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Re: A charter for the IESG

2003-03-08 15:45:51

Some comments on the process...

I have specific comments on the document, but I will send them
separately.

At 04:10 PM 3/7/2003 +0100, Harald Tveit Alvestrand wrote:
in December, I published an internet-draft called "draft-iesg-charter-00.txt", containing a proposed text for an IESG charter.
A revised version (-01) was published in January based on comments.

This IESG charter attempts to capture what the IESG has believed that it has been asked to do by the IETF community. Most of the document is simply collecting references to sections of other IETF BCP documents, and attempting to form a coherent picture of what the IESG is supposed to be doing. I do not believe that it shows the IESG to be much different from what the community currently believes it is.

I think you need to be very clear about what this document is trying
to accomplish.  Are you trying to:

        #1 Document what the IESG believes its current role, authority
                and responsibilities are?
        #2 Document community consensus regarding the role, authority and
                responsibilities that the community has granted to the IESG?

Some of the discussions on the problem-statement list indicates that
there may be a gap between these two things.

If you are trying to do #1, then the process you have identified sounds
fine.  However, I would consider this to be an informational communication
from the IESG to the community, so I think it should be published as an
Info RFC, not a BCP.  Also, the document should state that it is a
communication from the IESG to the community, and does not represent a
community mandate.

If you are trying to do #2, then revision control needs to belong to the
community.  You may choose to serve as the editor of this document, but
you would need to update it, as necessary, to reflect community consensus.
I also think that this would take longer than you have outlined, and it
might not make sense to do this in parallel with the problem-statement
effort.

But until then, I believe there is value in publishing this document.

I think that there could be considerable value in publishing a document
that explains what the IESG believes its charter to be (#1 above).  Among
other things, this could serve as a useful baseline for any changes that
the community decides to make as a result of the problem-statement effort.
But, I would prefer to see such a document published as an Info RFC, with
wording that would discourage misinterpretation of the document as a
community mandate.

Margaret






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