Technically, the IETF (or ISOC or IAOC) will not be signing the
agreement, the host in China will, but that's in some sense a fairly
minor detail. We would still be expected to "play by the rules".
I don't think anyone is expecting us to warrant the views or
behaviors of our attendees, so Marshall's question is really about
disclosing what the rules are ("you have been warned") and asking the
community if they can live with those rules. And yes, if you break the
rules, you're on your own, but if it brings down the meeting (and
network in the process) that's not good for anyone, but we feel it is
VERY unlikely to happen.
Whether or not we should meet in China based on principles of
free speech and such is, I think, something we need to come to
at least a rough consensus on. We, the IAOC, are confident that
a meeting there would be successful by the usual criteria that
we apply for meetings, but we recognize that the matter at hand
is important and thus it is being disclosed prior to any agreement
being made.
Ole
Ole J. Jacobsen
Editor and Publisher, The Internet Protocol Journal
Cisco Systems
Tel: +1 408-527-8972 Mobile: +1 415-370-4628
E-mail: ole(_at_)cisco(_dot_)com URL: http://www.cisco.com/ipj
On Fri, 18 Sep 2009, Bernard Aboba wrote:
The IETF does not and cannot make any warranties relating to the
political views, manners or behavior of attendees. The attendees
are responsible for their own actions, and the IETF has no ability
ensure their conformance to local laws or customers. If attendees
violate the laws or customs of the host country, they may face
consequences -- but they're on their own.
So if the question is whether the IETF should sign any agreement
that takes responsibility for the behavior attendees, I'd say that
this is a bad idea. It's not really an issue of politics -- I'd say
the same thing if the meeting were being held in Palm Beach and the
city requested that the IETF take responsibility for ensuring that
participants conformed to the dress code (no white after labor
day!).
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