I am the assigned Gen-ART reviewer for this draft. For background on Gen-ART,
please see the FAQ at <http://wiki.tools.ietf.org/area/gen/trac/wiki/GenArtfaq>.
Please resolve these comments along with any other Last Call comments you may
receive.
Document: draft-eggert-successful-bar-bof-06
Reviewer: Ben Campbell
Review Date: 2011-09-07
IETF LC End Date: 2011-09-08
Summary: This draft is nearly ready for publication as an informational RFC,
but has some open issues
Major issues:
-- I share some of the concerns of other last call commenters, in that an RFC
is written in stone. This draft is written in response to a current trend, and
may make no sense, or worse, be interpreted very differently in future
contexts. On the other hand, I agree the trend that it addresses needs to be,
uhm, addressed. This might be fixable with a more strongly worded "scope of
applicability" pointing this out. Or maybe an RFC is not the right
approach--I'm not really sure what the right way to move forward is here.
-- Section 6 suggests side meetings should be (somehow "informally") covered by
NOTE WELL. I think this is a very dangerous suggestion. The rest of the
document suggests that a side meeting has no official standing. That seems to
me to mean it's no different than a group of people who coincidentally
participate in the IETF having a dinner or bar meeting on any subject at any
time. Or a hallway conversation, for that matter. By the logic of this section,
I can't really figure out how "informal" a meeting would need to be before it
no longer fell under NOTE WELL.
In an informal meeting, the participants should be able to follow any IPR
policy they like. I can even imagine an informal meeting covered by an NDA,
where the participants want to decide if they want to have further discussions
of a subject under IETSF IPR rules or not.
I think the best we can hope to do is suggest that side meeting organizers and
participants be explicit with their expectations on IPR and confidentiality, so
there is less chance for down-stream surprises. If we want something stronger
than that, then we really need to create a new category of "official" meeting.
Minor issues:
-- section 1, 2nd to last paragraph:
Good luck in asking for a cultural change to behavior that is unofficial in the
first place. I think we're better off clarifying the term people already use
than trying to introduce a new one.
Nits/editorial comments:
-- section 3, 5th paragraph: "dialogs between two people, which is much more
ineffective than a group discussion around a restaurant table."
I suggest s/"more ineffective"/"less effective"
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