At 02:34 PM 3/16/02 -0800, Bonney Kooper wrote:
The current registration fee of $575 is outrageously
high. Even though IETF claims to be an open forum with
no membership fee - you need $575*3=$1725 per year for
registration fee alone for attending IETF sessions.
This is effectively the membership fee for IETF. Sorry
- not everyone can plan ten days in advance to get
$125 reduction in fee. Just try to run a small
consulting business or work for a 20 person start up -
you would know what I mean.
Well, as one who is not attending this meeting, in part for reasons of
funding, I think your case here may be a little overstated.
While I shall miss the opportunity to share a beer and swap war stories
with some friends and colleagues, I don't feel excluded from effective
participation in IETF business. While face to face meetings can certainly
be very helpful, I have also found that it's quite possible to advance an
idea and build working relationships with people I've not met.
I have some sympathy: I think being able to attend meetings does enhance
one's opportunities to both understand issues and influence outcomes (with
emphasis on the former), but the IETF meeting fee is really a small part of
the overall cost involved in doing this -- my typical total costs for past
IETF meetings have been around $2500, with advance planning. (And that has
often been while working for a small startup.)
#g
-------------------
Graham Klyne
<GK(_at_)NineByNine(_dot_)org>