Peter Deutsch wrote:
> g'day,
>
>
> John C Klensin wrote:
> . . .
>
>>Please, folks, I am _not_ trying to restart the discussion of
>>"archival" I-Ds. Personally, I remain opposed to the idea, and
>>I believe that they should be treated as drafts and discarded.
>>If they result in an RFC, then the RFC should stand on its own.
>>Nor do I think that there is any quick fix to the patent
>>situation, least of all anything like this.
>
>
> Well, without repeating the entire thread yet again there were pretty
> categoric statements made during the last iteration of this thread that
> a Drafts archive *was* going up "soon". Has this idea been shelved,
> canceled, delayed or absorbed by the event horizon surrounding the
> infinitely dense Black Hole that is the intellectual property mess? ;-)
>
> And if we're going to state our own opinions in an aside, I personally
> believe that such an archive would be invaluable. "He who fogets history
> is doomed to repeat it" and all that....
Yes. The history here is the reason why the drafts are ephemeral and not
archived - to encourage the exchange of incomplete ideas. The success of
this history is what is being compromised.
Archiving them creates an environment where drafts and updates will be
stalled, with the response "well, since this is archival, we'd better
get it a little more complete". Given how long it takes for even the
active drafts to make it to RFC with such discussion, the chilling
effect on the creation of RFCs (at least by people who _are_ careful,
who you want to encourage) may grind things to a halt.
Joe
