Subject: Re: [IAOC] Request for community guidance on issue concerning afuture meeting of the IETF

From: Cullen Jennings <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 5 Oct 2009 11:07:42 -0600

On Sep 24, 2009, at 9:43 AM, Ole Jacobsen (ole) wrote:

>
> >
> > Does your above response mean that the host would not consider
> > slides and oral presentations made during working group sessions to
> > be part of "the Group's activities, visual or audio presentations at
> > the conference"? Or does your response mean that the host is going
> > to take the risk of having the event terminated for reasons having
> > to do with slide or presentation content that was not pre-approved
> > by the government? Or does it mean that you do not think that the
> > content of working group sessions falls under the category of
> > "topics regarding human rights"?
> >
> > Thanks much.
> > Alissa
> >

Dear IAOC,

The questions from the chair of Geopriv WG which is the WG in RAI most  
likely to have problems meeting in China are fairly relevant in  
determining if we can run a "business as usual" meeting in China. I  
would greatly appreciate the IAOC reposing to them so we can plan  
appropriately.

Thank you,
Cullen <send in my RAI AD role>

---

From: Cullen Jennings <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 5 Oct 2009 11:07:51 -0600

I have done a little digging around on the questions I asked and  
thought I might summarize some of the responses I got back to my email.

More inline .... Note all the comments below do not refer to the  
"Special Administrative Regions". I strongly support Ted's suggestion  
that running the meeting in one of theses zones would eliminate the  
concerns I have raised.

On Sep 23, 2009, at 9:45 PM, Cullen Jennings (fluffy) wrote:

>
> IAOC,
>
> I'm trying to understand what is political speech in China. The
> Geopriv WG deals with protecting users' location privacy. The policies
> of more than one country have come up in geopriv meetings in very
> derogatory terms. There have been very derogatory comments made by
> people about the US's wiretap policy. Unless someone can point me at
> specifics of what is or is not OK, I would find this very concerning.
> We also regularly discuss issues around Taiwan/China, cryptography,
> wiretap, DNS root server location, reverse engineering, and so on.
> Clearly most the people involved with IETF would never want to break
> the laws of the country they are visiting but the question is do we
> actually understand the laws and what impact do they have on our
> technical work? To help us make informed decision about whether these
> terms are issues or not:
>
> 1) What is political speech in China? And can we explain that to IETF
> participants well enough that they know what is OK and what is not.
>

Got a few reposes to this - none very solid but they seemed generally  
along the lines of "If you are looking for something crisp, forget it"
>
> 2) Are there any special rules about publishing and broadcasting? I
> note that the IETF, unlike most other groups having meetings,
> broadcasts the meetings live over the internet, which will be both
> publishing the material and exporting it outside of the PRC.
>

Got answer from non legal person of yes you need a license for this  
but they could not point me to the actually regulations. Still hoping  
to get a better answer. Hs the IAOC got legal advice on this?

>
> 3) Are there any rules around discussion, publication, or export of of
> cryptography algorithms and technology? publishing weaknesses of
> national crypto algorithms?
>

The advice I got was that unless we got a license if the IETF  
developed crypto in China and we exported it out, then this would be  
illegal in PRC. It was pointed out PRC is not part of  Wassenaar  
Arrangement. I was advised our broadcasts of and export of minutes  
from meetings would be "Deemed Export". It seems pretty hard to argue  
that the IETF does not develop any crypto.  Has the IAOC received any  
legal advice on this?
>
> 4) Many of our participants use communications products (like jabber
> clients) that they helped develop and include strong cryptography. Do
> they need permission to use these in China?
>

One person with what I view as a reasonable background in PRC law told  
me this would be illegal and violate State Council Order No. 273,  
"Commercial Use Password Management Regulations" among other things.  
The "clarification letter" does not seem to change this. It seems this  
would be illegal there without a license. Has the IAOC received legal  
advice on how this  impacts us.

