date:20130619

Re: IETF Diversity

2013-06-19 Thread Doug Barton


On 06/19/2013 10:13 PM, Randy Presuhn wrote:

Hi -

It seems as though participants in this thread are operating
with different understandings of what constitutes "institutional
bias."  A critical difference is whether *intent* is necessary
for bias to exist.  As I understand it, institutional bias
can exist in the absence of ill intent, and can even be an
unintended consequence of efforts to *reduce* bias.


I would disagree with your definition, but that's a minor issue. I don't 
care if you want to call it a "barrier to entry," as you did later in 
your post, bias, or whatever other term is trendy atm. Personally, I 
have been explicitly addressing the issue of intent, which has rather 
strongly been hinted at, if not an accusation directly leveled.


Meanwhile, I personally have said explicitly that we can do better at 
removing the barriers to entry that unquestionably do exist, so one 
wonders what your point may be.


Most importantly however, the reason I think we need to focus more on 
positive actions around outreach and equal opportunity is that by 
focusing on "bias" we run the very real risk of making self-flagellation 
its own goal.


Doug (and its own reward)

Re: IETF Diversity

2013-06-19 Thread Randy Presuhn

Hi -

It seems as though participants in this thread are operating
with different understandings of what constitutes "institutional
bias."  A critical difference is whether *intent* is necessary
for bias to exist.  As I understand it, institutional bias
can exist in the absence of ill intent, and can even be an
unintended consequence of efforts to *reduce* bias.

If something about the way we do business makes it more difficult
for otherwise qualified individuals from some group to participate
at a given level, then we have to admit the possibility that
we have a case of institutional bias.  The available remedies
might be worse than the problem, but we shouldn't fool ourselves
into thinking that we're any better at this stuff than any other
well-meaning bunch of people, and we shouldn't pretend that
privilege doesn't exist, no matter how much that conflicts
with our self-image fantasy of being a meritocracy.  Embracing
an ideal does not mean ignoring reality.

For a hopefully non-controversial example, consider how excessively
idiomatic English, over-reliance on sports metaphors, and obscure
cultural references all serve as barriers to participation.
It doesn't matter whether I intend to exclude anyone through,
for example, my use of long sentences.  But if my long sentences
make it too much harder for others to participate, then I *am*
part of the problem, and need to think about how that effect might
be mitigated.

Randy

Re: IETF Diversity

2013-06-19 Thread Moriarty, Kathleen

Thanks, Medel.

I just wanted to clarify that my closing 'in this space' was intended for 
diversity improvements.  Getting more users, operators, and vendors involved 
will help.  Having diverse input will help us have better solutions come out of 
the WG.

Thanks,
Kathleen 


Sent from my iPhone

On Jun 20, 2013, at 11:42 AM, "GT RAMIREZ, Medel G."  
wrote:

> Kathleen,
> Thanks, well understood  indeed... I hear you.
> 
> Medel Ramirez
> Globe Telecom, Inc.
> Manila , Philippines.
> +++
> 
> 
> -Original Message-
> From: ietf-boun...@ietf.org [mailto:ietf-boun...@ietf.org] On Behalf Of
> Moriarty, Kathleen
> Sent: Thursday, June 20, 2013 12:11 AM
> To: Melinda Shore; Peter Saint-Andre
> Cc: ietf@ietf.org
> Subject: RE: IETF Diversity
> 
> A little earlier in the thread, ways to improve things came up.  I
> presented at an international conference in Bangkok this week on the
> subject area covered by MILE.  While the focus was intended to be more
> on how we can look at the problem space to make faster/more effective
> progress, standards will enable some of those activities.  The second
> half of the talk provided background on MILE, what we are trying to do
> and gave the audience a general challenge as well as had specific
> requests for help.  My last slide was on how to engage in the IETF.
> Outreach and helping people understand how they can be effective within
> the IETF may be useful for other WGs as well and could help improve
> diversity.  I had 2 requests following the talk to give the same
> presentation at other conferences and will likely do them to assist in
> this area as well as to make faster progress (and hopefully drive people
> to think about how to share information more effectively.  There are
> many opportunities for people to help in this space.  
> 
> Best regards,
> Kathleen
> 
> From: ietf-boun...@ietf.org [ietf-boun...@ietf.org] On Behalf Of Melinda
> Shore [melinda.sh...@gmail.com]
> Sent: Wednesday, June 19, 2013 12:00 PM
> To: Peter Saint-Andre
> Cc: ietf@ietf.org
> Subject: Re: IETF Diversity
> 
> On 6/19/13 7:56 AM, Peter Saint-Andre wrote:
>> Why do you believe that my opinions are unexamined? I have been 
>> thinking and reading about social, cultural, and personal change for a
> 
>> very long time.
> 
> You made an assertion that's at least a little ahistorical, you used it
> to support an argument against organizational change, and when I
> disagreed you went to the "Let's not talk about it" place.
> 
> Melinda
> 
> This e-mail message (including attachments, if any) is intended for the use 
> of the individual or the entity to whom it is addressed and may contain 
> information that is privileged, proprietary, confidential and exempt from 
> disclosure. If you are not the intended recipient, you are notified that any 
> dissemination, distribution or copying of this communication is strictly 
> prohibited. If you have received this communication in error, please notify 
> the sender and delete this E-mail message immediately.
>

