--On Wednesday, July 25, 2018 16:18 +1200 Brian E Carpenter <brian.e.carpenter@xxxxxxxxx> wrote: > On 25/07/2018 15:53, Ted Lemon wrote: >> The problem with review teams is that if you don't read the >> documents and don't know what they are about, you don't have >> the overview that allows for synthesis. One of the >> advantages of having people who review "all" the documents is >> that stuff occurs to those people because they see connections >> that people who don't review "all" the documents don't get. >> I put "all" in quotes because it's never really all, but even >> so, ADs definitely have a bird's eye view that is not shared >> by anyone else. > > It's true. But do you have any other ideas how to > *substantially* reduce the AD workload? Sure. Let the ADs steer and manage and put final document review and approval somewhere else. It isn't as if we haven't discussed that before, e.g., see draft-klensin-stds-review-panel, whose 2005 abstract read: Somewhat over a decade ago, the IETF responded to a series of perceived problems with the then-IAB by restructuring the way in which the IAB and IESG were constituted and assigning all standards- approval and closely-related processes to the IESG. In retrospect, that decision has had serious downsides: among them are the observations that the IESG has become overloaded to the point that the role requires an unreasonable level of investment and that the intertwining of managing WGs and then reviewing and approving their products has led to confusion and the risk, and sometimes the appearance, of inherent conflicts of interest and abuses. This document proposes to re-separate the "steering" and "WG management" functions that were orginally the IESG's responsibility from the "final review and standards approval" roles and respecifies the standards approval process in that context. The general concepts outlined in this document have been discussed informally in the community for some time. This document is provided as a specific proposal to facilitate a focused discussion. IIR, in that round of the discussion, the IESG members concluded that they preferred the overload to reducing their power and authority. Maybe things are different today. best, john
