Subject: "trouble maker"

From: "Hallam-Baker, Phillip" <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 24 Jun 2003 08:20:17 -0700

"i.e. there should be no place for the term "trouble maker" in IETF
documents. "

I agree, I think that the problem here is that it becomes very easy for a
partisan chair to further reinforce his power by invoking this phrase.

DNSSEC has just produced a spec that cannot be deployed. The WG was in favor
of fixing the spec but the chair as we all know had other ideas.

Pointing out that the spec was broken resulted in numerous atempts to
intimidate me by 'reporting me to my management' as a 'trouble maker'. Like
get a clue, who do you think had asked me to push for the protocol changes
in the first place?

>From my point of view the "trouble maker" was a WG chair acting in a clearly
partisan manner.

The first time I spoke in a DNSEXT WG the chair in question gave a loud hiss
as I gave my name and company. Despite being prompted to do so he has
refused to appologise. The is hardly the behavior I expect from an
organization claiming to be open and inclusive.

It is very easy to get a WG to adopt the consensus you want if you are
prepared to drive away supporters of contrary views. This is what happened
in ASRG. At the start there were a lot of people interested in
authentication based approaches. Then I see that any proposal they make is
attacked on non-technical grounds, the proposers insulted, called 'a snake'
etc. Pretty soon I am the only person left proposing authentication based
approaches so having marginalized my position the faction can now dismiss me
as a 'trouble maker' for proposing ideas that are opposed to the consensus
they have formed by driving away any supporters.

I fail to see the point of the IESG. It does not appear to be providing much
in the way of direction or architectural guidance. It is not even providing
the most basic guidance one would expect such as "this spec must work for
all the Internet".

The Internet has major structural security problems that are likely to be
tested in the near future. We already have spam senders hijaking unused IP
address blocks with BGP spoofing, expect them to shortly start hijacking
used address blocks. The proposal on the table for BGP security meanwhile is
to replace all routers with new ones that support BGP over IPSEC, a very
likely occurrence.

At this point there is no deployable security solution for BGP OR DNS. I see
little likelihood that the IETF will play a positive role in solving either
problem.

		Phill

---

From: James Seng <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 25 Jun 2003 00:11:41 +0800

Philip,

The fact you failed to convience others of your proposal is not a 
problem of IETF. Neither is the role of the chair or the IESG to assist 
you in that regard.

If you did not get rough consensus, you lose. Deal with it.

For your specific issues with DNSEXT, I am not sure how true "WG was in 
favour to fixing the spec" but you should deal with that in the DNSEXT 
or file an appeal to IESG if it is really true. Complaining here dont 
help you in anyway.

For the wg chairs reaction to your company name, while I dont think it 
is appropriate, I dont see why it would prevent IETF to be open and 
inclusive. Everyone here represents himself/herself here and being 
political correct was, AFAIK, not one of IETF core principle.

-James Seng

---

From: Scott W Brim <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 24 Jun 2003 12:24:47 -0400

> political correct was, AFAIK, not one of IETF core principle.

If the chair hisses when someone stands up to speak that's more than
just being "politically incorrect".  However, that kind of lack of
training in chairs is already covered.

---

From: "Bob Wyman" <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 24 Jun 2003 13:32:05 -0400

James Seng wrote:
> For the wg chairs reaction to your company name, while I 
> dont think it is appropriate, I dont see why it would prevent
> IETF to be open and inclusive. Everyone here represents 
> himself/herself here and being political correct was, AFAIK, 
> not one of IETF core principle.

	WG Chairs should be held to a higher standard of conduct. One of
the functions of the chair is to ensure that the process is, in fact,
"open and inclusive". It seems difficult to me to imagine how anyone
could suggest that a WG Chair who hisses participants could be said to
be contributing to an "open and inclusive" process. 
	The mere fact that such WG Chairs continue to exist should be
considered a subject for the "Problem Statement."

		bob wyman

---

From: Pekka Savola <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 27 Jun 2003 10:32:40 +0300 (EEST)

> get a clue, who do you think had asked me to push for the protocol changes
[...]

I think the last sentence is interesting and troubling, at the same time.

One doesn't interest the interests of the employer/management in the IETF.

Now, I just tried to look at some documents, including:
 - RFC2026
 - the TAO
 - newcomer's orientation web page and slides
 - some additional introductory slides linked under www.ietf.org

.. and it seems apparent to me that this "tenet" isn't being stated as 
explicitly as it should.  So, there seems to be a problem in the 
training/education of regular IETF participants (and not just the 
IESG/IAB/WGchair/DocEditor/etc.) too.

-- 
Pekka Savola                 "You each name yourselves king, yet the
Netcore Oy                    kingdom bleeds."
Systems. Networks. Security. -- George R.R. Martin: A Clash of Kings