RE: IETF Diversity

2013-06-19 Thread GT RAMIREZ, Medel G.

Kathleen,
Thanks, well understood  indeed... I hear you.

Medel Ramirez
Globe Telecom, Inc.
Manila , Philippines.
+++

-Original Message-
From: ietf-boun...@ietf.org [mailto:ietf-boun...@ietf.org] On Behalf Of
Moriarty, Kathleen
Sent: Thursday, June 20, 2013 12:11 AM
To: Melinda Shore; Peter Saint-Andre
Cc: ietf@ietf.org
Subject: RE: IETF Diversity

A little earlier in the thread, ways to improve things came up.  I
presented at an international conference in Bangkok this week on the
subject area covered by MILE.  While the focus was intended to be more
on how we can look at the problem space to make faster/more effective
progress, standards will enable some of those activities.  The second
half of the talk provided background on MILE, what we are trying to do
and gave the audience a general challenge as well as had specific
requests for help.  My last slide was on how to engage in the IETF.
Outreach and helping people understand how they can be effective within
the IETF may be useful for other WGs as well and could help improve
diversity.  I had 2 requests following the talk to give the same
presentation at other conferences and will likely do them to assist in
this area as well as to make faster progress (and hopefully drive people
to think about how to share information more effectively.  There are
many opportunities for people to help in this space.  

Best regards,
Kathleen

From: ietf-boun...@ietf.org [ietf-boun...@ietf.org] On Behalf Of Melinda
Shore [melinda.sh...@gmail.com]
Sent: Wednesday, June 19, 2013 12:00 PM
To: Peter Saint-Andre
Cc: ietf@ietf.org
Subject: Re: IETF Diversity

On 6/19/13 7:56 AM, Peter Saint-Andre wrote:
> Why do you believe that my opinions are unexamined? I have been 
> thinking and reading about social, cultural, and personal change for a

> very long time.

You made an assertion that's at least a little ahistorical, you used it
to support an argument against organizational change, and when I
disagreed you went to the "Let's not talk about it" place.

Melinda

This e-mail message (including attachments, if any) is intended for the use of 
the individual or the entity to whom it is addressed and may contain 
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Re: IETF Diversity

2013-06-19 Thread Doug Barton


On 06/19/2013 05:09 PM, Pete Resnick wrote:

On 6/19/13 2:47 PM, Doug Barton wrote:

On 06/19/2013 11:31 AM, Melinda Shore wrote:

Even in fields in which the overwhelming majority of
practitioners, the majority of people in leadership or
management positions are men.


So again, it's not at all clear how that relates to the IETF (given
that we don't fall into the category of "the overwhelming majority of
practitioners [are women]."


I think the point was that if organizations that have a majority of
women in the ranks have trouble getting women into leadership roles
(where one would think, ceterus paribus, women would have an easier time
moving up as against other organizations), then an organization that has
a majority male population won't fare much better unless there's some
reason to believe it is interestingly different.


Yes, Pete, I understand what the point was supposed to be. The point *I* 
am making is that unless you have a solid understanding of the 2 
populations the comparison is not only at best meaningless, it is almost 
certainly actively harmful because it leads to a short-circuit of the 
very path to understanding that is required to actually address the 
problem. I could count all of the unfounded assumptions you're making 
just in the paragraph above for you, but you're a smart guy, I'm sure 
you can take that on as a side project if you're interested.



Institutional biases in organizations are not uncommon. We almost
certainly have *some* brand of it here, whether it's Americo-centrism
(cf. SM's comments about Selma and Dan's comments about baseball),


So again, there is absolutely zero evidence that those kinds of comments 
are a form of institutional bias. The fact that people use cultural 
references that they are familiar with IS evidence that they are human, 
but you cannot extrapolate from Ted's comment (directed at Melinda who 
Ted had a reasonable belief would be familiar with it) that Ted is de 
facto biased against non-Americans. In fact, one of the things I enjoy 
about working in the I* realm is being exposed to other cultures, and 
learning a bit about their culture, idioms, humor, etc. And $DEITY 
forbid we actually achieve some of that diversity stuff, how are you 
going to react to even MORE people bringing their own cultural 
experience to bear in the IETF?!? The nerve of them!



or
one of gender. I'd be (happily) shocked if there were some reason to
believe that we're different than other organizations when it comes to
gender,


For the Nth time now, let me be clear that I do not think we have zero 
problems in this area. But "we can improve" is different from "we have a 
widespread and deep-seated problem with institutional bias." More about 
the importance of the distinction below.



but I haven't seen much to convince me we're all that different.


