--On torsdag, juli 14, 2005 21:33:05 -0400 Sandy Wills
<sandy(_at_)WEIJax(_dot_)com>
wrote:
> Directed towards the IESG:
> Recording meetings, and publishing those recordings, may be a hassle,
> but it answers all questions about the integrity of the decision-making
> process. There may still be questions about knowledge and wisdom, but
> you put to rest all questions about integrity. Refusing to record (for
> whatever reason*), after having been asked (for whatever reason) by the
> people you represent, says something rather different.
I'm sorry to be this blunt, but...
Nonsense.
Anyone who has watched the on-stage, recorded, extremely-public board
meetings of ICANN and has also watched the multitude of conspiracy theories
about the ICANN board knows that conspiracy theorists will take the
existence of a recording as proof that the REAL conspiracy was going on
somewhere else, and what was recorded was an orchestrated public charade.
You are, of course, correct. But guess what: This is one where the conspiracy
theorists are actually partly right. They know good and well that there are in
fact plenty of private conversations and off the record exchanges going on
behind the scenes. There have to be.
Like it or not, the members any small group charged with making important
decisions need to be able to communicate off the record.
Having been on the IESG, I can tell you that private communication with other
IESG members is very common, if only because bothering the entire IESG with
every small issue that comes up would be a huge time waster for the group as
whole. So any notion that recording IESG meetings will capture the process in
its entirety is simply silly.
As for atually recording the meetings, I'm pretty ambivalent about that. For
one thing, I think people are seriously underestimating the amount of time and
effort that would be needed to make this work. And for another, I don't think
it improves transparency nearly as much as people think it will. OTOH, the
added insight it would provide to general IETF participants about how the IESG
operates would be a very good thing. Perhaps the right thing to do is to record
1-2 meetings a year, as someone else suggested.
Been there, done that, no cigar.
Anyone with corporate board experience has been there as well. Or school board
experience. Or, for that matter, corridor conversations at IETF meetings.
There's certainly no shortage of examples.
Ned
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