RE: Request for community guidance on issue concerning a future me etingof the IETF
Everybody, How I read the condition text it is basically saying if the IETF breaks the Chinese law the meeting is over. Having it twice (once in the law and second time in the contract) seems to be just to remind the the meeting organizer the law exists as the law is for many people quite unusual. Even striking that text from the contract wouldn't IMHO change- anything, because the law basically says the same anyway. Entering a country puts you always under the local law - whether you agree with the laws or not. However, I think when not quite this strict, other countries restrict political activity of visitors. If I remember correctly, the US law restricts the possibility of political activism for visa holders. Regardless of what I think of the Chinese law, and having such text in the contract, I don't think the particular text is an issue for the IETF meeting. Many other organizations (3GPP, Wimax Forum, etc.) have had meetings in China for many years without any issues. Cheers, Jonne. --- original message --- From: ext Marshall Eubanks t...@americafree.tv Subject: Request for community guidance on issue concerning a future meetingof the IETF Date: 18th September 2009 Time: 6:48:36 pm Greetings; We have received numerous suggestions and requests for an IETF meeting in China and the IAOC has been working on a potential China meeting for several years. We are now close to making a decision on a potential upcoming meeting in China. However, the following issue has arisen and we would appreciate your feedback. The Chinese government has imposed a rule on all conferences held since 2008 regarding political speech. A fundamental law in China requires that one not criticize the government. Practically, this has reference to public political statements or protest marches, which are not the IETF's custom. The government, which is a party to the issue, requires that people who attend conferences in China (the IETF being but one example) not engage in political speech during their tour in China. We consider this to be acceptable, on the basis that the IETF intends to abide by the laws of whatever nations it visits and we don't believe that this impacts our ability to do technical work. The rule is implemented in the Hotel agreement and reads (note that the Client would be the Host, and the Group would be the IETF) : Should the contents of the Group's activities, visual or audio presentations at the conference,or printed materials used at the conference (which are within the control of the Client) contain any defamation against the Government of the People's Republic of China, or show any disrespect to the Chinese culture, or violates any laws of the People's Republic of China or feature any topics regarding human rights or religion without prior approval from the Government of the People's Republic of China, the Hotel reserves the right to terminate the event on the spot and/or ask the person(s) who initiates or participates in any or all of the above action to leave the hotel premises immediately. The Client will support and assist the Hotel with the necessary actions to handle such situations. Should there be any financial loss incurred to the Hotel or damage caused to the Hotel's reputation as a result of any or all of the above acts, the Hotel will claim compensation from the Client. What does this condition mean ? The hotel staff would have, in theory, the legal right to shut down the meeting and ask the offending participants to leave the property immediately. While we do not foresee a situation where such action would take place, we feel that it is proper to disclose these conditions to the community. The members of the IAOC, speaking as individuals, do not like this condition as a matter of principle. The IAOC does believe that this condition would not prevent the IETF from conducting its business. We note that the Vancouver/Quebec survey conducted earlier this year asked for people to suggest venues in Asia; an overwhelming majority (94%) of those who mentioned China were in favor of having a meeting there. We are therefore asking for input from the community by two means - by commenting on the IETF discussion list, and also by completing a very short survey on people's intentions to travel to China, or not, subject to these conditions. This survey can be found here : https://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=h4DUkRUOdG_2bVLqioPcYYHw_3d_3d All responses received by October 1, 2009 at 9:00 AM EDT (1300 UTC) will be considered by the IAOC in making its decision. We appreciate the assistance of the community in providing us with data that will help us to make an informed decision. Regards Marshall Eubanks (acting for the IAOC) ___ IETF-Announce mailing list ietf-annou...@ietf.org https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf-announce
Re: China venue survey
Hi Ole, I'm afraid that results of the survey will *not* prove informative. The one pertinent question in the survey assumes that we have a meeting in China, then asks if the respondent, as an individual, would prefer to attend it. This is very different from asking if we, as a community, should hold such a meeting given that we, as a community, are required to sign away our right to free speech. For your reference, the question is: You may have other reasons for not attending the meeting, but would this contract provision by itself prevent you from attending the meeting? Thanks, Yaron Date: Fri, 18 Sep 2009 19:17:10 -0700 (PDT) From: Ole Jacobsen o...@cisco.com Subject: Re: Request for community guidance on issue concerning a future meeting of the IETF To: Theodore Tso ty...@mit.edu Cc: i...@ietf.org, ietf@ietf.org, Robert Elz k...@munnari.oz.au Message-ID: pine.gso.4.63.0909181905390.25...@pita.cisco.com Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Fri, 18 Sep 2009, Theodore Tso wrote: OTOH, if there is a legal agreement which must be signed which clearly impacts the free speach rights of IETF attendees, past a certain level, I think it is valid for us as a community to decide that maybe using such a venue might not be the path of wisdom. Which is why we asked you :-) Whether or not the situation on the ground in Beijing is likely to rise to that level, I am not sure. Maybe people are right in that the authorities understand that if they were to be unreasonable, it's highly likely that it would be widely publicized and it would be a major black eye for them. On the other hand, having heard stories (admittedly many years ago), about someone on an international assignment in China who called his wife and talked to her in Portugese (since that was her native language), only to have a heavily Chinese-accented voice break into the line to demand, speak in English, I'd be feeling rather cautious about going to China and would probably feel that I would want to be very careful about how I spoke and behaved while in that country, far more than most other civilized parts of the world --- which wouldn't make it to be a terribly pleasant place to visit. I think that if you would ask the thousands of businessmen who visit China every day you would not hear such stories in 2009. Having just come from a meeting in Beijing (APNIC 28), I can certainly attest to the fact that nobody worries about what they say in public or private and there isn't an army of listeners ready to jump on you (at least as far as I could tell). Of course, if you wander down to a certain square and unroll a banner, it would probably get you arrested before anyone had a chance to read it. Since that's not typically something we do in the IETF, the IAOC does not feel it would impact our ability to have a good meeting. The result of the survey will be informative, I am sure. Ole Email secured by Check Point Email secured by Check Point ___ Ietf mailing list Ietf@ietf.org https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf
