John C Klensin <john-ietf(_at_)jck(_dot_)com> wrote:
--On Thursday, 23 December, 2004 13:31 -0800 Carl Malamud
<carl(_at_)media(_dot_)org> wrote:
[John Klensin wrote:]
(i) the IESG, or the IESG's leadership, is likely to
micromanage because it has tended to micromanage, or try to
do so, many of the things it has touched in the last several
years...
John Klensin, I think, is in a position to know whether this is
so. I haven't seen evidence that he's wrong...
Hmmm .... I don't see how worrying this particular BCP to
death is going to change any of that. You're talking some
pretty fundmamental doom-and-gloom stuff. If things are that
broken, could any BCP fix them?
Well, we've had at least partial success on previous tries...
But that's really not the point. We should ask, will _this_ BCP
tend to make that situation better or worse?
Well, that is one of the reasons why several members of the
community have tried to comment, several times, that the Admin
Reorg effort is addressing problems that are either irrelevant
or not on the critical path.
Indeed. The lack of agreement what _is_ the critical path has
made this process difficult.
And I have observed that all of them, after having been ignored,
have simply dropped out of the discussion.
This is not the way consensus is supposed to work: that things
get dragged out until only like-minded people are still around.
Consensus is supposed to consider issues raised by even very small
minorities, and try to satisfy all reasonable persons that their
concerns are addressed.
... But I'm concerned about even the possibility of
bagels-by-appeal, or bagels-by-IESG/IAB-overriding IAD decisions,
even while realizing that particular example is (deliberately)
unlikely.
This example is sufficiently unlikely that one is tempted to
dismiss it, and miss the baby being thrown out with the bathwater.
I'm not so much worried about IESG actually _appealing_ the
decision on where to get bagels as I am about language which seems
to encourage anyone who doesn't like the bagels to _ask_ the IESG
to appeal it. Inevitable, somebody will claim to have heard that
<some-very-important-person> didn't like the bagels, at which
point it will be hard for any Chair to avoid wasting time talking
about bagels. :^(
The whole idea here, I thought, was to set up a support structure
which would just work -- so that it could be "invisible" to the IESG
and never need to be discussed by that group. (The problem, I thought,
was that shortcomings of the current Secretariat were entirely too
visible; and the IESG was spinning its wheels discussing them.)
And, as I said, the issue I'm raising is a key management and
management-relationships principle. Whether one agrees with
it or not, characterizing it as a corner case seems to me
like a stretch.
Let's review what John Klensin asked for:
"
" * the IETF has got to keep its hands off the day-to-day
" decisions, even when they seem wrong
"
" * the IESG and IAB need to be prohibited structurally
" from micromanaging, or managing at all, beyond the
" degree that the IAOC wants to permit. They supply
" input, they make requests, but decisions rest on the
" IAOC side of the wall and stay there, with the only
" _real_ recourse being to fire the IAOC
This doesn't sound like a "corner case" to me.
You may have noted that I've said virtually nothing, on or
off-list, about editorial matters that don't impact principles
except sometimes to suggest that excess detail be removed.
That is not an accident. It is consistent, I think, with
your desire to get this cooked and out but without pushing
important issues under the proverbial rug in the process.
YMMD, of course, and likely does.
It does. I've seen a remarkable degree of consensus, a few
tweaks on a few things, but no huge disagreement that the
principles are wrong. It may not be a great document, the
framework may not be ideal, but I think y'all should move on
and get back to some real work. :)
I respect Carl's belief... but I respect John Klensin's worry
more.
And I think that a large fraction of that "remarkable degree of
consensus" is consensus by exhaustion of most of the community.
I've even heard from several IAB and IESG members that they have
been exhausted by the process and can't deal with it any more.
They shouldn't have to!
If what we design doesn't make their job easier, and reduce
the non-Internet things they need to worry about, this whole
process will be a terrible mistake.
I have a great deal of respect for Harald. He's done a very
good job of managing a very difficult process. The process is an
exhausting one -- we're trying to replace a totally unique process
which _used_to_ work well for us with a slightly less unique
process which none of us have experience with.
Beliefs run strong. Legitimate concerns arise at every turn.
Patience is needed here.
I strongly recommend we wait for the next draft, so we can be
sure we're on the same page. Harald's probably doing better than
we may think he is. We _really_don't_ need arguments about whether
concerns are "legitimate" or "corner-cases" today.
--
John Leslie <john(_at_)jlc(_dot_)net>
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