Re: WG Review: Internet Wideband Audio Codec (codec)

On 1/5/10 11:10 AM, Roni Even wrote:
> Hi,
> I do not think that the IETF should accept any work because people want to
> do it, if this is the case a group of people can come and ask to start
> working on any idea they have that has some relation to the Internet. IETF
> should accept work that is in scope for of the IETF  and for which there is
> enough knowledge to evaluate the work by the participants. 
Statements like this puzzle me. What is "the IETF" if not the people who
show up at our meetings, post to our mailing lists, and seek to work in
good faith within our organizational and legal framework for the benefit
of the Internet?

In the case of the proposed Codec WG we seem to have a group of
technically competent volunteers who want to "make the Internet work
better by producing high quality, relevant technical documents that
influence the way people design, use, and manage the Internet"
<http://www.ietf.org/about/mission.html> ...

These volunteers seem to be part of the "large open international
community of network designers, operators, vendors, and researchers
concerned with the evolution of the Internet architecture and the smooth
operation of the Internet" <http://www.ietf.org/about/> ...

Yes, it is true that "the issues on which the IETF produces its
documents are issues where the IETF has the competence needed to speak
to them, and that the IETF is willing to listen to technically competent
input from any source" <http://www.ietf.org/about/mission.html> ...

But I don't think we can say that relevent members of the IETF community
do *not* have the competence to work on an audio codec or that they are
*not* willing to listen to technically competent input from any source
when it comes to codec technologies. Indeed, the two BoFs at Stockholm
and Hiroshima would lead, I think, to the opposite conclusion: the
people who want to do this work appear to be competent (they have
already developed codecs like Speex, CELT, SILK, IPMR, BV16, and BV32)
and to be quite committed to rough consensus and running code, we have
some precedent for doing work of this kind within the IETF (e.g., RFC
3951), several longtime IETF participants have experience with digital
signal processing and similar technologies, a codec working group would
attract new participants with relevant areas of expertise, and people at
the BoFs appeared to be quite open to input from the IETF community or
any interested individual.

I agreed to co-chair the BoF in Hiroshima to give these folks a chance
to present their case for working within the Internet Standards Process,
and I think that case is strong. Yes, they might fail to achieve their
goals or to solve the problems they set out to solve, but that is true
of any WG for any number of reasons. We won't know unless we try, and I
see no reason to prevent them from trying.

Peter

-- 
Peter Saint-Andre
https://stpeter.im/

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