Charters, "normal process" versus ISOC, etc. (was: Re

[Dave Crocker]

Harald,

HTA> Yes, and they are. But I follow it even more closely than the others.

>> But it has nothing to do with the work of actually providing oversight.

HTA> It has - oversight cannot be provided without following the work, and a
HTA> significant portion of the work of oversight is to follow (in, ideally,
HTA> near real time) discussions like this one.


I started to write a "that's not my point" response to your note but
suddenly realized that this exchange is frankly a distraction.


This is not a company.  The employees are not the final authority in a
company.  So we should not automatically apply corporate management
style to these IETF efforts.  As already noted, even with company change,
independent change agents are often brought in.


We have a disgruntled community.  We have productivity problems.

Some changes are underway, including finally getting better tracking
software. All that is fine, but it has literally nothing at all to do
with the core problems. The core problems are deep and long-standing.
They have to do with transparency, accountability, responsiveness and
conflicting responsibilities.

With Kobe we had constructive change within a few months. Now we are 10
months after Kobe and simple, reasonable suggestions for independent
management of the change effort are being resisted rather vigorously.

It really is time to change this.

John K. has made an extremely constructive proposal as a compromise
between concerns over enjoying the safety of existing process, versus
the need for independence in the change effort.

Please note the word *compromise*.  It needs to be present in far more
of the postings.

   Having any sitting member of the IESG directly in charge of this
   effort is a good way to make sure the effort is not credible.

   It does not matter who that person is; it does not matter what the
   community thinks of them. Having any such person in charge is an
   inherent conflict of interest.

   The community has an institutional concern and it is not reasonable
   for anyone from that institution to manage the change effort.

John's proposal places a *new* person into that same institution, with
the sole mandate to pursue the necessary structural change.

Placing them into the IESG creates some risk with credibility, but at
the benefit of ensuring use of existing process and good access to
current management.


HTA> my point was that we either relax the requirement on "operative day before
HTA> yesterday" or we (perhaps initially) load the hat on some existing IESG
HTA> member.

To repeat: We are already 10 months after Kobe, with no direct changes
yet underway.

The current effort is already a long way from "operative day before
yesterday."


d/
--
 Dave Crocker <mailto:dcrocker at brandenburg.com>
 Brandenburg InternetWorking <http://www.brandenburg.com>
 Sunnyvale, CA  USA <tel:+1.408.246.8253>, <fax:+1.866.358.5301>