>
> 5) When discussing what I think of as technical issues, many
> participants regularly treat Taiwan and PRC as two different countries
> and currently recognize both of them as separate countries in their
> own right. I'd actually venture a guess that there is strong IETF
> consensus they should be treated this way.  Could any discussions like
> this be viewed as political speech? What are the rules on this?
>
Still gathering data on this one. If you know something, let me know.  
I heard a rumor that on our registration form, when we asked what  
country you are from, we would not be allowed to ask Taiwan or PRC.  
Does anyone know any truth value to this rumor?

>
> 6) It is not core to IETF work but some of us do some interop of
> running code for IETF protocols under development sometimes at IETF.
> This would be about the right timing for running P2PSIP code, but that
> requires us to to run a local CA. Is any special permission needed to
> run a CA in China?
>

A license is needed to run a CA in PRC. What we normally do would be  
illegal there.

>
> 7) Would we be OK running a BOF on techniques for firewall advancement
> in general and in particular on getting around any firewalls China
> runs? [Seriously, you know someone will propose this BOF, the
> questions is could we run it or not?]
>

Answer I got was discussion of security policies of PRC's firewall and  
methods to get around it would definitely not be OK to discuss. Two of  
the many problems would be:

1) this is defamatory towards the state agency that run the firewalls
2) this could be considered release of state secrets

Answer seemed pretty solid that this topic was not one that most  
people would consider a really bad idea to discuss in PRC.

>
> 8) Given the Chairs for WG set the agendas and such, I am assuming
> that a reasonable person would consider all the presentation done by
> presenters at the front of the room to be things that are under
> control of the client. Is this the assumption the IAOC is working
> under too?
>
>
> 9) What is the IETF's potential liability here. If the meeting was
> canceled on Monday, everyone checked out of hotels early and paid a
> one day change fee, would the IETF be responsible for the hotel's loss
> of revenue for the Wednesday through Friday nights?
>
> 10) If the meeting is canceled, will the IETF be reimbursing the
> registration fees?
>
> 11) Given the IETF would be depending on the actions of the
> participants of the meeting to meet the contract, it would seem very
> prudent to me to make sure that each participant agreed to this. Will
> you be asking each participant to sign an agreement agreeing to these
> terms?
>
>
Really love to hear the IAOC thoughts on this one ....

> 12) Do you all feel like you need a beer yet?
>
> I'm trying to get to the bottom about what is legal and what is not in
> the PRC.  Ignorance is not an excuse for the law in any country and
> when I don't know if something is legal or not, I don't do it.
>
As an interesting side note, it seems that some people think that many  
of these things are officially illegal but they are fine to do anyway  
because other meetings are doing them etc. This is not a position I  
share and more importantly, it is not a position where I am willing to  
ask our WG Chairs, authors, and other volunteers to do something  
illegal because it will all be fine. Even if there are no short term  
consequences, I can imagine a case where 10 years later someone is  
seeking security clearance and this comes back to bite them.

> Right
> now I am looking for input from knowledgeable people on these
> questions. I imagine the IAOC has looked into many of these and would
> appreciate understanding what you have found.
>
> Thanks, Cullen
>
>
>

The answer I have got are very disturbing from a legal point of view.  
I believe the IAOC has received requirements front the IESG around the  
minimum things needed for a meeting.  For the IAOC to understand if  
they can meet these requirements, I believe IAOC needs to get legal  
advice from a PRC lawyer around if the questions I am asking about  
certain discussions being legal or not in PRC and make the results of  
that advice public. Anything less would be in my view a failure of  
their fiduciary responsibilities. The advice I have gotten so far has  
not been advice from definite experts that I am sure is correct so I  
am hesitant to rely on it too strongly but so far it has indicated  
that some of  these things all are  not legal in the PRC but clearly  
the IAOC should get to the bottom of this before making a decision and  
inform the community of what they learn so that individual can make  
informed decisions about their own attendance.

