Re: [Last-Call] Last Call: <draft-iesg-nomcom-eligibility-2020-00.txt> (Eligibility for the 2020-2021 Nominating Committee) to Best Current Practice

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Hi.  
Sorry to have not responded more quickly.

First and most important, with the addition of the changes
suggested by Adrian and Barry, I agree with Cullen: this is
probably the least-bad solution (or tied for that distinction)
and I support it on that basis.  

I would prefer that the document be explicit about an issue
partially pointed out by others, i.e., that a future,
longer-term, proposal be able to change the status of IETF 107
wrt counting for NomComs after this one.   For example, in the
last paragraph of Section 3, we might change:

Old:
	precedent: another update to BCP 10 will be necessary to
	address future eligibility, as there will be time for
	proper community work on such an update.

New:
	precedent: another update to BCP 10 will be necessary to
	address future eligibility, as there will be time for
	proper community work on such an update.  That update
	may change how participation in IETF 107 is counted for
	the 2021-2022 NomCom and for any activities related to
	NomCom eligibility (other than seating the 2020-2021
	NomCom) after it becomes effective.

This would accomplish two things.   First, it makes it a little
bit more clear that that there is no constraint on the
longer-term effort figuring out a way to count some criterion
for attendance at IETF 107 and doing so.  Having that option
will be particularly important should IETF 108 be virtual (as
seems likely after yesterday's IESG announcement).  I think most
of the discussion has been consistent with the possibility of
counting IETF 107 somehow for NomComs after this one, so that is
just a clarification.  

The other is that there is a scenario, however unlikely, in
which Barry's formulation probably does not work.  As I read his
text, the certification of eligibility for signing Recall
Petitions and qualifications to volunteer for any Recall
Committee seated before the 2021-2022 NomCom is seated would
follow the eligibility rules for the 2020-2021 Nomcom.   If the
longer-term effort concludes (and concludes before or right
after IETF 108) that IETF 107 (and 108) should be counted
somehow, it is not clear to me that we want qualifications to
filed a petition in, say, August, to be evaluated against
eligibility to volunteer for the 2020-2021 NomCom under these
emergency rules.  RFC 8713 further complicates the situation
because it says "qualified to be voting members of a NomCom" (in
Section 7.1.1) and "The five meetings are the five most recent
meetings that ended prior to the date on which the solicitation
for NomCom volunteers was submitted for distribution to the IETF
community" (Section 4.14). without, AFAICT, specifying whether
the Secretariat is to count the five meetings prior to when the
petition was filed or the five meetings used to determine
eligibility for the either the most-recently-seated Nomcom or,
if the petition is filed between the third meeting of one year
and the end of the first meeting of the next, the next one.

I don't believe we either can or should try to discuss those
issues now, much less block this document waiting for them to be
resolved, but (especially given the second concern below) we
shouldn't have anything in this document that would appear to
preclude the longer-term effort from addressing them and having
its conclusions reflected immediately. 

I have two additional concerns, which are probably best noted as
issues for future consideration while we move forward with this
document:

(1)  With appreciation for Michael's analysis and comments and
other attempts to go through scenarios, I am a bit concerned
about fairness to one hypothetical class of people, those who
started coming to IETF meetings with IETF 105, attended 106,
expected to attend 107, and who have plunged themselves into the
IETF's work sufficiently that they intended to volunteer for the
NomCom.  I find it harder to be concerned about people who have
stopped attending meetings and intermittent attendees in part
because, until we make changes to how the NomCom operates
(already too late for the upcoming volunteer pool), I don't see
them as volunteering for the NomCom in significant numbers
whether they are eligible or not (nor have I seen anything since
these discussions started that would change that guess).  But,
while I am guessing that the pool of those very active relative
newcomers is small and the subset of them who would have
volunteered is smaller still, there is at least a hint of
unfairness that we should note, if only to add to the sense of
urgency about the longer-term work.

(2) I don't think we could have done better with the tools we
have and in the available time and I think we owe the IESG
thanks for navigating through this.  However, this document is
the result of a proposal from the IESG to deal with an issue
whose outcome will affect the membership of the 2021-2022 IESG
(including whether incumbents who are willing to serve again are
returned); community discussion whose conclusions were less than
obvious and crystal-clear; a document produced by the IESG
reflecting their analysis of community rough consensus and that,
coincidentally I'm sure, includes approximately the same
proposal for how to move forward that they proposed initially;
and the same IESG evaluating the results of this Last Call.
Again, given the available procedures and time pressure, I think
the IESG made the best of a bad situation and could not have
done much better.  But I think the situation strongly suggests
that, in addition to looking at the Nomcom and eligibility rules
for the future, we need to think about procedural mechanisms to
avoid putting the IESG in a position in which, in order to Do
the Right Thing, they are trapped into a situation in which they
need to act as Proposer, Document Author, Discussants,
Consensus-determiner, and Document approver [1], especially in
situations in which a reasonable person could conclude that they
were working with situations that might have a direct effect on
them.

thanks,
  john

[1] More complicated, IMO, than arresting officer, judge, jury,
and maybe executioner.


--On Thursday, April 2, 2020 10:24 -0700 The IESG
<iesg-secretary@xxxxxxxx> wrote:

> 
> The IESG has received a request from an individual submitter
> to consider the following document: - 'Eligibility for the
> 2020-2021 Nominating Committee'
> <draft-iesg-nomcom-eligibility-2020-00.txt> as Best Current
> Practice
> 
> The IESG plans to make a decision in the next few weeks, and
> solicits final comments on this action. Please send
> substantive comments to the last-call@xxxxxxxx mailing lists
> by 2020-04-30. Exceptionally, comments may be sent to
> iesg@xxxxxxxx instead. In either case, please retain the
> beginning of the Subject line to allow automated sorting.


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