Re: path forward with RFC 3932bis
As you may recall, my conclusion of the discussion was that while opinions were split, a dispute resolution model emerged as a potential compromise. A week ago I promised that we would come up with a specific proposal. Russ, Olaf, Harald and myself have now worked on this. In the process we have realized that the devil is in the details, but we do have a proposal that we believe addresses the various interests in an acceptable manner. The full updated draft is at http://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-housley-iesg-rfc3932bis-09 but the important part is copied here for your convenience: Experience has shown that the IESG and the RFC Editor have worked well together regarding publication recommendations and IESG notes. Where questions have arisen, they have been quickly resolved when all parties become aware of the concerns. However, should a dispute ever arise, a third party can assist with resolution. Therefore, this dispute procedure has an informal dialogue phase followed by a formal arbitration phase if the matter remains unresolved. If the IRSG or the RFC Editor has concerns with the content of a particular IESG note, then they should contact the IESG with a clear and concise description of the concern. Alternate content may be suggested. Informal dialogue is desired. At the end of the dialogue, the IESG can reaffirm the original IESG note, provide an alternate IESG note, or withdraw the note altogether. The dialogue should not take more than six weeks. This period of time allows the IESG to conduct an IETF Last Call to determine community consensus if desired. If dialogue fails to resolve IRSG or RFC Editor concerns with the content of a particular IESG note, then they can take the matter to the IAB for a final ruling. The IAB review will occur according to procedures of the IAB's own choosing. The IAB can direct the inclusion of the IESG note or withdraw the note altogether. Unlike the IAB reviews specified in RFC 4846 [I3], in this situation, the IAB decision is binding, not advisory. The rationale for choosing this model is first of all the fact that normal discussion should be given an opportunity, and only if that fails should the dispute resolution be invoked. We have chosen a model where a third party, the IAB, helps resolve the conflict. We believe the use of a third party is a necessary part of the compromise. We also believe that this model allows the independence of the RFC Editor to be retained. An alternative that we considered during discussion was a two-party model where the RFC Editor still made the final determination about the requested note, but was required to ask for an IAB opinion before ignoring the request. We are not sure if this model would work as a compromise, because the two party model may not satisfy those who felt that the RFC Editor should not be able to decide on this on its own. However, the alternative does raise the bar for ignoring a request for an IESG note. An advantage of the alternative model is that it can be described purely as an application of the rules in RFC 4846. If we were to choose this model, the last paragraph would read as follows: If dialogue fails to resolve IRSG or RFC Editor concerns with the content of a particular IESG note, then they are required to acquire an opinion from the IAB. The IAB can direct the inclusion of the IESG note or withdraw the note altogether. As specified in RFC 4846, IAB's opinion will be advisory. In any case, the decision on what to do rests again with the community. We are asking the IETF community, the RFC Interest list, and the IAB to think about our proposal and provide feedback and/or alternative suggestions. I will wait for this feedback from the IETF until October 1st. Given that this matter concerns the boundary between the IETF and RFC Editor operation, I will also ask the IAB to make a decision on whether they are comfortable with the model going forward. Jari Arkko ___ Ietf mailing list Ietf@ietf.org https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf
Re: path forward with RFC 3932bis
Here's the problem I see with draft-housley-iesg-rfc3932bis-09. You responded before I had a chance to explain what the rationale and options are. Sorry, but I was asleep at the time the draft came out :-) Please see my other mail. Jari ___ Ietf mailing list Ietf@ietf.org https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf
Re: [IAOC] [IAB] Request for community guidance on issue concerning a future meeting of the IETF
On Sep 18, 2009, at 4:44 PM, Brian E Carpenter wrote: On 2009-09-19 08:08, Fred Baker wrote: On Sep 18, 2009, at 12:29 PM, Henk Uijterwaal wrote: I think it is safe to assume that the government did run some checks on what the IETF is doing The government has been negotiating to bring an IETF meeting to China since 1997, and has been very carefully vetting the IETF's activities for a long time. U betcha they know what we're doing. Up to *at least* the level of a Vice Minister of the PRC Government, from my personal knowledge. Roughly the same level as the US Government's direct contact with the IETF, also from my personal knowledge. There is nothing sinister there; we should be flattered. However, I have a question to the IAOC: do we know if other standards meetings such as 3GPP had to sign similar conditions before meeting in the PRC? Dear Brian; Please note that we would not be signing these conditions. The host would be. We were told that these conditions apply to all conferences, without exception. Whether or not other conferences have the same level of transparency as we do (i.e., whether the organizing committees know about these formal restrictions, and communicate them to their attendees), I do not know. Regards Marshall Brian ___ IAOC mailing list i...@ietf.org https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/iaoc ___ Ietf mailing list Ietf@ietf.org https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf
Re: China venue survey