---

From: Cullen Jennings <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 5 Oct 2009 12:30:11 -0600

On Oct 5, 2009, at 11:53 AM, John C Klensin wrote:

> Cullen,
>
> For purposes of discussion, one comment below and one addition
> to your list...
>
> --On Monday, October 05, 2009 11:07 -0600 Cullen Jennings
> <[email-masked]> wrote:
>
> > I have done a little digging around on the questions I asked
> > and thought I might summarize some of the responses I got back
> > to my email.
>
> >...
> >> 3) Are there any rules around discussion, publication, or
> >> export of of cryptography algorithms and technology?
> >> publishing weaknesses of national crypto algorithms?
> >>
> >
> > developed crypto in China and we exported it out, then this
> > would be illegal in PRC. It was pointed out PRC is not part of
> > Wassenaar Arrangement. I was advised our broadcasts of and
> > export of minutes from meetings would be "Deemed Export". It
> > seems pretty hard to argue that the IETF does not develop any
> > crypto.  Has the IAOC received any legal advice on this?
>
> Another piece of this question is whether PGP (or CACert)
> key-signing activities, with signed private keys being taken out
> of the country afterwards, would violate any law or require a
> license.  I had previously assumed that the answer would be
> "no", but the answers you have given to this question, the
> P2PSIP/CA one, and maybe others, leads me to wonder a bit.
>

The PGP Key signing is a good question - I have no idea - it's  
certainly something we have done in the past but if it is not legal in  
the PRC, I could live with a meeting where we did not do any PGP key  
signing. It detracts a bit from the meeting but is not in what I  
consider the mediatory must have core of the meeting. Of course this  
would mean that a group of people that did not often travel out of the  
PRC would be missing a great opportunity to sign with a group of  
people outside of China which I view as one of the benefits of having  
a meeting in Beijing.
>
> >> 7) Would we be OK running a BOF on techniques for firewall
> >> advancement in general and in particular on getting around
> >> any firewalls China runs? [Seriously, you know someone will
> >> propose this BOF, the questions is could we run it or not?]
> >
> > Answer I got was discussion of security policies of PRC's
> > firewall and methods to get around it would definitely not be
> > OK to discuss. Two of the many problems would be:
> >
> > Answer seemed pretty solid that this topic was not one that
> > most people would consider a really bad idea to discuss in PRC.
>
> Too many negatives in that sentence for me to parse.  Did you
> mean "was one that ...bad idea to discuss" or "ok to discuss"?
>

Oops - sorry. I meant to try and say, that most the people I had  
talked to advised me *not* to have any such discussion in PRC.
>
> >> 10) If the meeting is canceled, will the IETF be reimbursing
> >> the registration fees?
>
> That question may have an answer under US or European law (and
> probably other places): if someone paid the registration fee for
> a meeting, and paid for non-refundable airline tickets, hotel
> room, etc., on the basis of a good-faith assumption that the
> meeting would be held, would he or she have the right to a
> reasonable expectation of recovering those costs if the meeting
> were called off?  Called off on any basis other than what I
> believe some lawyers call an Act of God?  If the IAOC has gotten
> legal advice on this --from the IAOC's point of view, IASA's
> liability to participants if a meeting were cancelled-- could
> that advice be shared.
>
> > As an interesting side note, it seems that some people think
> > that many of these things are officially illegal but they are
> > fine to do anyway because other meetings are doing them etc.
> > This is not a position I share and more importantly, it is not
> > a position where I am willing to ask our WG Chairs, authors,
> > and other volunteers to do something illegal because it will
> > all be fine. Even if there are no short term consequences, I
> > can imagine a case where 10 years later someone is seeking
> > security clearance and this comes back to bite them.
>
> Concur
>
> For the record, I'm still generally in favor of a meeting in
> Beijing.  But I agree with Cullen that answers to these types of
> questions should be extremely clear before a decision to go is
> made and that, if any of the answers are sub-optimal, that the
> IESG should make a formal decision, after reviewing community
> input, etc., as to whether they believe that a satisfactory
> meeting can be held in spite of them.  And I believe we should
> hold any potential meeting site to those standards, i.e., that
> this is not about the PRC.
>

+1, and speaking of other countries, I also thing it is a very  
reasonable requirement that "most of the participants can get a visa  
in a reasonable time". Not sure what the values of most and reasonable  
time are but I would say something like we only meet in countries  
where 95% of the participants can get a visa in under 4 months.

