Ted, In relation to the IAOC’s message of May 17, you asked:
In reading their message, I noted that they said "Singapore can function as a meeting location for IETF100". It was not clear to me, however, what the scope of that assessment was. I have asked the IAOC to clarify if that assessment was of only the working meetings or if it included assessing the usual accommodations for families and partners (or even included an assessment of whether it was suitable for a gala occasion, given the 100th)
Discussion has moved along considerably since, but I wanted to give you an answer to clarify what the IAOC used as its parameters in the review that lead to the message of May 17.
The IAOC has to date focused on the suitability of venues/countries for meeting purposes, but not explicitly for suitability of meeting attendees bringing companions, family members, etc. That is the limit of what the IETF has asked us to explicitly plan for. This is not to suggest that the concerns in the current discussions about companions, family members, and so on are not important. It's just to recognize the edges of the constraints we believed we were working under.
As discussed on the IETF@ mailing list, if the IETF community wants to change the range of what we are looking for, we’d like the discussion to be contributed to the mtgvenue mailing list discussion of draft-baker-mtgvenue-iaoc-venue-selection-process. We think that such discussion is important and valuable, and look forward to clear direction from the community on this topic for the future. At the same time, we are completely aware that none of that can happen in time to address this current issue.
WRT the question of the IETF 100 as gala opportunity — honestly, we haven’t gotten to that. Something of that scale probably would not be considered without a specific proposal from a sponsor for it, which we don’t have. Since we didn't have such a sponsor, we never even considered trying to do such a thing for IETF 100. This is not because it never occurred to us that 100 might be a milestone for some. But it was not our focus, and without having optimized for it we concluded that we should treat 100 as just another meeting. So that's what we did.
If people really want to have a significant recognition of a milestone of numbers of meetings, we of course would entertain suggestions on how to do that in a way that is suitably inclusive of participants, both in attendance or remote, and that is agnostic of the actual meeting's location. But to do that responsibly, we'd also have to ensure that it was sponsored in the way that was necessary.
Leslie, for the IAOC. -- ------------------------------------------------------------------- Leslie Daigle Principal, ThinkingCat Enterprises LLC ldaigle@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx ------------------------------------------------------------------- On 18 May 2016, at 19:32, Ted Hardie wrote:
First, I'd like to thank the IAOC for going to the community forcommentary on this issue. I believe that the IAOC is working toward being more transparent with the community, and I think this is an important step.Secondly, I'd like to note publicly that I have asked the IAOC a clarifying question. In reading their message, I noted that they said "Singapore canfunction as a meeting location for IETF100". It was not clear to me,however, what the scope of that assessment was. I have asked the IAOC toclarify if that assessment was of only the working meetings or if itincluded assessing the usual accommodations for families and partners (or even included an assessment of whether it was suitable for a gala occasion,given the 100th).Personally, I did and do support the conclusion that it is suitable for a working meeting. The issues in Singapore might occur with public displays of affection between members of same sex couples, family rights issues with an accompanying spouse or children, or with interactions with police. Noneare common working group experiences. A single individual, traveling alone, is simply unlikely to be affected.I cannot support, however, a conclusion that it meets the other roles. Traveling with my son to territories where my marriage and parentage might not be recognized involves at minimum both a lot of paperwork (bringing birth certificates, judge's orders, letters allowing me to make medical decisions) and some risk. I simply would not, personally, do that to allow him to attend an IETF, and I believe the same to be true for other familieslike ours.I am not yet sure whether I am agreeing with the IAOC, disagreeing with the IAOC, or we simply are not yet agreed on what the problem is. I understand that they will discuss the matter in their upcoming meeting next Wednesday,and I look forward to a response sometime after then.Lastly, I want to point to a comment I made to the venue selection list:https://mailarchive.ietf.org/arch/msg/venue-selection/YJXG4WtJKyjUrrRT78hOR4Mzn-c. The most salient piece is this:The institution of the companion program has increased the visibility offamilies joining IETF participants, and it is clear that some participants