On Sat, 19 Sep 2009, Yaron Sheffer wrote: Hi Ole, I'm afraid that results of the survey will *not* prove informative. The one pertinent question in the survey assumes that we have a meeting in China, then asks if the respondent, as an individual, would prefer to attend it. This is very different from asking if we, as a community, should hold such a meeting given that we, as a community, are required to sign away our right to free speech. Perhaps my use of the phrase rough consensus in another message led you to conclude that we are trying to get the IETF to take a moral or political stance. That's not the intention and should not be the intention as kre points out. As organizers of a meeting for the IETF we have an obligation to determine if a bunch of conditions are met in advance, including such things as suitability of venue, access, cost, safety, etc. There is even an Internet Draft that outlines these requirements. Free speech and other politicial matters are not part of the Draft, but that doesn't mean we should not consider them. At the end of the day, if a majority of the community (who would otherwise attend) would stay away from location X for whatever reason, then it would make little sense for us to hold a meeting there. Not only do we need critical mass in order to make it a productive meeting, we need a certain attendance level to make the budget work. (Yes, the budget is based on predicted attendance levels which do vary based on a number of factors, but I think you would agree that holding meetings in places where we expect extraordinarily low levels of attendance would not be good for anyone). In this case the community really means each individual. We have already determined that the venue meets our requirements for a successful meeting, that's not what we're asking about. For your reference, the question is: You may have other reasons for not attending the meeting, but would this contract provision by itself prevent you from attending the meeting? Thanks, Yaron I don't see why the answer to that question would not be informative. I would say the feedback received so far has been very informative. Ole Ole J. Jacobsen Editor and Publisher, The Internet Protocol Journal Cisco Systems Tel: +1 408-527-8972 Mobile: +1 415-370-4628 E-mail: o...@cisco.com URL: http://www.cisco.com/ipj ___ Ietf mailing list Ietf@ietf.org https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf
RE: China venue survey
Hi Ole, The IETF is highly ideological. Probably more so than most other SDOs. We care deeply about the end to end principle, about net neutrality, and (at least in the community I'm a member of) about security. Many of our members care a lot about IPR and its effect on open source. So why when it comes to free speech, which is clearly related to our open way of making standards, we suddenly shy away from taking a moral stance and instead resort to budgetary calculations? And regarding the survey: most people, myself included, would bend a principle or two to go somewhere as interesting and exciting as China. But you would get a radically different answer if you asked: should the IETF hold a meeting in a country that mandates a non-free speech commitment, or should we prefer an alternative where no such commitments are required. Thanks, Yaron -Original Message- From: Ole Jacobsen [mailto:o...@cisco.com] Sent: Saturday, September 19, 2009 16:07 To: Yaron Sheffer Cc: ietf@ietf.org Subject: Re: China venue survey On Sat, 19 Sep 2009, Yaron Sheffer wrote: Hi Ole, I'm afraid that results of the survey will *not* prove informative. The one pertinent question in the survey assumes that we have a meeting in China, then asks if the respondent, as an individual, would prefer to attend it. This is very different from asking if we, as a community, should hold such a meeting given that we, as a community, are required to sign away our right to free speech. Perhaps my use of the phrase rough consensus in another message led you to conclude that we are trying to get the IETF to take a moral or political stance. That's not the intention and should not be the intention as kre points out. As organizers of a meeting for the IETF we have an obligation to determine if a bunch of conditions are met in advance, including such things as suitability of venue, access, cost, safety, etc. There is even an Internet Draft that outlines these requirements. Free speech and other politicial matters are not part of the Draft, but that doesn't mean we should not consider them. At the end of the day, if a majority of the community (who would otherwise attend) would stay away from location X for whatever reason, then it would make little sense for us to hold a meeting there. Not only do we need critical mass in order to make it a productive meeting, we need a certain attendance level to make the budget work. (Yes, the budget is based on predicted attendance levels which do vary based on a number of factors, but I think you would agree that holding meetings in places where we expect extraordinarily low levels of attendance would not be good for anyone). In this case the community really means each individual. We have already determined that the venue meets our requirements for a successful meeting, that's not what we're asking about. For your reference, the question is: You may have other reasons for not attending the meeting, but would this contract provision by itself prevent you from attending the meeting? Thanks, Yaron I don't see why the answer to that question would not be informative. I would say the feedback received so far has been very informative. Ole Ole J. Jacobsen Editor and Publisher, The Internet Protocol Journal Cisco Systems Tel: +1 408-527-8972 Mobile: +1 415-370-4628 E-mail: o...@cisco.com URL: http://www.cisco.com/ipj Scanned by Check Point Total Security Gateway. Email secured by Check Point Email secured by Check Point ___ Ietf mailing list Ietf@ietf.org https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf
RE: China venue survey
On Sat, 19 Sep 2009, Yaron Sheffer wrote: Hi Ole, The IETF is highly ideological. Probably more so than most other SDOs. We care deeply about the end to end principle, about net neutrality, and (at least in the community I'm a member of) about security. Many of our members care a lot about IPR and its effect on open source. So why when it comes to free speech, which is clearly related to our open way of making standards, we suddenly shy away from taking a moral stance and instead resort to budgetary calculations? And regarding the survey: most people, myself included, would bend a principle or two to go somewhere as interesting and exciting as China. But you would get a radically different answer if you asked: should the IETF hold a meeting in a country that mandates a non-free speech commitment, or should we prefer an alternative where no such commitments are required. Thanks, Yaron You might get a different answer, but it's ultimately up to the individuals who answer the survey. How would you expect our large and growing contingent from China to answer that question? Should we ask about the policies of the United States, France or Germany on a long range of topics (visa, wars, death penalty...)? Where do we draw the line? Don't get me wrong, I have every respect for anyone who wants to avoid going to China for political/moral reasons, and if that collection of people is large enough to seriously impact our ability to run a successful meeting then I agree that another location would be better. [Insert philosophical comment about where most of our electronic products are produced these days, and maybe a shopping boycott would be in order too?]. I continue to believe, from personal experience, that we would have a great meeting and that none of the draconian stipulations in the contract would even come close to affecting us, but that doesn't matter if only a handful of people show up! The survey will tell us something about that, provided we get enough responses. Ole ___ Ietf mailing list Ietf@ietf.org https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf
Re: Request for community guidance on issue concerning a future meeting of the IETF