>    john

---

From: Cullen Jennings <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 5 Oct 2009 13:20:54 -0600

On Oct 5, 2009, at 11:45 AM, Dave CROCKER wrote:

>
> At its base, your exercise seems to be an effort at doing the IAOC's  
> job for it.
>   It's their job to research venue details and make choices and to  
> ensure the
> logistics for productive IETF meetings.  The IETF as a body is not  
> likely to
> become experts in the details of holding a meeting in China.

Well it sounds like we both agree that it is the IAOC job to make sure  
they have answers to the questions I am raising before making a  
decision.

I asked about legalities of discussing crypto a few years ago when  
this China meeting was raised to IESG. I did not get an answer. I  
asked about it around the time of the Stockholm meeting and got no  
answer. I am asking publicly on the IETF list when the topic finally  
got brought to a public list. I think it is a reasonable question.

I'm not asking about if someone stands up at a plenary and asked some  
questions that is totally tangental to the IETF. I am asking about the  
legality of discussions we regularly have to produce the type of  
things that we have put in RFCs. If the IAOC was telling me, "yep, we  
contacted these lawyers in PRC and here is what they told us, we think  
we can run a normal IETF discussion in PRC" then I'd feel like they  
looked at this and it is all fine. I do understand the IAOC is a  
thankless job where arm chair experts complain about everything you do  
on the IETF list. (I'm sort of familiar with a job that is similar to  
that).

---

From: Cullen Jennings <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 5 Oct 2009 14:59:42 -0600

On Oct 5, 2009, at 1:28 PM, Dave CROCKER wrote:

>
> Cullen Jennings wrote:
> > Well it sounds like we both agree that it is the IAOC job to make  
> sure they
> > have answers to the questions I am raising before making a decision.
>
> We are seeing a solid pattern to suggest that U.S. reading skills  
> have declined
> seriously.

Sorry but I'm Canadian, Eh, so don't blame the US. Besides, as Spencer  
correctly points out, my writing is worse than many ESL people.

>
> I neither expressed nor implied any opinion at all about your  
> questions, except
> that they are out of scope for the query being made by the IAOC and  
> that any
> pursuit of your questions ought to be done *separately*.

By "separately" you mean doing something like changing the subject  
line? But on to the serious answer ....

As an IESG member, I was aware the IAOC was considering a meeting in  
China before the IAOC announced it on a public list. I felt that I  
should not discuss it as an individual contributor on a a public list  
until the IAOC made the topic public. To my knowledge this query from  
the IAOC was the first time it had been made public so I brought up  
the issues at the first point in time available. I'm not sure what  
else you would have suggested I do to ask for information that I think  
is important.

The question from the IAOC, as far as I can read it, asks if we are OK  
with having the meeting be canceled for everyone if one person discuss  
various under specified things that includes topics that are illegal  
in China. It seems to me the questions of if our normal discussions  
are illegal or not is very relevant to making that decision.

> d/

---

From: Jeffrey Hutzelman <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 5 Oct 2009 19:03:11 -0400 (EDT)

On Mon, 5 Oct 2009, Cullen Jennings wrote:

>> At its base, your exercise seems to be an effort at doing the IAOC's job 
>> for it.
>>  It's their job to research venue details and make choices and to ensure 
>> the
>> logistics for productive IETF meetings.  The IETF as a body is not likely 
>> to
> Well it sounds like we both agree that it is the IAOC job to make sure they 
> I asked about legalities of discussing crypto a few years ago when this China 
> meeting was raised to IESG. I did not get an answer. I asked about it around 
> the time of the Stockholm meeting and got no answer. I am asking publicly on 
> the IETF list when the topic finally got brought to a public list. I think it 
> is a reasonable question.

