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Re: procedural question with remote participation

2013-08-04 17:42:34

On Aug 3, 2013, at 7:25 PM, John C Klensin <john-ietf(_at_)jck(_dot_)com> wrote:

First, probably to the "when meetings begin" part, but noting
that someone who gets onto the audio a few minutes late is in
exactly the same situation as someone who walks into the meeting
room a few minutes late -- announcements at the beginning of the
session are ineffective.

Jabber appears to have some way of setting a banner/announcement thing that 
shows up when you first join a jabber session, because I've seen such a thing 
on occasion.  I don't know if it's defined in some standard way in XMPP or a 
proprietary extension.  But assuming it's either standard or defacto and 
popular, we could put the NOTE WELL in it (or a URL to a NOTE WELL).

Likewise for the IETF web pages with the audio links, so that you see the NOTE 
WELL before clicking the audio link.  Or even have an annoying pop-up if you 
prefer. (ugh)


We regularize remote participation [1] a bit by doing the
following.  At some level, if remote participants expect to be
treated as serious members of the community, they (we) can
reasonably be expected to behave that way.

* A mechanism for remote participants should be set up
      and remote participants should be to register.  The
      registration procedure should include the Note Well and
      any other announcement the IETF Trust, IAOC, or IESG
      consider necessary (just like the registration procedure
      for f2f attendance).

Sure - to *participate*, i.e. have a chance at the mic.  Not to 
listen/watch/read. 


* In the hope of increased equity, lowered overall
      registration fees, and consequently more access to IETF
      participation by a broader and more diverse community,
      the IAOC should establish a target/ recommended
      registration fee for remote participants.  That fee
      should reflect the portion of the registration fee that
      is not specifically associated with meeting expenses
      (i.e., I don't believe that remote participants should
      be supporting anyone's cookies other than their own).  
      
* In the interest of maximum participation and inclusion
      of people are aren't attending f2f for economic reasons,
      I think we should treat the registration fee as
      voluntary, with people contributing all or part of it as
      they consider possible.  No questions asked and no
      special waiver procedures.  On the other hand,
      participation without registration should be considered
      as being in extremely bad taste or worse, on a par with
      violations of the IPR disclosure rules.

I don't agree - I go to the meetings physically, but I *want* remote people to 
participate.  It's to everyone's benefit that they do so, including the 
physical attendees.  I don't want to charge them for it.  Making them register 
(for free) is fine, but don't make them pay money.  Don't even make them feel 
guilty.  The people who can afford the time and money to go to the physical 
meetings still get their money's worth.


* I don't see a practical and non-obtrusive way to
      enforce registration, i.e., preventing anyone
      unregistered from speaking, modulo the "bad taste"
      comment above.  But we rarely inspect badges before
      letting people stand in a microphone line either.

Sure there is.  Have the current "[wg-name]@jabber.ietf.org" jabber rooms be 
for open access lurking, from any XMPP domain, and not allow microphone 
representation in the WG by simply having jabber scribes ignore such requests 
in those rooms.  And have separate rooms that require registering, like 
"[wg-name]@members.ietf.org" or whatever, where you have to have a registered 
account on 'members.ietf.org'.  I assume XMPP servers support such a policy?  
It would be a free account, but require filling out the blue-sheet type 
information, verified email address, etc.  Or maybe even have it all in the 
same current jabber room but only accounts with "members.ietf.org" as the 
domain portion are represented at the mic by the jabber scribes.


In return, the IETF generally (and particularly people in the
room) needs to commit to a level of seriousness about remote
participation that has not consistently been in evidence.  In
particular:

      * Remote participants should have as much access to mic
      lines and the ability to participate in discussions as
      those who are present in the room.   That includes
      recognizing that, if there is an audio lag and it takes
      a few moments to type in a question or comment, some
      flexibility about "the comment queue is closed" may have
      to be in order.  For some sessions, it might require
      doing what ICANN has started doing (at least sometimes),
      which is treating the remote participants as a separate
      mic queue rather than expecting the Jabber scribe (or
      remote participant messenger/ channeler) to get at the
      end of whatever line is most convenient.

Do you find this is an actual problem in WG meetings?  My experience has been 
the opposite.  The WG chairs always seem to let jabber participants get their 2 
cents in, even if the queue line has been capped... especially if there's lag.


      * It is really, really, important that those speaking,
      even if they happen to be sitting at the chair's table,
      clearly and carefully identify themselves.  Last week,
      there were a few rooms in which the audio was, to put it
      very politely, a little marginal.  That happens.  But,
      when it combines with people mumbling their names or
      saying them very quickly, the result is as little
      speaker identification as would have been the case if
      the name hadn't been used as all.  In addition, some of
      us suffer from the disability of not being able to keep
      track of unfamiliar voices while juggling a few decks of
      slides, a jabber session, audio, and so on.   "I
      identified myself 10 minutes ago" is not generally
      adequate.

Do you find this is an actual problem in WG meetings?  Are the jabber scribes 
not able to tell you who is at the mic if you ask them?  People have forgotten 
to state their names in WGs I go to, but the scribes have been fairly vocal 
about reminding folks to do it.

-hadriel