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Re: Why ask for IETF Consensus on a WG document?

2011-06-24 14:12:25
Hi Martin,

On Fri, Jun 24, 2011 at 2:27 PM, Martin Rex <mrex(_at_)sap(_dot_)com> wrote:
Donald Eastlake wrote:

If polls at area meetings with 100+ people at them at three successive
IETF meetings on different continents consistently show, say, a 3 to 1
preference for some proposal but the IETF Last call email has 6 people
speaking against and only 4 in favor, what do you think the right
judgement would be as to the consensus of the IETF community?

That is completely missing the point of the IETF consensus process.

Sometimes it does and sometimes it doesn't. It depends, as you state
below, on the type of issue or issues that are being discussed. I
should have stated that it was something like deciding between two
methods of accomplishing the same technical goal where neutral
observers do not think there is a big difference in the technical
effectiveness of the methods, or something like.

If there is just one single person that objects during LC, but
raises 10 different issues, then it is totally irrelavant how many
there are that are in favour.

But then you go on, below, to say that the number of supporters really
is the most relevant thing if it turns out to be issues of taste...

Raised issues have to be processed with the
issue resolution process, i.e. drilldown (probably during discussion)
into pure matters of taste (where a significant majority decision is OK),
procedural issues (which strongly need to be resolved) and technical
issues that need to be either resolved or determined&declared to be
out-of-scope (or documented that no practical solution is known to
exists but the proposal/document is useful in spite of that).

So it really depends on the circumstances.

...

-Martin

Thanks,
Donald
=============================
 Donald E. Eastlake 3rd   +1-508-333-2270 (cell)
 155 Beaver Street
 Milford, MA 01757 USA
 d3e3e3(_at_)gmail(_dot_)com
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