Actually, verbatim translations are already allowed under the existing IETF
document license. It's other modifications that are not allowed under IETF,
but which
CC-BY would permit.
That sounds right. Someone might want to add commentary (even in English) to
the Tao,
such as to discuss local participants, diversity, and so on.
Someone might, or they might rewrite it to say that IETF meetings have
simultaneous translation, and while the IAB is all U.S. greybeards,
the IESG members are chosen to represent the gender and ethnic balance
of the whole world. Or they might rewrite it to say that the IETF has
corporate members, you have work for one to participate, and all RFCs
are standards.
The CC license says
You must not distort, mutilate, modify or take other derogatory
action in relation to the Work which would be prejudicial to the
Original Author's honor or reputation.
Would those changes be prejudicial to your honor or reputation, or are
they just wrong? How much are we willing to spend to find out?
It's extremely hard to let just one of the cat's paws out of the bag.
In practice either we have change control or we don't, and I don't see
much sentiment for giving it up to unknown CC users.
On the other hand, if they just want a CC license, it looks to me like
they can use CC BY-ND right now.
R's,
John