So do I.  While it is certainly the IAOC's job to reserach possible venues 
and select a meeting location, many of us have jobs which require knowing 
the answers to some of the questions you've raised.  For example...

I co-chair a working group which is responsible for a cryptographic
authentication protocol.  If it is not legal to discuss and develop
cryptographic algorithms and protocols in the PRC, or to export the
results of such work, then my working group cannot usefully meet there,
regardless of what the IAOC decides about the IETF as a whole being
able to meet.

I also normally organize PGP key-signing sessions at IETF meetings.
If the operation of a CA or other cryptographic signing service requires a 
license in the PRC, then we may not be able to hold such a session, or it 
may require a special license.

I consider it entirely appropriate for me in my role as a working group 
chair, or Cullen in his role as an AD, to ask that the IAOC obtain answers 
to these questions from competent experts, such as legal counsel familiar 
with PRC law.

Finally, I would note that I am all for appointing people to positions of 
responsibility, putting appropriate checks and appeal and recall 
mechanisms in place, and them letting them go about doing their jobs. 
However, in this instance, the IAOC _asked_ for community input, so it 
seems silly to object to someone providing such input on the grounds that 
they are "doing the IAOC's job for it".

-- Jeff

---

From: Marshall Eubanks <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 5 Oct 2009 19:23:28 -0400

On Oct 5, 2009, at 7:03 PM, Jeffrey Hutzelman wrote:

>>> At its base, your exercise seems to be an effort at doing the  
>>> IAOC's job for it.
>> sure they have answers to the questions I am raising before making  
>> a decision.
>>
>> answer. I am asking publicly on the IETF list when the topic  
>> finally got brought to a public list. I think it is a reasonable  
>> question.
>
>
> So do I.  While it is certainly the IAOC's job to reserach possible  
> venues and select a meeting location, many of us have jobs which  
> require knowing the answers to some of the questions you've raised.   
> For example...
>
> If the operation of a CA or other cryptographic signing service  
> requires a license in the PRC, then we may not be able to hold such  
> a session, or it may require a special license.
>
> I consider it entirely appropriate for me in my role as a working  
> group chair, or Cullen in his role as an AD, to ask that the IAOC  
> obtain answers to these questions from competent experts, such as  
> legal counsel familiar with PRC law.
>
>
> Finally, I would note that I am all for appointing people to  
> positions of responsibility, putting appropriate checks and appeal  
> and recall mechanisms in place, and them letting them go about doing  
> their jobs. However, in this instance, the IAOC _asked_ for  
> community input, so it seems silly to object to someone providing  
> such input on the grounds that they are "doing the IAOC's job for it".
>

I would just note that no one on the IAOC has objected to this. I, for  
one, find all of this discussion useful and enlightening.

Regards
Marshall

> -- Jeff
> _______________________________________________
> IAOC mailing list
> [email-masked]
> https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/iaoc
>

---

From: Henk Uijterwaal <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 06 Oct 2009 10:49:04 +0200

John,

> Dave, I disagree, at least slightly, but that is because I
> suffer from a concern --documented in a "request for review" and
> previous notes to this list-- that the IAOC/Trustees are _not_
> doing their job, or at least the part of that job that requires
> keeping the community informed about the decisions they are
> making and the reasons for them.

Speaking as myself.  I think we have heard this message and we
are working on improving communications.  We have spent time to
get all outstanding meetings done, we are now working on making
minutes of new meetings more readable for somebody not present
at the meeting.   We also started to explicitly ask the community
about choices we have to make for meetings, for example, Quebec
vs. Vancouver or China or no China.

