Subject: RE: IETF mission boundaries (Re: IESG proposed statement on the IETF mission )

From: "Christian Huitema" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 16 Oct 2003 15:15:56 -0700

> > According to you, this has nothing to  do with the IETF.  It might
> result
> > in the congestive collapse of the Internet,  but who cares, the IETF
> > doesn't do street  lights.  I would  like  to see  the  criteria
which
> > determine  that telephones belong on the Internet but street lights
> don't!
> 
> thanks for making the most concise statement of the conflict here in
the
> discussion so far!
> I think this point is one of the critical causes of conflict when
talking
> about the IETF mission - and unless we lance the boil, actually talk
about
> it, and attempt to *resolve* the issue, we will go on revisiting the
issue
> forever, with nothing but wasted energy to show for it.

Well, to paraphrase a well known leader, "the IETF, how many divisions?"
The gist of this comment is that someone developing a network
application protocol ought to somehow get a blessing from the IETF.
Reality check. Who got the IETF approval to deploy ICQ, Kazaa, or for
that matter HTTP?

If the Internet is so fragile that a poorly developed application can
break it, then the IETF response should not be to try control each
application. It has to be, design checks that can be implemented by
cooperating hosts and routers so that their neck of the Internet is in
good health!

-- Christian Huitema

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From: Eric Rosen <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 17 Oct 2003 11:19:55 -0400

> Reality check. Who got the IETF approval to deploy ICQ, Kazaa, or for

The fact  that someone  did something without  the IETF's approval  does not
imply that  what they did is  outside the scope of  the IETF, or  that it is
beyond the IETF's mission.

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From: Harald Tveit Alvestrand <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 17 Oct 2003 22:09:44 +0100

Christian,

we might be looking through opposite ends of this tunnel.....

> Reality check. Who got the IETF approval to deploy ICQ, Kazaa, or for

For application protocols, I view it in the opposite direction - if someone 
comes to the IETF and *asks* for the IETF's advice, blessing or ownership, 
what are the conditions under which we say "yes"? Or "no"?

For those that never ask, and never become important, I say "not my 
problem". The number of application protocols with the oomph to "break" the 
Internet is quite small - offhand, I'd say that HTTP/1.0 probably was the 
closest try.

> cooperating hosts and routers so that their neck of the Internet is in

Now there's an idea..... :-)

The flipside is of course with those things that are *already* under IETF 
control, or critical for our infrastructure, for some reason. The 
abstracted version of the fights over MIME types, URI schemes, SIP 
extension etcetera seems to be "don't extend until you've talked to us 
about what you're doing, and if we don't like it, don't try to pretend that 
we did" (the P-headers, vnd. MIME types and the proposed faceted URI 
schemes); I'm not certain what the abstracted version of the fights over 
COPS, CR-LDP, RSVP-TE and so on are.....

The IETF has got fewer divisions than the Pope, of course. Anyone is free 
to ignore us. And we need to remember that, sometimes.

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From: Keith Moore <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 19 Oct 2003 22:02:29 -0400

> The number of application protocols with the oomph to "break" the 
> Internet is quite small

however, it's not safe to assume that it's zero.  any new killer app that were
poorly designed could do it.

also, you might be underestimating the damage done by HTTP (1.0 or later).

---

From: "Spencer Dawkins" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 19 Oct 2003 21:40:11 -0500

> The number of application protocols with the oomph to "break" the

OK, I've gotta ask - how many times do we break the Internet before we
reverse this reasoning? (How many times is "too many"?)

(signed) curious

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From: "todd glassey" <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 20 Oct 2003 08:37:51 -0700

Spencer, this is not intended at you personally but rather at the whole IETF
and this WG in particular. So let me ask then - What makes you think *you*
or anyone else here has any say as to what is or is not routed on the
Internet. ***YOU DON'T***  also as to "what breaks the Internet" - You don't
there too. None of us do.

And in fact NO ONE PERSON has any possible say as to the US internet except
the person running DHS and if you doubt this - try arguing with them.

BTW - The biggest thing the IETF can do is to get off the concept of "that
its wares and efforts" only pertain to the Internet. Because they don't -
obviously so too, and this is a key issue. If the IETF's actions only
pertained to the Internet and there was such a quantifiable thing as the
Internet then this might have some meaning - but its a fantasy that the IESG
likes to propagate to justify its existence.

Sorry if the truth hurts - but it is what it is.

Todd

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Spencer Dawkins" <[email-masked]>
To: <[email-masked]>; <[email-masked]>
Sent: Sunday, October 19, 2003 7:40 PM
Subject: Re: IETF mission boundaries (Re: IESG proposed statement on theIETF
mission )

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From: "todd glassey" <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 20 Oct 2003 08:37:51 -0700

Todd

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Spencer Dawkins" <[email-masked]>
To: <[email-masked]>; <[email-masked]>
Sent: Sunday, October 19, 2003 7:40 PM
Subject: Re: IETF mission boundaries (Re: IESG proposed statement on theIETF
mission )

---

From: "Spencer Dawkins" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 19 Oct 2003 21:40:11 -0500

(signed) curious