Re: participation in IETF meetings

[Pete Resnick <presnick at qualcomm.com>]

On 10/23/01 at 9:49 AM -0400, RJ Atkinson wrote:

> Many have been the meetings where folks who want to actively 
> participate in that meeting are unable to get in or unable to sit 
> down.

I'm sorry, but I really think this is a problem with the 
person/persons chairing the meeting. If you are the chair of a 
working group whose meeting room is too small, you've got some 
choices:

1. If this happened in the past, you need to ask for a bigger meeting 
room. However, I understand this is not always possible.

2. Before your WG meeting, ask on the mailing list (which all active 
participants should be reading anyway) for all people who are 
planning on attending the meeting and actively participating to send 
you a piece of e-mail. Count. When you get to the room at the 
meeting, count off that many seats in the front rows. Add 10 for 
useful IESG/IAB members. Add a bunch if you know your WG is going to 
have cross-area interest where some people will be attending who 
don't subscribe to the WG list. Cordon off the section with some 
paper signs which read "ACTIVE PARTICIPANTS ONLY". No, it won't stop 
everyone, but it will help things.

3. If people are blocking the door during the meeting, be a traffic 
cop. Go to the door and say, "If you are staying, move in to the 
opposite side of the room away from the door. Otherwise, leave." The 
area behind where the chair usually sits is a fine place to stick 
people. If it gets totally out of hand, you may have to conduct the 
meeting by standing in the door; people who are just loafing hate 
sitting right next to the chairperson anyway.

4. (Up on soapbox again) Do not allow lecture-style presentations in 
your WG meeting, or at the very least do not let anyone present 
introductory material which could be posted to the list. These kinds 
of things encourage people to come to the meeting to try to learn. 
That's not why we're having these meetings. There should be NO NEW 
INFORMATION presented at WG meetings. If at least an introduction to 
the topic has not been written up and posted to the list, discussion 
of that topic should not be allowed in the WG meeting. The content of 
a WG meeting should be without surprise.

Personally, I think this is a fine idea for BOFs too: You're posting 
an agenda before the meeting anyway; make sure any needed information 
is written up and posted before the meeting and make sure that the 
agenda has URLs for that information. Now, I understand that BOFs are 
in a somewhat different position and sometimes there's going to have 
to be presentation of new material in BOF meetings, but that needn't 
always be the case. WGs, of course, have no excuse.

pr
--
Pete Resnick <mailto:presnick at qualcomm.com>
QUALCOMM Incorporated - Direct phone: (858)651-4478, Fax: (858)651-1102