see venues that are friendly to family travel as a benefit. But it's not currently clear where that accommodation falls in site selection or where it should. To clarify that, I suspect that the IAOC will ultimately need to lead a community discussion on the extent to which the accommodation ofthat larger issue, and I look forward to contributing to it when it occurs.accompanying family members should be considered in site selection.How to factor specific issues in this category into our meeting planning is part of what came up for Singapore, but the question does not really end there. It touches not just on pretty much every aspect of diversity, but on basic issues of travel freedom. While many of us and our families havea relatively unfettered access to tourist travel, for some of our colleagues the ability to get a business travel visa to a specificdestination in no way guarantees that their family could get tourist visasto accompany them to a specific site.As I said in that message, I believe we need a community discussion ofregards, Ted HardieOn Tue, May 17, 2016 at 2:14 PM, IAOC Chair <iaoc-chair@xxxxxxxx> wrote:On April 7, 2016, the IAOC announced that IETF 100 scheduled for November 2017 will be held in Singapore. This venue, as any other, was announced assoon as it was under contract and thus secured. Following thisannouncement, concerns were raised about anti-LGBT laws in Singapore thatthe IAOC was not aware of. We apologise for missing this.The IAOC took the action to review the current committed plan for IETF 100, and also to review our meeting planning procedures to ensure that wehave input at appropriate points to ensure issues are identified andaddressed before contracts are signed and announcements made. The process updates are in progress, and an outline of the current update is copiedbelow. Our focus here is on bringing IETF 100 to closure.Having reviewed the Singapore proposal in the light of the plenary input, we have a proposal for moving forward and would like community input — seebelow. ReviewThe IAOC meetings committee reviewed the options for IETF 100, including investigating costs and possibilities of moving the meeting to a different location. In keeping with the updated process outlined below, they checkedwith official advisory sources and consulted with specialty travelservices, frequent travelers, and local representatives about the concerns that have been raised. The input received from those sources is consistentwith the text on http://travel.state.gov [1].From that research, at a strictly practical level, the IAOC believes thatit is possible to have a successful meeting in Singapore. The IAOCproposes that holding the meeting in Singapore is the best option for IETF100 at this time. Next Step: The IAOC would like to hear from the community by June 1st, 2016 onbarriers to holding a successful meeting in Singapore. Responses should bedirected to venue-selection@xxxxxxxxAgain, we apologize for the failures in the venue selection process that took place here and we are moving to enhance that process, to avoid thistype of error in the future. Leslie Daigle, for the IAOC. [1] Relevant text from http://travel.state.gov : "While the Singapore government has stated that it will not enforcethis section of the penal code, the law remains on the statute books.Singapore does not recognize same-sex unions. LGBT individuals may have difficulty gaining employment in certain sectors of the civil service." [2] Appendix: Updated ProcessN.B.: These are draft procedures being further refined as we speak. For more information and input on the overall meeting venue selection processdocument, please join the mtgvenue@xxxxxxxx mailing list. IETF meeting venues are selected through a process which involvesseveral steps and numerous specific criteria. The IAOC and its MeetingCommittee are in the process of better documenting these steps in the Internet-Draft draft-baker-mtgvenue-iaoc-venue-selection-process. Based on the experience the following changes have been introduced to the draft: Section 3.3.1: o Review available travel information (such ashttps://travel.state.gov/content/passports/en/country.html) for issuesthat would be counter to our principles on inclusiveness etc. [Mandatory] And these steps have been added to the process covered in Section 3.5 of the draft:D. The Meetings Committee consults Official Advisory Sources, consultswith speciality travel services, frequent travelers and local contacts, to determine if there are barriers to holding a successful meeting in the target cities. E. The IAOC asks the community whether there are any barriers to holding a successful meeting in the target cities. As covered in the draft, these steps will occur very early in thevenue selection process – at least 3 years prior. For the current setof meetings being planned, the timing of the steps will be driven by contract schedule and will occur before future contract signing. _______________________________________________ Recentattendees mailing list Recentattendees@xxxxxxxx https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/recentattendees