Given that one of the reasons for moving meetings out of the US was an inability to get timely visas for physical entry I find it kind of ironic that we're contemplating having a meeting in a place where there's a complete inability to get a visa for your mind. Yup - hyperbole - but I will note the set of permissible actions at this venue appears to be much more constrained than any other venue we've visited. I will also note that many if not most of the topics considered within the security area could be in violation of PRC law. We've been focusing on the free speech issues and really should be considering whether or not we have more fundamental issues. For those who have said the government is unlikely to enforce... various items, I would suggest that its not smart to knowingly violate any laws in any country. Mike At 11:42 AM 9/18/2009, Marshall Eubanks wrote: Greetings; We have received numerous suggestions and requests for an IETF meeting in China and the IAOC has been working on a potential China meeting for several years. We are now close to making a decision on a potential upcoming meeting in China. However, the following issue has arisen and we would appreciate your feedback. The Chinese government has imposed a rule on all conferences held since 2008 regarding political speech. A fundamental law in China requires that one not criticize the government. Practically, this has reference to public political statements or protest marches, which are not the IETF's custom. The government, which is a party to the issue, requires that people who attend conferences in China (the IETF being but one example) not engage in political speech during their tour in China. We consider this to be acceptable, on the basis that the IETF intends to abide by the laws of whatever nations it visits and we don't believe that this impacts our ability to do technical work. The rule is implemented in the Hotel agreement and reads (note that the Client would be the Host, and the Group would be the IETF) : Should the contents of the Group's activities, visual or audio presentations at the conference,or printed materials used at the conference (which are within the control of the Client) contain any defamation against the Government of the People's Republic of China, or show any disrespect to the Chinese culture, or violates any laws of the People's Republic of China or feature any topics regarding human rights or religion without prior approval from the Government of the People's Republic of China, the Hotel reserves the right to terminate the event on the spot and/or ask the person(s) who initiates or participates in any or all of the above action to leave the hotel premises immediately. The Client will support and assist the Hotel with the necessary actions to handle such situations. Should there be any financial loss incurred to the Hotel or damage caused to the Hotel's reputation as a result of any or all of the above acts, the Hotel will claim compensation from the Client. What does this condition mean ? The hotel staff would have, in theory, the legal right to shut down the meeting and ask the offending participants to leave the property immediately. While we do not foresee a situation where such action would take place, we feel that it is proper to disclose these conditions to the community. The members of the IAOC, speaking as individuals, do not like this condition as a matter of principle. The IAOC does believe that this condition would not prevent the IETF from conducting its business. We note that the Vancouver/Quebec survey conducted earlier this year asked for people to suggest venues in Asia; an overwhelming majority (94%) of those who mentioned China were in favor of having a meeting there. We are therefore asking for input from the community by two means - by commenting on the IETF discussion list, and also by completing a very short survey on people's intentions to travel to China, or not, subject to these conditions. This survey can be found here : https://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=h4DUkRUOdG_2bVLqioPcYYHw_3d_3d All responses received by October 1, 2009 at 9:00 AM EDT (1300 UTC) will be considered by the IAOC in making its decision. We appreciate the assistance of the community in providing us with data that will help us to make an informed decision. Regards Marshall Eubanks (acting for the IAOC) ___ IETF-Announce mailing list ietf-annou...@ietf.org https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf-announce ___ Ietf mailing list Ietf@ietf.org https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf
Revision 3
Hello, There has been several long threads over the last few months about IETF issues. Some of the viewpoints may be read as philosophical disagreements about how the IETF should do its thing. Postel apparently edited a series of reports called Request for Comments or RFC for short. These seem to be one of the principal means by which the technology of the Internet has been documented, and also, as nearly as I can tell, a lot of its culture. Some people view RFCs as the main brand of the IETF. I'll postulate that what makes the IETF is not the RFC Series even though a lot of its culture is documented in them. The brand of the IETF is the Internet Standards Process. It is much more than a process to publish RFCs. The goals of the Internet Standards Process are: - technical excellence; - prior implementation and testing; - clear, concise, and easily understood documentation; - openness and fairness; and - timeliness. The Process is based on procedures that are designed to be fair, open, and objective; and to be flexible. The Process allows for open participation; any person can voice out their opinion and that opinion bears the same weight as any other. The strength of the IETF is that it favors the individual; the IETF does not have members or corporate members. There are well-known companies that participate in the IETF. The IETF does not publish standards; it publishes an ASCII document which is a record of the consensus at a given time. That record, generally a derivative work based upon it, only becomes an Internet Standard through an evolution with the Internet community deploying the specification. If you want to do this thing, this is the description of how to do it. It does not imply any attempt by the IETF to mandate its use, or any attempt to police its usage - only that if you say that you are doing this according to this standard, do it this way Over the years, there has been a special class of RFCs that preempts other RFCs. Some of them can be viewed as forward-looking. For example, there is a proposal to create a new revenue source for the IETF by selling naming rights in IETF protocols that has the consensus of the community. The IAOC will definitely not be able to implement that proposal. The procedures and policies used internally are based on process agility. Most decisions are based on judgement calls instead of a stoic process. They favor the consensus instead of proclamations from the mountain top. The IETF favors free speech; not the kind defined for use within geographical boundaries. Critics of the IETF have their say. That doesn't imply that IETF participants have a licence for abuse. There are heated and even passionate technical debates. Free speech within the IETF, by virtue, is not based a national political system. After all, the goal is to make the Internet work better. What follows can be considered as pure speculation. The values that keeps the mission on course is the commitment to openness and fairness. This implies transparency and actions that are publicly justifiable. The writing is already on the wall but it have been ignored. There is enough evidence to build a case. If any of the IETF (or related) bodies wants to claim a layer violation, it can always do so. But that won't make the problem go away. If there is a meltdown the IETF might accept a leveraged buy-out to preserve the Internet Standards Process or at the very least the RFC Series. Please do not conflate the content of this message with the one from the thread of the week. It doesn't even contain a rough sketch for a Boston Tea Party*. Regards, -sm * Sweet seventeen ___ Ietf mailing list Ietf@ietf.org https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf
Re: Request for community guidance on issue concerning a future meeting of the IETF
Robert Elz wrote: If the effect of that were to cause attendance at some site to be so low that useful work was impossible, then the chances of a future meeting there would be negligible - and that's the one thing that the IETF (or IAOC or whoever) should consider Robert, Trying to follow up on Ted Tso's very reasonable comments... You are suggesting an evaluation model that would cause going to a place that resulted in poor attendance and other problems during the meeting, thereby seriously damaging the effectiveness of that meeting. If we believe the incremental cost and utility of a single meeting is small, then this is a reasonable model. If instead we know that costs are quite high -- as they are -- and we believe that each meeting should be treated as strategically important, then we should not be so cavalier in taking risks with their success. d/ ps. I quite like Pete's suggestion to simply cross off the problematic section of text. However, since it is really the host -- that is, a Chinese group -- and not us signing the thing, I suspect this approach has its own problems. -- Dave Crocker Brandenburg InternetWorking bbiw.net ___ Ietf mailing list Ietf@ietf.org https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf
Re: Request for community guidance on issue concerning a future meeting of the IETF
The Chinese government has imposed a rule on all conferences held since 2008 regarding political speech. A fundamental law in China requires that one not criticize the government. Practically, this has reference to public political statements or protest marches, which are not the IETF's custom. The government, which is a party to the issue, requires that people who attend conferences in China (the IETF being but one example) not engage in political speech during their tour in China. We consider this to be acceptable, on the basis that the IETF intends to abide by the laws of whatever nations it visits and we don't believe that this impacts our ability to do technical work. The rule is implemented in the Hotel agreement and reads (note that the Client would be the Host, and the Group would be the IETF) : Should the contents of the Group's activities, visual or audio presentations at the conference,or printed materials used at the conference (which are within the control of the Client) contain any defamation against the Government of the People's Republic of China, or show any disrespect to the Chinese culture, or violates any laws of the People's Republic of China or feature any topics regarding human rights or religion without prior approval from the Government of the People's Republic of China, the Hotel reserves the right to terminate the event on the spot and/or ask the person(s) who initiates or participates in any or all of the above action to leave the hotel premises immediately. The Client will support and assist the Hotel with the necessary actions to handle such situations. Should there be any financial loss incurred to the Hotel or damage caused to the Hotel's reputation as a result of any or all of the above acts, the Hotel will claim compensation from the Client. What does this condition mean ? The hotel staff would have, in theory, the legal right to shut down the meeting and ask the offending participants to leave the property immediately. While we do not foresee a situation where such action would take place, we feel that it is proper to disclose these conditions to the community. It's not entirely clear to me what these conditions mean, so maybe it's worth trying to parse them a bit. ISTM that there are a bunch of potential questions about their interpretation: 1. What materials are covered under this? This could include any of [in roughly descending order of officialness]: (a) Materials printed in the program [Do we have a program?] (b) Materials presented by IETF management (IAB, IESG, etc.) (c) Speech by IETF management (d) Materials presented by WG participants (e) Speech by WG participants 2. What exactly is covered by the restriction on any defamation against the Government of the People's Republic of China, or show any disrespect to the Chinese culture, or violates any laws of the People's Republic of China or feature any topics regarding human rights or religion? 3. What recourse, if any, do we have if the hotel staff judge that the lines above have been crossed? 4. What, if anything, is the IETF on the hook for if the conference is cancelled? None of these seem entirely clear from the text above. In the maximal (and most worrisome) interpretation, the hotel staff, in their sole discretion, could choose to cancel the entire IETF because a single WG participant says something about Taiwan in the course of a WG discussion. If that's in fact the controlling interpretation, then that seems distinctly problematic. Is it really that bad? Let's take a deeper look at each term: 1. The materials covered are specified as: Should the contents of the Group's activities, visual or audio presentations at the conference,or printed materials used at the conference (which are within the control of the Client) Except for the final parenthetical, this seems to include all of (a)-(e). The relevant question then becomes what the meaning of the final parenthetical is, and in particular, who the Client is. I suppose one could argue that the Client is just IASA and so all that's relevant is presentations from IAOC (or more liberally from the I*). However, if you argue that the client is IETF then clearly the IETF management *could* control what people present (E.g., require pre-clearance of slides) and say (by cutting off the microphones). So, I don't think this is particularly clear. It doesn't seem to me that we would really have much of an argument that presentations at the plenary aren't within the control of the Client, however. That said, I think the natural interpretation is that anything that's on the agenda falls into this category--if people want to interpret it differently, we should get a legal opinion to that effect--or better yet, get the terms modified to make it clear. 2. The offensive topics are described as: [1] any defamation against the
Re: Request for community guidance on issue concerning a future meeting of the IETF
The choice is between engaging and not engaging. Engaging is better. Not engaging isn't constructive. The Internet and the IETF are all about engaging, expanding, communicating and being open. Much of this dialog has been worried about possible extreme situations. Let's focus on the center. More than a billion people live in China and their use of the Internet is expanding rapidly. They are building much of the technology and contributing technically. It's to everyone's advantage to have comfortable, constructive interaction. Our first slogan was Networks Bring People Together. If you prefer to focus on the negatives, here's my analysis: If we don't go to China, we have charted a downhill course and the rest of the world will come together without us. The IETF will lose relevance. If we do go to China and something bad happens, the consequences will be much worse for China than for the IETF. The work of the IETF will suffer a bit, but we'll recover quickly enough. However, China's quest for engagement with the rest of the world will be hurt more seriously. Bottom line: We should go to China with a positive attitude. We're robust enough to deal with any consequences. If we don't go to China, however, we have weakened ourselves. Steve ___ Ietf mailing list Ietf@ietf.org https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf
RE: Request for community guidance on issue concerning a future meeting of the IETF
Hi, I support this view. Furthermore I believe that even though people are allowed to have their opinions about a specific country politics or values the IETF is not the place to bring them forward regardless of the meeting location. The IETF is a technical body and not the UN. Roni Even -Original Message- From: ietf-boun...@ietf.org [mailto:ietf-boun...@ietf.org] On Behalf Of Steve Crocker Sent: Saturday, September 19, 2009 10:56 PM To: IETF Discussion; IAOC IAOC Subject: Re: Request for community guidance on issue concerning a future meeting of the IETF The choice is between engaging and not engaging. Engaging is better. Not engaging isn't constructive. The Internet and the IETF are all about engaging, expanding, communicating and being open. Much of this dialog has been worried about possible extreme situations. Let's focus on the center. More than a billion people live in China and their use of the Internet is expanding rapidly. They are building much of the technology and contributing technically. It's to everyone's advantage to have comfortable, constructive interaction. Our first slogan was Networks Bring People Together. If you prefer to focus on the negatives, here's my analysis: If we don't go to China, we have charted a downhill course and the rest of the world will come together without us. The IETF will lose relevance. If we do go to China and something bad happens, the consequences will be much worse for China than for the IETF. The work of the IETF will suffer a bit, but we'll recover quickly enough. However, China's quest for engagement with the rest of the world will be hurt more seriously. Bottom line: We should go to China with a positive attitude. We're robust enough to deal with any consequences. If we don't go to China, however, we have weakened ourselves. Steve ___ Ietf mailing list Ietf@ietf.org https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf ___ Ietf mailing list Ietf@ietf.org https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf
Re: Request for community guidance on issue concerning a future meeting of the IETF
Roni Even wrote: I support this view. Furthermore I believe that even though people are allowed to have their opinions about a specific country politics or values the IETF is not the place to bring them forward regardless of the meeting location. The IETF is a technical body and not the UN. Unfortunately (or maybe not) national regulatory policies do have some influence on what the IETF does and one hopes that what the IETF does has some influence on national regulatory policies. I think the likelihood of there being a problem seems low, but still, it's hard not to wonder about something like the Raven process and how that particularly boisterous meeting (Washington?) would have fared in China. Melinda ___ Ietf mailing list Ietf@ietf.org https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf
RE: Request for community guidance on issue concerning a future meeting of the IETF
Michael StJohns wrote: Given that one of the reasons for moving meetings out of the US was an inability to get timely visas for physical entry I find it kind of ironic that we're contemplating having a meeting in a place where there's a complete inability to get a visa for your mind. Yup - hyperbole - but I will note the set of permissible actions at this venue appears to be much more constrained than any other venue we've visited. I will also note that many if not most of the topics considered within the security area could be in violation of PRC law. We've been focusing on the free speech issues and really should be considering whether or not we have more fundamental issues. For those who have said the government is unlikely to enforce... various items, I would suggest that its not smart to knowingly violate any laws in any country. I too was struck by the irony of trading one set of visa issues for another ... While I agree one should not intentionally violate any laws of the visited country, my concern with this condition is that I might lose my ability to acquire a visa in the future due to the stupid actions of someone else. I don't recall the questions on the PRC visa application, but I know that a frequent question on visa app forms is something to the effect of have you ever been denied access, or asked to leave the country. I am willing to deal with the consequences of my own actions, but I am not sure I want to risk my future livelihood over someone else's desire for 15 minutes of fame. I have been to Beijing/Shanghai/Guangzhou/HK many times over the last 7 years, and I can't see jeopardizing the ability to conduct future business there given the strongly held viewpoints of many IETF attendees, so it is not clear to me that I would attend under that condition. I would be happy to participate in normal IETF business there, as there are contributors that deserve the same locality considerations that the rest of the group is given. If there were some way to make it clear that any issues were personal actions, which probably means not scheduling a plenary to invite a group discussion which may go south, I would be less concerned about attending. Beyond that, I do agree with Mike that we need to take a close look at the WGs which have problematic agendas in such an environment. It is not about how we interpret the content of the discussions, it is how the local officials would interpret it. Unless someone fairly high up in the national government is willing to bless the topics in advance, and strong-arm any local enforcement that is looking to make a name for themselves, I don't think it makes sense to even bother scheduling them to meet. Tony Mike At 11:42 AM 9/18/2009, Marshall Eubanks wrote: Greetings; We have received numerous suggestions and requests for an IETF meeting in China and the IAOC has been working on a potential China meeting for several years. We are now close to making a decision on a potential upcoming meeting in China. However, the following issue has arisen and we would appreciate your feedback. The Chinese government has imposed a rule on all conferences held since 2008 regarding political speech. A fundamental law in China requires that one not criticize the government. Practically, this has reference to public political statements or protest marches, which are not the IETF's custom. The government, which is a party to the issue, requires that people who attend conferences in China (the IETF being but one example) not engage in political speech during their tour in China. We consider this to be acceptable, on the basis that the IETF intends to abide by the laws of whatever nations it visits and we don't believe that this impacts our ability to do technical work. The rule is implemented in the Hotel agreement and reads (note that the Client would be the Host, and the Group would be the IETF) : Should the contents of the Group's activities, visual or audio presentations at the conference,or printed materials used at the conference (which are within the control of the Client) contain any defamation against the Government of the People's Republic of China, or show any disrespect to the Chinese culture, or violates any laws of the People's Republic of China or feature any topics regarding human rights or religion without prior approval from the Government of the People's Republic of China, the Hotel reserves the right to terminate the event on the spot and/or ask the person(s) who initiates or participates in any or all of the above action to leave the hotel premises immediately. The Client will support and assist the Hotel with the necessary actions to handle such situations. Should there be any financial loss incurred to the Hotel or damage caused to the Hotel's reputation as a result of any or all of the above acts, the Hotel will claim
