential participants we'd supposedly like to encourage. I still believe that the agenda pages should be one-step shopping for these types of meeting program-specific bits of information, whether it be remote participation bits (or at lest a pointer to whether they can be found) and meeting material pages (ditto). It is slightly extraneous information but I note that we have had a list of Areas and ADs on the agenda pages ever since I can remember. That information is much more easily located than most of the things I've been commenting on and, if one locates it (IETF Home Page -> IESG -> Members) one even gets contact information as a bonus. And the listing of AD names is pretty useless without contact info. More inline. >... >>> (1) The note below strongly implies that none of those >>> sessions are being audiocast. Why not and can that be >>> fixed? >> >> I think that would mean that the crew (partly volunteers) >> would need to mobilise 24 hours earlier. Not impossible, I >> suppose, but not free of costs either. Brian, there are two reasons I'm pushing on this set of issues. One is that there are folks like you and me (and, since he dropping into a different part of the thread, SM) who are reasonably experienced participants but who are not likely to attend most or all f2f meetings in the future. To the extent to which it is in the IETF's interest to keep us active --and I hope that it is-- then a lot of this stuff ought to work (even though we will know about and, given enough patience, be able to find meeting materials lists, mechanisms to subscribe to slightly-hidden mailing lists, the actual names and locations of incorrect links to drafts, names of BOF Chairs and responsible ADs, etc. If we are desperately concerned about hearing a particular tutorial, I imagine that, with a little planning, either of us could find someone to sit in the room and do a Skype or equivalent if there was a functional network or get someone to sit in the room with a voice recorder and make something that could be converted into an MP3 file for transmission after the network comes up. I assume that, were the question posed, there would be general IETF consensus that I run out of patience a lot faster than you do. I'm willing to concede that and agree that anything that doesn't irritate you too is my problem and I should live with it. I certainly would have a lot of difficulty arguing for folks going to a lot of extra trouble or expense on my account (or even on yours). However, the IETF has been having a lot of discussions about newcomers, diversity, and attracting new folks to participate and get work done. I think those populations will be better served if it is possible for people a lot less experienced than the two of us can participate actively and constructively without attending every meeting. I also think that, especially for many people from developing countries, universities, small companies, and far-away places, we will be far more successful in recruiting if we can encourage remote participation as a starting point with the expectation of getting people physically to meetings only after the value to them and their organizations of doing so has been demonstrated. I'd personally even favor making remote participation at a could of meeting be a prerequisite for most applications for ISOC's IETF Fellows program. But the above picture isn't going to happen unless we are serious and treat that seriousness as an integral part of our strategies about newcomers and diversity. Seriousness to me says that we get more careful about how experienced one has to be to find critical information, that we make sure remote participation works, and that we make any session that would be relevant to remote participants accessible to them (and with materials available as much as possible in advance and from easy-to-find places). Seriousness implies that, if there are extra costs, we figure out how to cover them (or how to cut somewhere else). Or, if we are not serious, it would probably be to the benefit of the community for us to face that and stop wasting energy and resources on outreach efforts that are expensive in one or the other (or both). best, john