But my point, in regards to this proposal, is that the bar for
Informational/Experimental is not "half-baked" nor "won't cause
harm" nor "crap", but whether it provides information is of reasonable
use to the Internet technical community and meets
the (low) editorial/technical standards for RFCs.
For information to be of "reasonable use" it needs to be reasonably
accurate.
Opinions can also be useful, if nothing else to students of history, if
the opinions are clearly labeled as such, and if they help illustrate a
historically important debate.
These days, for a protocol specification to be of "reasonable use" on a
wide scale it needs to avoid causing harm. There have been too many
exploits of security holes and privacy holes in poorly-designed
protocols. While it might be useful to publish an informational
specification of a widely-deployed protocol on the theory that
publishing it will make the public more aware of its limitations and
help them migrate to better protocols, publishing a specification of a
hazardous protocol that is not widely deployed can encourage wider
deployment and increase the risk of harm.
Keith is trying to raise the bar. I prefer to keep the bar low. I,
frankly, don't see a problem with there being more
crap published as RFCs, whether produced by WGs or produced by
individuals.
Publishing crap dilutes the value of the RFC series, and makes it more
difficult for the public to recognize the good work that IETF does. It
also costs money which could be better put to other uses.
Keith