RE: Request for community guidance on issue concerning a future meeting of the IETF
Melinda, I see a difference between addressing requirements for protocol that address national regulatory services and voicing an opinion about national regulatory policies. I also noticed that the issues raised on the mailing list were wider than national regulatory services Roni Even -Original Message- From: Melinda Shore [mailto:melinda.sh...@gmail.com] Sent: Sunday, September 20, 2009 1:01 AM To: Roni Even Cc: 'Steve Crocker'; 'IETF Discussion'; 'IAOC IAOC' Subject: Re: Request for community guidance on issue concerning a future meeting of the IETF Roni Even wrote: I support this view. Furthermore I believe that even though people are allowed to have their opinions about a specific country politics or values the IETF is not the place to bring them forward regardless of the meeting location. The IETF is a technical body and not the UN. Unfortunately (or maybe not) national regulatory policies do have some influence on what the IETF does and one hopes that what the IETF does has some influence on national regulatory policies. I think the likelihood of there being a problem seems low, but still, it's hard not to wonder about something like the Raven process and how that particularly boisterous meeting (Washington?) would have fared in China. Melinda ___ Ietf mailing list Ietf@ietf.org https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf
Re: [IAOC] Request for community guidance on issue concerning a future meeting of the IETF
Speaking just for myself, I agree with Steve. I think it that is better to engage than to retreat. Nothing is certain, but I also think that it is highly likely that we would have a good meeting. Regards Marshall On Sep 19, 2009, at 3:55 PM, Steve Crocker wrote: The choice is between engaging and not engaging. Engaging is better. Not engaging isn't constructive. The Internet and the IETF are all about engaging, expanding, communicating and being open. Much of this dialog has been worried about possible extreme situations. Let's focus on the center. More than a billion people live in China and their use of the Internet is expanding rapidly. They are building much of the technology and contributing technically. It's to everyone's advantage to have comfortable, constructive interaction. Our first slogan was Networks Bring People Together. If you prefer to focus on the negatives, here's my analysis: If we don't go to China, we have charted a downhill course and the rest of the world will come together without us. The IETF will lose relevance. If we do go to China and something bad happens, the consequences will be much worse for China than for the IETF. The work of the IETF will suffer a bit, but we'll recover quickly enough. However, China's quest for engagement with the rest of the world will be hurt more seriously. Bottom line: We should go to China with a positive attitude. We're robust enough to deal with any consequences. If we don't go to China, however, we have weakened ourselves. Steve ___ IAOC mailing list i...@ietf.org https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/iaoc ___ Ietf mailing list Ietf@ietf.org https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf
Re: Request for community guidance on issue concerning a future meeting of the IETF
At Sat, 19 Sep 2009 15:55:55 -0400, Steve Crocker wrote: The choice is between engaging and not engaging. Engaging is better. Not engaging isn't constructive. The Internet and the IETF are all about engaging, expanding, communicating and being open. Much of this dialog has been worried about possible extreme situations. Let's focus on the center. More than a billion people live in China and their use of the Internet is expanding rapidly. They are building much of the technology and contributing technically. It's to everyone's advantage to have comfortable, constructive interaction. Our first slogan was Networks Bring People Together. If you prefer to focus on the negatives, here's my analysis: If we don't go to China, we have charted a downhill course and the rest of the world will come together without us. The IETF will lose relevance. If we do go to China and something bad happens, the consequences will be much worse for China than for the IETF. The work of the IETF will suffer a bit, but we'll recover quickly enough. However, China's quest for engagement with the rest of the world will be hurt more seriously. Bottom line: We should go to China with a positive attitude. We're robust enough to deal with any consequences. If we don't go to China, however, we have weakened ourselves. I'm not necessarily disagreeing with this analysis, but I'm not sure it's a complete analysis. We've been offered a deal under certain terms that at least some of the community aren't comfortable with. Now, it might well be true that it's better to take those terms than not if those were the only two options, but that's not the case here. In particular, we can refuse to take those terms now and instead attempt to negotiate for terms that we find more acceptable. It seems to me that even under the analysis you've laid out that's a superior course of action. -Ekr ___ Ietf mailing list Ietf@ietf.org https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf
Re: Request for community guidance on issue concerning a future meeting of the IETF
It might be helpful to avoid responses of the form At least the Chinese will be able to attend, whereas they couldn't get visas into the U.S. or Yeah? Well, the U.S. has human rights problems, too! This is not a competition between the U.S. and China. There are two hundred other countries where international conferences can be held. -- Doug Ewell | Thornton, Colorado, USA | http://www.ewellic.org RFC 5645, 4645, UTN #14 | ietf-languages @ http://is.gd/2kf0s ___ Ietf mailing list Ietf@ietf.org https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf
Re: Request for community guidance on issue concerning a future meeting of the IETF
