| Hi all, I wanted to follow up on the recent threads concerning the sergeants-at-arms that stemmed from Matthew Miller’s message [1] about the RSOC’s request for SOW comments. For clarity, there were two RFC Editor-related messages sent on August 30 that were seeking community input: one from the RSOC Chair, Sarah Banks, requesting that input be sent to rsoc@xxxxxxx over a two-week period [2], and one from the IAB Chair, Ted Hardie, requesting that input be sent to rfc-interest@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx [3]. The reply-to on Ted’s message was set to rfc-interest@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx. Matthew’s message concerned the SOW input, and he requested that discussion of it occur on rfc-interest@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx, based on off-list feedback from Ted about where SOW input had been directed in the past and based on consultation with the other SAA. As the IETF community discussed at the administrative plenary at IETF 105 [4], there is significant work for us to do as a community to meet the ideals set out in BCP 54. Some of that work relates directly to the sergeant-at-arms role: rotating the sergeants-at-arms, clarifying escalation procedures, and streamlining how we talk about conduct. Personally I have been busy on all of these fronts doing outreach to potential new sergeants, studying existing professional literature about managing codes of conduct in technical organizations, and researching how other organizations have successfully handled this set of issues. I expect to have some news to share with the community about some of this quite soon, and I expect to continue working with the sergeants, the IESG, and professional resources on the other pieces to get some proposals in shape for community comment. The feedback during the IETF 105 plenary was clear that people want to see a firmer commitment to building a respectful environment, and the IESG has agreed to make this a priority. But all of this work will take time. In the interim, we will all continue to feel our way through in an extremely gray area where what seems like an obvious right answer to one person seems like an obvious wrong answer to another. During this interim period, a personal wish of mine would be to not have every message sent by the SAA challenged and adjudicated on ietf@xxxxxxxx. I realize some would wish the SAA to remain mostly silent during this period. As with so many other IETF experiences, it is likely that no one will be completely satisfied. But everyone is capable of being thoughtful about how each of their contributions to this list can help to make the Internet work better and whether they absolutely must hit the send button on another email to thousands of people. Matthew made a suggestion to use a mailing list controlled by the RFC Series Editor for discussion about an RFC Series-related SOW, based on the charter of this list described in RFC 3005. It would be great if people decide to follow his suggestion, as some have already. If not, I am confident that the RSOC and the IAB will take into account what they read here between now and September 14 when the SOW comment period closes and I am optimistic that the discussion on rfc-interest, on this list, and everywhere in the IETF can remain respectful. My hope is that people will use the next 12 days to contemplate the email Sarah sent and provide their feedback. Cheers, Alissa Cooper IETF Chair [1] https://mailarchive.ietf.org/arch/msg/ietf/Q3f9FnFcrWKRySD-DqQCgI6lbCw [2] https://mailarchive.ietf.org/arch/msg/ietf/-3M3WswGZ_0zvYvDMO4f_J58qtQ [3] https://mailarchive.ietf.org/arch/msg/ietf/M2d85XpOOR4tm78yGyh205iJWJc [4] See slides 14 to 18 of https://datatracker.ietf.org/meeting/105/materials/slides-105-ietf-sessa-all-slides-ietf-105-administrativeoperations-plenary |
