On Jul 10, 2013, at 2:17 PM, Josh Howlett
<Josh(_dot_)Howlett(_at_)ja(_dot_)net> wrote:
Day passes have nothing to do with it.
I disagree. Day passes encourage the notion that it's normal to
parachute into the IETF to attend a single session. I think that the
IETF's strength is that we don't totally compartmentalise work items.
I am perplexed that there is, on the one hand, a (valid, IMHO) concern
about increasing IETF diversity & participation, when there appears to be
an active policy of discouraging potential participants who simply wish to
get work done in some specific sessions. Superficially, it would seem that
making participation more flexible and affordable might help to improve
diversity & participation.
Josh.
Dear Josh,
I agree. A single day fee should also be considered in conjunction with the
increased status of remote participation underwritten by a much smaller remote
meeting fee. It seems there is a general reluctance to consider schemes aimed
at capturing face-to-face meetings in a realtime fashion permitting moderated
realtime interaction with selected network entities. Experiments with things
like WebEx and others involve a fair amount of network resources or they offer
poor results. An audio/video bridge suitable for many simultaneous
participants is difficult to solve in a generic manner. The real question is
simultaneous participation in conjunction with telephone bridges really
necessary?
Setting up a dedicated low cost device to manage video projectors, microphones,
and PA systems for a single moderated inbound access should supplant much of
the complexity. By not permitting multiple video/audio sources and requiring
presentation being available in the cloud prior to the meetings, issues of
distribution and audio quality are removed. Such an approach will necessitate
greater meeting discipline to ensure only those at an active microphone are
recognized, and that presenters both local and remote are permitted control of
their presentation.
Developing this approach would offer a number of benefits extending well beyond
that of the IETF since this is a common problem. Much of the ongoing work
related to HTML5 facilitate standardizing the needed APIs. There are many
fairly powerful systems using dual core Atom processors available well below
$300. These systems should be able to handle audio using USB adapters and
source video presentations accessed from the cloud. A fallback operation
should be able to carry meetings forward completely from the cloud "as if"
moderators and participants were present locally. In other words, treat loss
of the Internet at the venue as being equivalent to being denied access to the
physical venue and include this requirement in venue arrangements.
Those traveling thousands of miles already confront many uncertainties. Those
that elect to participate remotely should be afforded greater certainty of
being able to participate when problems occur at local venues or with
transportation. Increasing participation without the expense of the brick and
mortar and travel should offer long term benefits and increased fairness.
Regards,
Douglas Otis