Subject: Re: [Manycouches] Make an all-virtual IETF meeting a 24 hour affair

From: Michael Richardson <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 27 Feb 2020 09:35:28 -0500

Top-quoting.

The major thing that the in-person physical meeting does is to cause a
forcing function to select which timezone is "day".
The 1-1-1-* pattern spreads the pain of who is forced to rotate their
biological clocks, and who gets a free pass.

For me, the 3-hr change from EST5EDT to PST8PDT is way easier than the 12hr
switch to Bangkok or Singapore time.  In addition, I know months in advance
what the the time zone of the destination is, and if I can afford the time, I
can even add transition time to the trip.  In some ways, I regard the Saturday
Hackathon as a kind of group timezone adjustment process.

We already have many WG session conflicts (particularly among those to who
IoT security), and it seems on the surface that spreading the sessions out
over 24h rather than 9h would help with that.   But, the problem I have with
this proposal is that it will not result many people being forced to be awake
for long periods of time.

If we need to have a forcing function like a specific meeting "week" (there
is a big if here), I would rather that an all-virtual interim was extended to
be a 2 week event, spreading sessions over a larger time period.

Either we agree, via 1-1-1 what time period is "day", or we agree that each
day will advance by 1 or 2 hours (westward is probably easier) as to what is
day.  Over 12 days (Monday, to week Friday), we progress around the world
if we do 2-hour precessions, causing everyone equal pain, and returning
everyone to where they started.  The 1-1-1 can determine "day" for the first
Monday if we like.  Put the Hackathon on Sat/Sun in between, if such a thing
still makes sense for an all-virtual.

I am of the opinion that we are better off having each WG do it's own virtual
interim schedule.  The 10am EST slot (7am PST, 16:00 CET, 23:00 Beijing,
sorry to Australia and NZ) is a coveted time, and there are enough days in
the year that every WG could have some of it.

The all-virtual meeting would be reduced to a few plenary-type sessions
(including *dispatch, saag, and some hallway track, perhaps via whatever
SecondLife has turned into)

We also discussed on this list the concept of a ML discussion time-limiter
that evened out the volume.  It would be nice to turn this into an I-D, or
rather, an mailman-enhancement RFP.

Andrew G. Malis <[email-masked]> wrote:
    > There have been a number of comments that an all-virtual IETF meeting
    > would be difficult for some set of attendees due to time zone shifting
    > while they're in their home time zone. While it's impossible to hold a
    > particular WG session that works for ALL attendees around the world,
    > let the WG chairs choose, for each WG, what time out of the 24-hour
    > clock works for the majority of their active participants. It'll be up
    > to the WG chairs to figure that out for each WG, with the approval of
    > the relevant AD. But there's no reason why all of the WGs need to meet
    > during the same "daylight" hours if the meeting is all virtual. WGs
    > could also have multiple sessions optimized for different parts of the
    > world, to spread the pain. Just a thought ....

--
Michael Richardson <[email-masked]>, Sandelman Software Works
 -= IPv6 IoT consulting =-

---

From: Stephen Farrell <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 27 Feb 2020 14:54:50 +0000

Hiya,

> be a 2 week event, spreading sessions over a larger time period.

I guess one could try play with previous IETF meeting
agendas to see how they might look after applying various
algorithms/approaches. Those're downloadable as ICS files
(e.g. [1]) but I've no idea if there are any tools for
playing with those in the way one might wanna, or with
something that can be derived from an ICS. Anyone know?

S.

[1] https://datatracker.ietf.org/meeting/105/agenda.ics

---

From: Vittorio Bertola <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 27 Feb 2020 16:22:49 +0100 (CET)

> Il 27/02/2020 15:35 Michael Richardson <[email-masked]> ha scritto:
> 

I think that first you have to address the question: do we need an "IETF meeting" at all, and if so, why?

Certainly you could just spread a few annual online WG meetings throughout the year, in different days and weeks for each WG, and this would indeed have practical advantages. But IMHO that could also kill the "sense of community", which is what springs from seeing each other in person a few times per year, and doing so also outside of pure work, i.e. at socials, meals etc., and sharing a sense of "I belong there, I was there, we were there together" (just think of how many people proudly wear their t-shirts from past IETF meetings).

As far as I understand, IETF meetings started to happen because of the perceived need to work together in person to solve the hard issues, but have continued and flourished for decades also because of that "sense of community", which indeed contributes to the success of the organization.

This is also an effect of relatively rare, relatively far physical meetings: if you travel the world for that, it must be important. Once you get there, both you and your employer/funder are fully committed. The meeting is a natural reminder and deadline for everyone. If IETF activity becomes just one more call from the office in a random day of other calls, will people instinctively consider it less important?

So, is there still value in this "sense of community"? And could you generate it otherwise through purely online activities?

-- 
 
Vittorio Bertola | Head of Policy & Innovation, Open-Xchange
[email-masked] 
Office @ Via Treviso 12, 10144 Torino, Italy

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From: Michael Richardson <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 27 Feb 2020 17:12:48 -0500

> something that can be derived from an ICS. Anyone know?

You can use the sandbox <https://sandbox.ietf.org/> login as the secretariat,
and then reconfigure any meeting you like as a two week event.

It might take a 4K monitor to easily deal with 10 days of meeting slots, or
some small fonts, or putting up with scroll bars, but you could run the
process that the secretariat does.

---

From: Michael Richardson <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 27 Feb 2020 17:15:15 -0500

Vittorio Bertola <[email-masked]> wrote:
    > As far as I understand, IETF meetings started to happen because of the
    > perceived need to work together in person to solve the hard issues, but
    > have continued and flourished for decades also because of that "sense
    > of community", which indeed contributes to the success of the
    > organization.

    > This is also an effect of relatively rare, relatively far physical
    > meetings: if you travel the world for that, it must be important. Once
    > you get there, both you and your employer/funder are fully
    > committed. The meeting is a natural reminder and deadline for
    > everyone. If IETF activity becomes just one more call from the office
    > in a random day of other calls, will people instinctively consider it
    > less important?

    > So, is there still value in this "sense of community"? And could you
    > generate it otherwise through purely online activities?

This is why we can't give up all the in-person gatherings :-)

This list was restarted in an effort to reduce our need for in-person
meetings, not necessarily eliminate them.

Having fewer tracks with more cross-area discussion would be good.

---

From: Michael Richardson <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 27 Feb 2020 17:19:27 -0500

Kent Watsen <[email-masked]> wrote:
    > I propose moving IETF to pure-virtual *asynchronous* meetings as
    > follows:

...  This is worth trying out.

    > PROs:

    > 1) The dependence on physical travel is removed.
    > 2) The dependence on reliable broadband is removed.
    > 3) Everyone can stay comfy in their local timezones.
    > 4) Enables non-English native participants time to digest material.
    > 5) Avoids having to scale infrastructure to support synchronous attendance.
    > 6) Anything else?

    > CONs:

    > 1) In-person communication benefits are lost.
    > 2) Adhoc meetings (hallway huddles, meals, etc.) are not catered to.
    > 3) Presents an opportunity for corporate gaming (e.g., “prepared" responses)
    > 4) Ability to show off badge-stickers eliminated  ;)
    > 5) No ability to share gifts
    > 6) Anything else?

The big problem I see is that there could be a trend towards sophisticated video
production processes, with directors, cast, green-screens, CGI graphics.
But, I am still willing to try it out.