... remember what you said to me about anecdotes vs. data? :)


Certainly we should look for evidence of the existence and nature of any
biases that exist in our institutional practices, but given how
prevalent such biases are elsewhere, I'm not uncomfortable presuming
prima facia that we do have some and doing some things that might
(again, surprisingly to me) turn out unnecessary.


I find this perspective highly disturbing, and potentially very dangerous.


I look at women like Leslie Daigle, Allison Mankin, Margaret
Wasserman, Lynn St. Amour, Joyce Reynolds ... those are just off the
top of my head; certainly not my intention to slight anyone ... all of
whom have now, or have had significant leadership roles, and made
lasting impacts on the IETF both in its work product and culture.


As the saying goes, the plural of "anecdote" is not "data", but it might
be interesting to discuss with each of the people you noted their
experiences getting into leadership and their experiences in it.


Assuming they (and other similar folks) are willing, I agree. Just to be 
clear, I was not volunteering anyone for anything. :)



Can we (and should we) do better? Absolutely. I would love to see more
participation by different groups, nationalities, genders, etc. And I
have a vested interest here. I have a daughter who is smart as a whip,
and when it comes time for her to find a job I want to be sure that
every door is open to her.


Agree wholeheartedly.


But I also think it's possible for us to agree that we have room to
improve without constantly banging the drum that we have a deep-seated
institutional bias, especially when that point is far from proven.


Even if such a bias does not exist, it can come across a bit
self-serving to complain about the banging drum.


Agreed, which is why I have waited so long to speak up.


So someone has said
there is an institutional bias against the (minority and not in
leadership) group they are in and for the (majority and in leadership)
group you are in... No use in getting insulted or complaining about the
words used to express that perception.


Well I'm sorry to say, I actuall

Re: Fwd: [ISOC] Applications open for ISOC Fellowship to IETF 88 (Vancouver)

2013-06-19 Thread Arturo Servin


Ignore!

Wrong list. Jetlag.

my apologies,
as

Fwd: [ISOC] Applications open for ISOC Fellowship to IETF 88 (Vancouver)

2013-06-19 Thread Arturo Servin

Para los interesados.

Slds
as

 Original Message 
Subject:[ISOC] Applications open for ISOC Fellowship to IETF 88
(Vancouver)
Date:   Mon, 10 Jun 2013 20:02:37 +
From:   Steve Conte 
To: isoc-members-annou...@elists.isoc.org

Dear Colleagues,

The Internet Society has announced that it is inviting applications for
its latest Internet Society Fellowships to the IETF.  The Fellowship
programme allows engineers from emerging and developing economies to
attend an Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) meeting.

As you know, the IETF is the Internet's premier standards-making body,
responsible for the development of protocols used in IP-based networks.
IETF participants represent an international community of network
designers, operators, vendors, and researchers involved in the technical
operation of the Internet and the continuing evolution of Internet
architecture.

Fellowships will be awarded through a competitive application process.
The Internet Society is currently accepting fellowship applications for
the IETF 88 in Vancouver, Canada:

* IETF 88, November 03-08, 2013, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada

Information and links to apply can be found at:
http://www.internetsociety.org/fellows-ietf

Fellowship applications are due by 05 July 2013.

I encourage you apply or pass this information about this program to
individuals involved in your network that have a keen interest in the
Internet protocol development activities of the IETF.

The Internet Society Fellowships to the IETF are sponsored by Afilias,
SIDN, Google, Microsoft, and Verisign.

If you have questions, please do not hesitate to contact Steve Conte
.

Kind Regards,

Steve Conte

-
Steve Conte
Internet Leadership Programme
The Internet Society
co...@isoc.org

___
To manage your ISOC subscriptions or unsubscribe,
please log into the ISOC Member Portal:
https://portal.isoc.org/
Then choose Interests & Subscriptions from the My Account menu.

Re: [IETF] Re: IETF, ICANN and Whois (Was Re: Last Call: (The Internet Numbers Registry System) to Informational RFC)

2013-06-19 Thread John C Klensin

--On Wednesday, June 19, 2013 17:14 -0400 Warren Kumari
 wrote:

>>> I think this is the correct strategy, BUT, I see as a very
>>> active participant in ICANN (chair of SSAC) that work in
>>> ICANN could be easier if some "more" technical standards
>>> where developed in IETF, 
> 
> + lots.
> 
> If these are not developed in the IETF, we run the risk of
> ICANN doing technical stuff.

