[governance] Re: organizational orientation

[Lee McKnight]

Stephane, George,

To try to square the circle, as I sometimes do, just as Ebay ranks
buyers and sellers by reputation of past interactions, so do IETFers. 

Meaning if you had sensible good things to say on a prior round of IETF
work, you are more likely to be listened to the next time. Maybe that is
just a formalism of the old boy network, but old boys don;t usually tear
each other down (and with such glee) if they stray from saying
technically sensible things, as IETFers sometimes do.  Reminds me
of...this listserv ; )

So agreed it's far from perfect, and yeah if you don;t know your way
around you may feel alienated. 

On other hand it's been using virtual tools to enable and encourage both
real-time and asynchronous remote participation like forever, a practice
IGF and MAG is apparently finding difficult to replicate. 

Lee

Prof. Lee W. McKnight
School of Information Studies
Syracuse University
+1-315-443-6891office
+1-315-278-4392 mobile
>>> george.sadowsky at attglobal.net 05/29/08 12:41 PM >>>
Dear Stephane,

Thank you very much for referencing these two key documents.  I hope 
people on the list look at them.

i take your point that the IETF is not perfect.  But I also note that 
the first reference concentrates on the problem statement and the way 
to improve the situation.  I quote:

"Taken in isolation, this document may appear to be exceedingly 
negative.  The IETF needs to refresh its management and processes to 
address today's challenges, but it should not be forgotten that the 
IETF has produced a large body of high quality work which has lead to 
an extremely successful and pervasive network infrastructure. 
Against this background, we should see the current document as a 
necessary piece of self-criticism leading to renewal and continued 
success."

I think that's a pretty good objective.

The Narten document rightly tries to acclimatize newbies to the IETF 
culture.  As you point out, it's really different than the UN 
culture, or any other where diplomacy is a major factor.

I'm not comparing the IETF to a golden ideal that might be achieved 
when we all attain god-like status.  I'm comparing it to other 
organizations here on earth.  Given the pervasiveness of favoritism, 
corruption, and non-representativeness that unfortunately are 
commonplace in  human institutions, in my opinion the IETF stands out 
as a fair body, oriented to real results, and using the best talent 
offered to it to produce those results.

It is true that some opinions count much more than others. I never 
denied that.  But the reason those opinions count much more is 
probably that they are held by someone with lots of experience and 
with a good track record of producing for the organization,  NOT that 
they are the opinions of a nephew of a powerful cabinet minister (for 
example).

George

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

At 5:56 PM +0200 5/29/08, Stephane Bortzmeyer wrote:
>On Wed, May 28, 2008 at 09:25:48PM -0400,
>  George Sadowsky <george.sadowsky at attglobal.net> wrote
>  a message of 67 lines which said:
>
>>  IETF operates as a meritocracy.  It has no legal existence, and
>>  anyone can register for and attend an IETF meeting.  it doesn't
>>  matter where you are from, who you work for, what color, gender you
>>  are, or any other attribute of your personal life and/or beliefs
>>  that have no bearing on how well you think, contribute or perform.
>>  Once you are in one of its sessions, you are judged almost
>>  completely by the ideas that you contribute to the discussion.
>
>The good thing about the IETF is that it values plain and frank
>speaking (unlike UN organizations or ICANN which value diplomatic
>speech).
>
>That's why, to rebuke your affirmation, you can use IETF documents
>themselves. For instance, the RFC 3774 "IETF Problem Statement"
><http://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc3774.txt> explains very clearly why your
>representation is too idealistic.
>
>Other IETF material, such as Thomas Narten's excellent tutorial for
>IETF beginners, which are performed at the beginning of every IETF
>meeting <http://www.ietf.org/proceedings/06nov/slides/newwork-0.pdf>,
>also say quite the opposite of the nice legend you described. For
>instance, the opinions of known people count *much* more.
>
>>  In therms of treatment of individuals, this is one of the fairest,
most
>>  egalitarian groups I know.
>
>Sure, IETF is more open than the GAC, less secretive than the ISO,
>technically better than ITU, etc. Big deal. "In the kingdom of blind
>men the one-eyed is king."
>
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