--On Wednesday, January 20, 2016 16:16 -0500 "Scott O. Bradner"
<sob@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> do you have any suggestions for rewording to make this
> clear(er)?
(1) Take Brian's suggestion about the other problematic
statement.
(2) In both the paragraph that bothered Brian and the one that
bothered me, but using the first one as an example, think about
whether you really need the rather pompous-sounding "In
furtherance of this requirement" and replace it with either
"Consistent with this requirement" or just drop it entirely and
have "The date and time...". It may be lawyer-speak to write
that way, but your audience, the last I checked, was not lawyers.
See below.
>> On Jan 20, 2016, at 4:04 PM, John C Klensin
>> <john-ietf@xxxxxxx> wrote:
>...
>> --On Thursday, January 21, 2016 08:29 +1300 Brian E Carpenter
>> <brian.e.carpenter@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>>
>>> I see this in the new text:
>>> "In furtherance of this requirement the date and time of the
>>> terms of individual regular IAOC members begin or end at the
>>> start of the IAOC meeting held during the first IETF..."
>>>
>>> I would find this a bit clearer if it said:
>>> "In furtherance of this requirement the date and time of the
>>> terms of new individual regular IAOC members begin at the
>>> start of the IAOC meeting held during the first IETF... and
>>> the terms of outgoing individual regular IAOC members end at
>>> the start of that meeting."
>> yes. But the sentences I was most concerned about were:
>>
>>>> In furtherance of this requirement one of the regular or ex
>>>> officio IAOC members not eligible to be elected as the IAOC
>>>> Chair under BCP 101 or under adopted IAOC policies shall
>>>> open the IAOC meeting held during the first IETF meeting of
>>>> the year and act as a temporary Chair. The temporary chair
>>>> shall, as the first order of business in the meeting, call
>>>> for nominations for IAOC chair from among the members of
>>>> the IAOC defined as eligible for the role under BCP 101 or
>>>> under adopted IAOC policies.
>>
>> Now, read that quickly, ideally after a dose of strong drink
>> or equivalent to calibrate your perceptions, and then, without
>> studying BCP 101 or any the IAOC policies adopted since IASA
>> was created or any period of contemplation, tell me who is
>> eligible to be temporary chair for meeting.
>...
(3) Replace that paragraph with:
"A temporary chair shall be selected to open the IAOC
meeting held during the first IETF meeting of the year.
The temporary chair shall be one of the regular or
ex-officio IAOC members who is not eligible to be
elected as the IAOC Chair. The first order of business
in the meeting shall be a call for nominations for IAOC
chair. The restrictions and requirements as to who may
be IAOC Chair are discussed in BCP 101, Section XXX, and
may be further restricted by policies by the IAOC and
found at <URL> under the heading ABCDEFG."
I think that is shorter. It avoids the horribly (IMO)
convoluted sentences. It assumes the IETF community is smart
enough to figure out that everyone who is not eligible is
eligible and vice versa. It points to the requirements only
once and includes specific pointers into BCP 101 and to any
relevant requirements (if such requirements exist, it may
require a few minutes work on the appropriate web page, but I'd
assume that is within the capabilities of the IAD, IAOC, and the
staff on which they can call. If the IAOC cannot figure out
what "XXX" and "<URL>" are, we have bigger problems.
Speaking of staff on which the IAOC might call, it may be useful
to remind the IAOC and IAD that it has a highly skilled
editorial team who are really good at this stuff under assorted
contracts as elements of the RFC Editor function. It would
almost certainly be more efficient to call on them to get
something right the first (or second) time than to expect
editing work to be done on the IETF list.
And, yes, I'm annoyed at being asked to do this editing and
being asked to deal with the problem in the first place. I
think a document that hard to follow, given its purpose, is
unprofessional and that the IAOC should be considering who among
its membership has served too long, is not paying attention, or
should be resigning (for those or other reasons) rather than
waiting to be retired by appointing bodies. But that is just
my (admittedly annoyed) option, probably connected (although
that is not my intent) to disturbance over other issues that
have come up lately, especially consistent lack of transparency
about meeting planning and contracts.
john