Risk of ICANN doing technical stuff?  You mean like the
technical details of the escrow policy and how zones are
supposed to be restored?  Or how about Label Generation Rules
for IDNs?  Or how about the existing policies about registration
data availability and what information is required?

The point, Warren (and others) is that all of these are "ICANN
doing technical stuff" and even "technical standards" in a broad
sense of that term.   Some of it is stuff that the IETF really
should not want to do (I'm tempted to say "avoid like the
plague").  Some of it probably should be here.  As an outsider
to both, there is a certain amount of stuff that has ended up in
SSAC and even RSAC that might have been better located in SAAG
or some IETF or NOG DNS operations group.  I certainly won't
argue that we've got the balance right.  And I think it is
unfortunate that the very early redesign of the original PSO had
the side effect of making it hard or impossible to work out
optimal boundaries and cross-review mechanisms with ICANN and
that we are instead having a discussion more than a dozen years
later about keeping ICANN from doing technical work or making
standards.

Let's not complicate things further by making the assumption
that anything that reasonably looks like "technical stuff"
belongs in the IETF and not in ICANN.  It is likely to just make
having the right conversations even harder.

> As someone whose time is now[0] split between ICANN and IETF,
> I can tell you something -- you[1] *really* don't want ICANN
> developing technical standard.

Sorry.  Too late.  The horse left the barn well over a decade
ago, arguably after we opened the door, led it out, and gave it
a good swat.

More broadly, there are lots of organizations I'd rather not
have developing technical standards.  In a few areas, the IETF
might even be on the list.  But stopping them would take not the
usual Protocol Police force, but the IETF Army and I don't know
where to find or how to deploy them.  Perhaps you do.  But, if
not, the best we can do is to try to figure out and describe
realistic boundaries and then try to negotiate, starting with
having good arguments about what should be done where and why.
And we should be really, really, careful about what we wish for
because a lot of the space in which ICANN operates mixes really
protocol issues with Layer 8 and 9 considerations and really
heavy-duty politics.

>> A pre-condition for that is that technical and operational
>> problem statements are formulated, which could be sent to
>> appropriate WGs or used to justify a BOF. If ICANN could
>> focus on that instead of solutionism or committeeism,
>> progress should be possible.

Sure.  Especially if ICANN could actually commit. where
appropriate, to mandate whatever comes out of that process and
then to enforce its mandates.  Of course, I would also like a
pony... or perhaps a stable-full.

> Yup. This message needs to be properly communicated though --

You mean like the requirements for variant aliases communicated
to DNSEXT and other groups?   Or did you have in mind the
registration data requirements that went to CRISP?  Or the more
recent ones that have been handed off to WEIRDS after going
through enough of an ICANN Policy Development Process that we
can be reasonably confident that the requirements are real?

Sorry, but, if we are going to have this conversation, I think
it is very important that we be both real and specific, rather
than engaging in fantasies about how things might work in the
Best of All Possible Worlds or some other alternate reality.

best,
   john

Re: IETF Diversity vs. White Male ??

2013-06-19 Thread Fred Baker (fred)

On Jun 19, 2013, at 3:57 PM, Aaron Yi DING wrote:

> Well, if the dominant ones later being replaced by other groups, do we need
> to revamp again? What will be the end?

I'm told that white babies are now a minority of the population in the US.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2341066/Whites-soon-minority-American-children-age-5.html

It's all about political correctness. It is not politically correct to comment
on women unless you are one and hate men. It is not politically correct to
comment on whatever-they're-called-this-week, black, negro, afro-americans, or
whatever. It is not politically correct to comment on hispanics, or to note
that they are not a race; they might be a culture, but for the most part they
are people who grew up outside spain but speak - or whose parents speak - some
derivative of spanish as a native language. Or Asians, for that matter. But it
is absolutely politically correct to make racist and sexist remarks - the same
remarks that would draw outrage and umbrage if made about any of a list of
other groups - about people who happen to be caucasian and male.

A conversation from the 1993 movie Gettysburg comes to mind.

Colonel Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain: Tell me something, Buster... What do you
think of Negroes?
Sergeant 'Buster' Kilrain: Well, if you mean the race, I don't really know.
This is not a thing to be ashamed of. The thing is, you cannot judge a race.
Any man who judges by the group is a pea-wit. You take men one at a time.

I would replace "man" or "men" with "person" or "people" in the observation,
and would agree with it. There are a lot of pea-wits in the world. Some of them
are white males. Many are not.

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