Subject: Question for the list

From: [email-masked]
Date: Wed, 12 Jun 2002 17:02:54 -0400

Hi, I have a quick, off the wall question for the list.  I'm looking for 
some tidbits and advice. 

Here's the scenario.  Say there is this group of people from the same 
organization (or it could be one person for that matter) who respond so 
agressively on the list as to appear to be a "filibuster". Note for the 
record - this is not a large, west coast organization. 8-)  We are 
experiencing just such an attack - it has now reached the stage that it 
has driven some people away from the list. 

My question is this - how do other chairs handle that?  Is there any 
special technique.  Here's what we've done so far. 

1. Asked the group on the list to "back off" (in a nice way)
2. Talked privately to members of the group at an IETF meeting asking the 
same thing
3.  Talked privately to try and determine what is the issue.

One other point, they seem to attack one person in particular.  However, 
in checking back on the list, other unlucky souls have received equal 
emphasis.

I know this goes on all the time - however, this one is getting a bit out 
of hand.  So, I'm looking for some sage advice.  thanks in advance.

---

From: Edward Lewis <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 12 Jun 2002 17:59:46 -0400

At 5:02 PM -0400 6/12/02, [email-masked] wrote:

Generally, when there is a "situation" my approach is to send a 
message that reminds the list (or class) what the ground rules for 
communication are.  Important to this message is a short mention of 
why the message is being sent at the time.

It is important to be very specific regarding the problem, the rules 
for use of the forum, and the end goal of the discussion.  It is also 
important to do this in a very santizied manner, not referring in any 
way to any of the sources of the "irritation," and especially no 
sarcastic or "tongue-in-cheek" reference to what has preceeded the 
message.

To get folks to "clean up their act" you have to distill the problem 
and explain it so all can see the foolishness that is happening. 
This must also be done in a way that makes no one "lose face" and 
shut down their willingness to participate in a healthy manner.

One thing I also do is a self-examination to see if I (as chair, 
teacher, etc.) can be blamed for the degeneration of the discussion. 
Sometimes a large volume of "nasty" messages is a result of the 
sender's losing faith in the process and those who "govern" the 
discussion.  Whether we feel that we are hands-on or hands-off the 
mailing lists, there are always participants that believe the chair 
"rules."

If non-constructive arguments persist, I look to see if perhaps there 
is something wrong with the topic of the argument itself.  It sounds 
like the offending organization values being "competitive" over 
reaching an interoperable solution.  I am drawing a drastic 
conclusion here given just a little data, but one consideration is 
that perhaps there is no way consenus will be achieved and therefore 
the WG be disbanded.

...All of these opinions are "out there" and are in no way meant to 
be recommendations nor approaches I have used in the IETF...but since 
you asked

-- 
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Edward Lewis                                          +1-703-227-9854
ARIN Research Engineer

---

From: "Theodore Ts'o" <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 12 Jun 2002 19:22:21 -0400

In addition to to all of the other excellent suggestions made on this
list, I'd like to add one additional tidbit.

One of the things which you can remind both the "attackers" and the
"victims" (and sometimes the categorization can be loose) is that one
of the powers that you have as the chair is to determine consensus,
and that consensus is *not* side which is more vocal.  A quite voice
which makes technically sound points can sometimes be worth many loud
e-mail messages.  One of the things which is within your purview as
working group chair to consider is whether or not a particular
companies appears to be "stacking the deck" in an attempt to influence
consensus.

This is of course a blunt instrument, and needs to be applied
carefully.  Also, saying this doesn't may not help prevent harsh
e-mail messages by the "attackers" from driving away the "victims".

Also, the cautions of whether or not the wg chairs may have helped
exacerbate the problem are well taken; this is especially true
whenever you need to exert your authority as wg chair to try to solve
a problem --- if you're involved, this can make the problem infinitely
worse!  (This is why I tend to try to stay out of technical debates as
much as possible, except either when I am (a) trying to summarize the
positions on both sides, in which case I try to do so as fairly as
possible, or (b) when I explicitly take off my wg chair hat, and allow
my wg chair to run things so I can actually participate in the
discussion.  But even (b) is something which I try to do rarely, only
when I think it is absolutely necessary.)

Anyway, here are my two cents.....

						- Ted

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From: Patrik Fältström <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 13 Jun 2002 18:22:42 +0200

--On 2002-06-12 17.02 -0400 [email-masked] wrote:

> My question is this - how do other chairs handle that?

Normally I (as AD, and I am your AD in this case) offer myself being the
"bad cop" while the chair can be the "good cop" and try to run the wg.

One way of sorting out the discussions themseleves, keep a list of issuse
(which you do) and do not accept any discussions or wordings which are not
explcitly constructive comments on one of the "accepted issues to discuss
this week".

Then only discuss one or max 2 things per week.

   paf