BTW, we are still looking for a volunteer scribe for our meetings :-)

> Suppose he posted a list of questions to which he thought we
> should have answers before we put a meeting in any location that
> has a reputation (justified or not) for regulating the free flow
> of information, asked whether the IAOC had answers to those
> questions for a particular case, and, if they did, that they
> share those answers with the community?  I think that would be
> reasonable and that the IAOC could reasonably respond to such a
> question by saying "yes, similar questions were asked, we think
> the answers are reasonable, and the discussion is documented in
> the IAOC Minutes of ...".   Except that he did ask, hasn't
> gotten an answer like that and, by the way, there are no minutes
> of enough substance to be pointed to on that (or any other)
> issue.

We have a long list with issues that we think should be settled before
we decide to go there or not, and we are working on the document
describing why we decided one way or another.

Henk

-- 
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RIPE Network Coordination Centre          http://www.xs4all.nl/~henku
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Belgium: an unsolvable problem, discussed in endless meetings, with no
          hope for a solution, where everybody still lives happily.

---

From: Ole Jacobsen <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 5 Oct 2009 10:42:44 -0700 (PDT)

Cullen,

I will only answer #5 here, since I am not a lawyer (the rest will 
have to wait for now):

Most organizations, including the IETF, asks for ISO-3166 codes on the 
registration form. Not all those codes are necessarily "countries" by 
some other countries' definition, or even by the definition in that 
document. We are certainly allowed to ask "where are you from" and we 
even have a "other" field in case the pull-down is incomplete.

This particular concern is not an issue. Public demonstrations 
regarding the underlying issues might be.

Ole

Ole J. Jacobsen
Editor and Publisher,  The Internet Protocol Journal
Cisco Systems
Tel: +1 408-527-8972   Mobile: +1 415-370-4628
E-mail: [email-masked]  URL: http://www.cisco.com/ipj

---

From: Ole Jacobsen <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 5 Oct 2009 10:50:15 -0700 (PDT)

And just to be 100% clear: Holding the meeting in Hong Kong is not an 
option for the current discussion. There is neither a host nor a venue 
available there for the time period in question. It is entirely 
possible, I will even go so far as to say "probable," that we indeed 
WILL meet in Hong Kong some day, but that isn't what the current 
discussion is about.

Ole

Ole J. Jacobsen

---

From: Theodore Tso <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 5 Oct 2009 15:07:54 -0400

> I will only answer #5 here, since I am not a lawyer (the rest will 

I would hope the IAOC would see fit get formal legal advice on the
various issues which Cullen has raised before green-lighting an IETF
meeting in the PRC.  (Especially since his further research seems to
show that they are indeed may be some real problems!)  Is that a
reasonable expectation?

						- Ted

---

From: Cullen Jennings <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 11 Oct 2009 15:31:42 -0600

Dear IAOC members,

I asked what I thought were some fairly reasonable questions on the  
legalities of running a meeting as normal IETF meeting in PRC - I  
carefully stayed away from social policy issues about if this was a  
good place to have a meeting or not.

I was wondering if you plan to answer any of these or not? If you  
don't plan to answer them, I'd rather know that then just have to  
assume it. If you do plan but on answers any of them, I'd love to find  
out any answers you currently know and also find out which question  
you plan not to answer, and to find out the timelines of when you  
might have an answer for questions you can't currently answer.  I  
don't have any problem with you telling me some of these questions are  
TSTA (too stupid to answer).

Thanks, Cullen

On Sep 23, 2009, at 9:45 PM, Cullen Jennings wrote:

