Jon Postel Re: 202210301538.AYC

Mon Oct 31 16:03:37 UTC 2022

It is believed by many that 2 terms should be the maximum for one position of any chair (if it is a democracy).
It is evidently not the case for IETF - people stay in power for decades. It is just a fact that is not possible to dispute.
Yes, Nomcom is the mechanism for AD and above. I do not want to sort out how exactly it is performed.
By the way, WG chairs have been put aside from any election mechanisms.

If any politician would manage to possess power for more than 2 terms - he would be immediately called "totalitarian".
Even if he would say that there is a mechanism for it.
Eduard
-----Original Message-----
From: Donald Eastlake [mailto:d3e3e3 at gmail.com] 
Sent: Monday, October 31, 2022 4:28 PM
To: Vasilenko Eduard <vasilenko.eduard at huawei.com>; North American Network Operators' Group <nanog at nanog.org>
Subject: Re: Jon Postel Re: 202210301538.AYC

On Mon, Oct 31, 2022 at 2:37 AM Vasilenko Eduard via NANOG <nanog at nanog.org> wrote:
>
> 1.       What is going on on the Internet is not democracy even formally, because there is no formal voting.
> 3GPP, ETSI, 802.11 have voting. IETF decisions are made by bosses who did manage to gain power (primarily by establishing a proper network of relationships).
> It could be even called “totalitarian” because IETF bosses could stay in one position for decades.

I do not see how it can be called totalitarian given the IETF Nomcom appointment and recall mechanisms. Admittedly it is not full on Sortition (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sortition) but it is just one level of indirection from Sortition. (See
https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbestechcouncil/2020/08/20/indirection-the-unsung-hero-of-software-engineering/?sh=2cc673587f47)

Thanks,
Donald

>  ...
>
> Eduard