On Apr 15, 2013, at 4:44 AM, t.p. <daedulus(_at_)btconnect(_dot_)com> wrote:
So perhaps, to reduce the bias, e.g. towards "western white", any system
of choosing should give preference to the views of those who do not
attend IETF meetings, for whom judgement is based solely on the
contributions the person in question is seen to make - via the mailing
lists - towards open standards and running code.
We could also all be assigned masks, vocoders and randomly-generated numbers at
the beginning of each IETF, and go around wearing burlap robes.
The problem with your solution is that at the moment it's actually pretty hard
to participate in IETF without going to meetings. It's a source of some
frustration to me that despite having basically invented the Internet, the IETF
still does business as if we were living in the pre-Internet era. Three
face-to-face meetings a year is a lot of carbon, and I think it also creates
barriers for participation that are only readily surpassed by people who for
whatever reason happen to have a great deal of advantage. The degree of good
fortune that allows me to participate in IETF as I do is breathtaking in its
improbability.