On May 15, 2013, at 7:50 PM, David Farmer <farmer(_at_)umn(_dot_)edu> wrote:
So lets play a little hypothetical here; What if an RIR or ICANN through a
global policy decided Whois Data no longer should be public for overriding
privacy reasons. My read of Section 5, is that would be proper path for such
a change, and long as the technical guidance of the IETF is considered in the
process. But then through RFC 2860 and Section 5, if the IETF objected on
technical or architectural grounds, and formally through the IESG, then the
IAB would essentially adjudicate the issue. And ICANN or the RIR are
obligated to accept the decision of the IAB. Do I have that right?
To be abundantly clear, you are hypothesizing a difference of opinion between
the
IETF/IESG and the ICANN/RIR communities, wherein the technical guidance of the
IETF
was considered during the ICANN/RIR decision process, but in the end the
outcome was
contrary to IETF expectations.
This would be an unfortunate (but not impossible) situation, as many folks in
the
combined community would likely have been involved during the process trying to
figure out why there is such a significant difference in views and facilitating
sharing of the beliefs and thought processes that underlie the situation. (btw,
these types of efforts happen in more contexts than just the hypothetical one
you
suggest, and are a good reason to ask "Have you hugged your AD recently"? ;-)
To be clear, I'm not advocating Whois should or shouldn't remain public, or
that anything is wrong with the Section 5. This just seemed like a plausible
hypothetical to explore how the puzzle pieces work together to make the
Internet Numbers Registry System. Also, I just want to fully understand what
Section 5 really means.
Ultimately, your hypothetical situation could result in the breakdown of the
present
relationship between IETF and ICANN/RIR organizations (ref: RFC 2860, section
2), with
otherwise indeterminate consequences... i.e. "It would be bad." When the
various
Internet organizations are aligned in the coordination of Internet critical
resources
(DNS, IP addresses, protocol & parameter #'s), then the result is well
understood.
We lack experience with the alternative, and it is not clear whether chair
remains
upright when missing one or more legs.
FYI,
/John
p.s. Disclaimer: My views alone.