Hi, John.
I agree that over-emphasizing virtual interim meetings has its drawbacks, but
I’d like to push back on your first point.
On 19 Jul 2017, at 21:15, John C Klensin <john-ietf(_at_)jck(_dot_)com> wrote:
During the plenary, there was a strong pitch made for a
significantly increased number of virtual meetings, maybe even
every few weeks.. I want to play devil's advocate and point out
the downsides:
(1) We have usually thought that the IETF is at its best when
the vast majority of participants are designers, implementers,
and people with primary product responsibility rather than, at
the other extreme, professional standardizers. For at least
some organizations, having to commit regular blocks of time (or
very long blocks of time) to specific standards work will
trigger the same sorts of "are those people too valuable to do
this or can we commit fewer or less valuable people" reviews
that are sometimes triggered by meetings in resorts or other
exotic and/or other places that are perceived as exceptionally
expensive or attractive to tourists.
Note that this is about virtual interim meetings, or as non-IETF people call
them - conference calls. Blocking out one or two hours every two to three weeks
is not that big a deal to employers. There is no travel approval, no flight, no
hotel, no several day absence, no expense report. It’s a phone call (or Webex
or some kind of WebRTC thing). This is nothing compared to a F2F meeting, where
I’m gone for 5 days and have probably spent a total of one more day on all the
stuff around that.
Your points about cross-fertilization and English stand, but a virtual interim
is a far cheaper way (for all participants and their employers) to get a 1- or
2-hour slot for a WG meeting.
Yoav
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