> Geopriv WG deals with protecting users' location privacy. The  
> policies of more than one country have come up in geopriv meetings  
> in very derogatory terms. There have been very derogatory comments  
> made by people about the US's wiretap policy. Unless someone can  
> point me at specifics of what is or is not OK, I would find this  
> very concerning. We also regularly discuss issues around Taiwan/ 
> China, cryptography, wiretap, DNS root server location, reverse  
> engineering, and so on.  Clearly most the people involved with IETF  
> would never want to break the laws of the country they are visiting  
> but the question is do we actually understand the laws and what  
> impact do they have on our technical work? To help us make informed  
> decision about whether these terms are issues or not:
>
> 1) What is political speech in China? And can we explain that to  
> IETF participants well enough that they know what is OK and what is  
> not.
>
> 3) Are there any rules around discussion, publication, or export of  
> of cryptography algorithms and technology? publishing weaknesses of  
> clients) that they helped develop and include strong cryptography.  
> Do they need permission to use these in China?
>
> participants regularly treat Taiwan and PRC as two different  
> countries and currently recognize both of them as separate countries  
> in their own right. I'd actually venture a guess that there is  
> strong IETF consensus they should be treated this way.  Could any  
> discussions like this be viewed as political speech? What are the  
> rules on this?
>
> This would be about the right timing for running P2PSIP code, but  
> that requires us to to run a local CA. Is any special permission  
> needed to run a CA in China?
>
> advancement in general and in particular on getting around any  
> firewalls China runs? [Seriously, you know someone will propose this  
> BOF, the questions is could we run it or not?]
>
> one day change fee, would the IETF be responsible for the hotel's  
> loss of revenue for the Wednesday through Friday nights?
>
> prudent to me to make sure that each participant agreed to this.  
> Will you be asking each participant to sign an agreement agreeing to  
> these terms?
>
> I'm trying to get to the bottom about what is legal and what is not  
> in the PRC.  Ignorance is not an excuse for the law in any country  
> and when I don't know if something is legal or not, I don't do it.  
> Right now I am looking for input from knowledgeable people on these  
> questions. I imagine the IAOC has looked into many of these and  
> would appreciate understanding what you have found.
>
> Thanks, Cullen
>

---

From: Dave CROCKER <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 11 Oct 2009 15:31:15 -0700

Cullen Jennings wrote:
>  I 
> carefully stayed away from social policy issues 

>> 1) What is political speech in China? 
...
...
...
 >>      Could any discussions like

This is your version of staying away from social policy?

If it is, I suspect that what is first needed are lessons in the nature of 
social and political policy.

I suspect you -- and most of the rest of us -- can't give a definitive answer to 
these questions for any other venue the IETF has ever met in.  As a small 
example, I doubt many of us have a meaningful clue about the detailed impact of 
the US's Patriot Act as it changed basic freedoms's for citizens, nevermind 
non-citizens.

Really, Cullen, it's difficult to overemphasize just how basic a mistake it is 
for us to pursue your questions.

d/
-- 

   Dave Crocker
   Brandenburg InternetWorking
   bbiw.net

---

From: "Scott Lawrence" <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 12 Oct 2009 12:36:26 -0400

> for us to pursue your questions.

I don't think it's helpful for you to repeatedly try to shut down
attempts to get answers to questions that many people on the list have
repeatedly said that they think are relevant and important.

I don't think that Cullen has asked for opinions from anyone on whether
the rules in China are right or wrong - that would certainly be
discussing social policy.  What he has asked for is discussion of how
they will impact the normal functioning of an IETF meeting, and I for
one agree that the answers are important in that current context.

---

From: Richard Barnes <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 12 Oct 2009 17:00:42 -0400

+1

Cullen is not inquiring after social policy, he's asking what the 
practical constraints are likely to be if there is a meeting in China. 
This is a sensible question, worthy of a thoughtful, well-researched 
response.

 >> the US's Patriot Act as it changed basic freedoms's for citizens, 
nevermind

The question isn't whether someone on this list has a definitive answer 
-- or anyone, really.  The request was for appropriate due diligence to 
be done to estimate some parameters that are right now very uncertain. 
One could perform a similar analysis for other venues, but in most 
places where the IETF has met, the level of initial uncertainty has been 
much lower due to the relative clarity of precedent in constitutional, 
legislative, and judicial terms.

(P.S.: Could we make a corollary to Godwin's Law for the PATRIOT Act?)

--Richard

Scott Lawrence wrote:
> Ietf mailing list
> [email-masked]
> https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf
>