Ted Lemon <mellon@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> It's interesting that it's seen by quite a few people who have
> responded to this idea that an AD who is paid by the IETF would be _
> less_ neutral than an AD who is paid by some company that's sending
> them to the IETF. I would like to think that the ADs that nomcom
> appoints would be neutral in either case, but it seems to me that the
> incentives for an AD to play favorites are worse, not better, if the
> AD works for a company than if they are paid by the IETF, all other
> factors being equal. Of course, if companies that want to buy ADs were
> able to do so, that would be bad, but if the funding commitment is
> made in advance of AD selection, I don't see how that would happen.
> Maybe I'm just naive?
I pondered this question as well a bunch.
I think it's because an AD that works for company X has a very clear
conflict-of-interest. It's easy for everyone to see, and thus easy for that
AD to either recluse themselves from some decision, or for them to go out of
their way to appear un-biased.
An AD paid by the IETF has no obvious conflict-of-interests. That is, they
have only hidden conflicts of interest: some of which may come from access
that the entities funding the IETF might have, and some from outright behind
the scenes bribery. We see shades of this in the Olympic committees,
the Soccer (Football) organization (with actual charges having been recently
laid), and we think that we see it in other SDOs.
I don't think that we have to go down that road as well.
I think we can avoid things, and our randomized nomcom is a key part of it.
Another key part would be term limits. This might possibly imply slightly
longer terms (3 or 4 years rather than 2). Asking someone to take on a
4-year term paid-position in their career would be very different than asking
them to take on a 2 year interruption...
Another aspect might be paying ADs, but only part-time.
This removes part of the finanicial burden to their host organization, while
not actually pulling them away completely. It also might enforce more of a
50% commitment ("of the 80 hour week", as the joke used to go).
> On Sat, Jul 28, 2018 at 9:10 AM, Andrew Sullivan
> <ajs@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> On Wed, Jul 25, 2018 at 01:37:32PM -0400, Ted Lemon wrote:
>> As to the third, we have no data.
>>
>> You see where I'm going with this? :)
> I do, but it isn't really true that we have no data about what
> happens when SDOs have directly-paid staff with an interest in
> advancing "their" standards. I can think of a few examples off the
> top of my head, though I am loathe to name them.
> Best regards,
> A
> --
> Andrew Sullivan
> ajs@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> ----------------------------------------------------
> Alternatives:
> ----------------------------------------------------
--
Michael Richardson <mcr+IETF@xxxxxxxxxxxx>, Sandelman Software Works
-= IPv6 IoT consulting =-
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