Eric, Speaking not on behalf of the IAOC, but as an individual attendee who has also attended a couple of Internet-related meetings in China: You raise a number of good questions. Unfortunately, since the wording was dictated by a branch of the Chinese government I see little hope in it either being revised or further clarified. I view the entire thing as a warning sign that certain activities are not allowed [just like we have signs that say violators may be prosecuted]. The broadness of these statements I am sure is deliberate. In a more recent message you said: In particular, we can refuse to take those terms now and instead attempt to negotiate for terms that we find more acceptable. I very much doubt that we have any way to negotiate with the Chinese government on this. But back to the specifics: I don't think the rules were written with a group like the IETF in mind. I also don't think, in fact I am pretty certain, that the hotel staff would be the ones who decide to shut down the meeting or take other action. I am sure what would happen, in practice, is that the *local host* would intervene, warn the offender and that would probably be the end of it. This assumes there was ever anything for the hotel or host to complain about in the first place which is something I also doubt, unless someone in our community decides that they want to push the boundaries and prove a point. That is frankly my ONLY worry about this matter. The Chinese government is, by now, well aware of what a typical IETF meeting looks like and would not have granted permission for the meeting to take place if they expected us to stage a political rally, but just in case we should be so inclined, there is a set of rules spelled out (albeit broadly) in the text we are discussing. I assure you that there is no intention to have WG materials pre-screened or anything of the sort, heck they're never ready on time anyway ;-) And I honestly do not think that anyone should plan on being more careful than usual about what they say in general WG discussions or plenaries. The meeting should be like any other IETF meeting in terms of content. So, we can do what Steve Crocker suggests, go to China with a positive attitude or stay home and wonder what might have happened. Ole On Sat, 19 Sep 2009, Eric Rescorla wrote: It's not entirely clear to me what these conditions mean, so maybe it's worth trying to parse them a bit. ISTM that there are a bunch of potential questions about their interpretation: 1. What materials are covered under this? This could include any of [in roughly descending order of officialness]: (a) Materials printed in the program [Do we have a program?] (b) Materials presented by IETF management (IAB, IESG, etc.) (c) Speech by IETF management (d) Materials presented by WG participants (e) Speech by WG participants 2. What exactly is covered by the restriction on any defamation against the Government of the People's Republic of China, or show any disrespect to the Chinese culture, or violates any laws of the People's Republic of China or feature any topics regarding human rights or religion? 3. What recourse, if any, do we have if the hotel staff judge that the lines above have been crossed? 4. What, if anything, is the IETF on the hook for if the conference is cancelled? [snip] ___ Ietf mailing list Ietf@ietf.org https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf
RE: Request for community guidance on issue concerning a future meeting of the IETF
On Sun, 2009-09-20 at 00:48 +0300, Roni Even wrote: The IETF is a technical body and not the UN. What more needs to be said? Please stay on track for the sake of the IETF itself. Richard Golodner ___ Ietf mailing list Ietf@ietf.org https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf
RE: [IAOC] Request for community guidance on issue concerning a future meeting of the IETF
If by engage you mean continue to discuss the terms of having a meeting in China, then I agree. If the government there really wants to host an IETF meeting, they should be able to help changes these terms to focus on individuals and not the entire event or organization. But to suggest that without holding a meeting in China the IETF does not engage its Chinese members, that is simply false. Personally, I doubt I will be attending a meeting in China. Not because of any political reasons, but simply because the cost of such a meeting compared to the value it brings my employer (that is attending a meeting, not general IETF participation). My concerns are having access to the meeting via IRC and voice streams and not having to worry about where the meeting it taking place. I think bad behavior is more likely from people participating from outside China than at the event. And if all it takes to shut down such channels is someone saying something about Tibet on the IRC channel, then that's simply not acceptable. EHL -Original Message- From: ietf-boun...@ietf.org [mailto:ietf-boun...@ietf.org] On Behalf Of Marshall Eubanks Sent: Saturday, September 19, 2009 3:17 PM To: Steve Crocker Cc: IAOC IAOC; IETF Discussion Subject: Re: [IAOC] Request for community guidance on issue concerning a future meeting of the IETF Speaking just for myself, I agree with Steve. I think it that is better to engage than to retreat. Nothing is certain, but I also think that it is highly likely that we would have a good meeting. Regards Marshall On Sep 19, 2009, at 3:55 PM, Steve Crocker wrote: The choice is between engaging and not engaging. Engaging is better. Not engaging isn't constructive. The Internet and the IETF are all about engaging, expanding, communicating and being open. Much of this dialog has been worried about possible extreme situations. Let's focus on the center. More than a billion people live in China and their use of the Internet is expanding rapidly. They are building much of the technology and contributing technically. It's to everyone's advantage to have comfortable, constructive interaction. Our first slogan was Networks Bring People Together. If you prefer to focus on the negatives, here's my analysis: If we don't go to China, we have charted a downhill course and the rest of the world will come together without us. The IETF will lose relevance. If we do go to China and something bad happens, the consequences will be much worse for China than for the IETF. The work of the IETF will suffer a bit, but we'll recover quickly enough. However, China's quest for engagement with the rest of the world will be hurt more seriously. Bottom line: We should go to China with a positive attitude. We're robust enough to deal with any consequences. If we don't go to China, however, we have weakened ourselves. Steve ___ IAOC mailing list i...@ietf.org https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/iaoc ___ Ietf mailing list Ietf@ietf.org https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf ___ Ietf mailing list Ietf@ietf.org https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf
Re: Request for community guidance on issue concerning a future meeting of the IETF
On Saturday 19 September 2009 15:55:55 Steve Crocker wrote: The choice is between engaging and not engaging. Engaging is better. Not engaging isn't constructive. Thank you. I wanted to say this, but could not find the right words. I fully agree with Steve Crocker. In the long run, exposure to and participation in the IETF might even prove beneficial to the Chinese. Thanks, Simon -- DNS64 open-source -- http://ecdysis.viagenie.ca STUN/TURN server-- http://numb.viagenie.ca vCard 4.0 -- http://www.vcarddav.org ___ Ietf mailing list Ietf@ietf.org https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf
Re: path forward with RFC 3932bis
Hi Jari, On 2009-09-19 20:34, Jari Arkko wrote: Here's the problem I see with draft-housley-iesg-rfc3932bis-09. You responded before I had a chance to explain what the rationale and options are. Sorry, but I was asleep at the time the draft came out :-) I knew that this timezone must have an advantage once in a while ;-) Please see my other mail. I think my comment still applies - it should be the IESG that appeals against the Editor's final decision, not the other way round. Brian ___ Ietf mailing list Ietf@ietf.org https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf
