--On Thursday, April 14, 2016 08:27 +1200 Brian E Carpenter <brian.e.carpenter@xxxxxxxxx> wrote: > On 14/04/2016 08:04, Joel M. Halpern wrote: > ... >> Which is why most chairs, when trying to get a sense of the >> room on something, always ask the obverse question, and >> sometimes even ask "how many people don't care." > > I've also heard "who is abstaining?" and even "who is not > listening?". > > I think what John is getting at (please correct me if I'm > wrong) is individuals who have influenced the draft behind the > scenes but stay silent in public. Whether they are in the room > is a little beside the point. Yes, that is my main concern -- that we do not let such publicly-quiet influencers off the hook. > On 14/04/2016 08:06, Stephan Wenger wrote: >> Hi John and Mike, > ... >> "Strong sense of the room that active influence counts as >> participation, but listening and watching does not." > Fair enough - but that doesn't mean that the IETF condones > non-disclosure. And (for the topic originally under > discussion) it's clear that a WG Chair who declares consensus > for adopting a document, or forwards it to the IESG for > publication, or an AD who reviews a document prior to an IESG > ballot, is participating. If the text doesn't make that clear > to all readers, the text is defective. And that is another key part of the point I'm trying to make. It seems to directly contradict Michael's position that, AFAICT, posits some sort of non-involved acceptance of a WG recommendation that would not constitute participation. Along with wanting to stay very far from "I didn't really hum and therefore I don't need to disclose", I want to be sure we _never_ get into a situation in which Company A has a rule against its employees disclosing IPR before patents have been issued, a WG has a chair who works for company A, all ADs in the Area of that WG work for company A, all three of them are personally aware of relevant IPR, and yet there is some way to dance around the rules such that no one is obligated to disclose. The problem I see with trying to make extremely fine distinctions about ways to not-quite-participate is that they will almost certainly open up loopholes or edge cases that could make such a scenario possible. We could, of course, avoid such scenarios by adopting firm rules that no AD can be responsible for a WG whose Chair (or any co-chair) is from the same company and perhaps that areas with two or more ADs must have all of them from separate companies, but I think that cure might be worse than the problem. best, john