From: Stephen Kent <kent(_at_)bbn(_dot_)com>
To: Keith Moore <moore(_at_)cs(_dot_)utk(_dot_)edu>
Cc: <ietf(_at_)ietf(_dot_)org>
Sent: Tuesday, September 26, 2000 2:00 PM
Subject: Re: Topic drift Re: An Internet Draft as reference
material
As someone who was around when the notion of an I-D was
created, let
me disagree somewhat. There was a very definite intent to
cause I-Ds
to "officially" disappear after a limited time frame.
Am I the only librarian in the crowd?
Archival material is *extremely* important for
future research. Just because the document isn't
for publication and cannot be used normatively
doesn't mean that it should be obliterated. Aside
from their use in resolving IPR issues, conceivably
at some point in the future someone is going to
want to look at some aspect(s) of the process of
how we got from here to there and expunging
documents is guaranteed to make that work considerably
more difficult. Those documents aren't just
technical documents, they're also historical
documents.
Additionally, other bodies have a clear delineation
between normative references and informational
references, and presumably that's not a problem
here. Certainly, the review process should be
weeding out incorrect/invalid references.
Melinda