I wrote:
I have a simple question. What can a UTF-8 subject header
communicate that an RFC 2047 one can't? Other than inelegance,
what's the downside of 2047, when the upside is a huge increase in
backward compatibility?
Charles Lindsey responded:
No, it's just the inelegance. Plus the fact that the backward
compatibility issue is nowhere so huge as you imagine. In fact, it is
rather small.
Here, I believe, is the crux of the disagreement between the working
consensus of usefor and the unanimous agreement of email folks from
ietf-822.
Usefor recently conducted a straw poll [1] in which raw UTF-8 headers
barely won out [2] over using 2047/2231. (Specifically, in the #1 vs.
#5 vote, the tally was 9 to 8.) The chair, Dave Barr, declared "rough
consensus" [3] and suggested the group should move forward on that
basis.
I suggest to the usefor chair that the group should conduct the poll
again, based on a new piece of information. Specifically, they've seen
the applicable area director react in such a viscerally negative fashion
[4] that it is nearly impossible to imagine anything resembling the
current usefor approach being approved by the IESG. I.e., the backward
compatibility issue is nowhere near as small as the group seems to
believe.
(Ned, if I'm overstating your viewpoint and its implications, my
apologies, and please correct my error.)
It overstates things, but only slightly. First, I'm not the apps AD presently
responsible for usefor; Patrik Falstrom is. However, I am on the IESG, and at
some point this will be something I have to vote on.
My current position here is first that the use of message/rfc822 in the
proposed way is unacceptable, period. As for the general use of utf-8 in the
context of news, I'm having a great deal of trouble buying the argument that
this doesn't disenfranchise any number of gateways between the two
environments.
I have to say I find the recent claim that "in the reverse direction
News->Email, such general-purpose gateways just Do Not Exist" to be pretty
amazing, if for no other reason that I have years of direct personal experience
with such gateways. For example, as many of you know, I used to be a frequent
contributor to the info-pmdf mailing list, and that list was for several years
gatewayed bidirectionally between netnews and email. (This particular gateway
was discontinued in the news->email direction at some point, but other gateways
of this sort continue to operate.)
Based on this new information, I would suggest that the group consider
rechartering with a more precise plan and schedule, both approved by the
IESG, in such a matter that successful publication of a standards-track
RFC is a likely (or at least possible) outcome.
An excellent idea, one I would fully support.
Alternatively, if the group decides it's not interested in the IESG
imprimatur, I'd suggest that the group consider reforming outside the
aegis of the IETF.
That's also an option, of course.
Ned