Eligibility for the 2020-2021 Nominating Committee
FutureWei Technologies
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General
The 2020-2021 Nominating Committee (NomCom) needs to be formed between IETF 107 and IETF 108, and the issue of eligibility of who can serve on that NomCom needs clarification. This document provides a one-time interpretation of the eligibility rules that is required for the exceptional situation of the cancellation of the in-person IETF 107 meeting. This document only affects the seating of the 2020-2021 NomCom, and does not set a precedent for the future.
The COVID-19 outbreak, which at the time of this writing has been declared a global pandemic , has resulted in the cancellation of the in-person IETF 107 meeting , resulting in its conversion to a limited-agenda virtual meeting, with remote participation only.
The 2020-2021 Nominating Committee (NomCom) needs to be formed between IETF 107 and IETF 108, and the issue of eligibility of who can serve on that NomCom needs clarification: a one-time interpretation of the eligibility rules is required for this particular exceptional situation, given the tight timeframe for seating this year's NomCom.
Section 4.14 of BCP 10 includes these requirements for eligibility:
Members of the IETF community must have attended at least three of
the last five IETF meetings in order to volunteer.
The five meetings are the five most recent meetings that ended prior
to the date on which the solicitation for NomCom volunteers was
submitted for distribution to the IETF community.
On 13 March a message was posted to the IETF discussion list , suggesting two possible interpretations and asking for community input that might include suggesting other interpretations. Discussion over the subsequent two weeks centered around three:
Do not count IETF 107 at all, for the purpose of NomCom eligibility, as BCP 10 clearly refers to in-person meetings only. NomCom eligibility would, therefore, be based on attendance at IETFs 102 through 106.
Do not have anyone lose eligibility because of IETF 107, but do count someone as having attended 107, for the purpose of NomCom eligibility, if that person attended the IETF 107 virtual meeting (signed the electronic blue sheet). People could thus gain eligibility from IETF 107, but could not lose eligibility from it, and eligibility would be based on attendance at IETFs 102 through 107.
Count virtual attendance at IETF 107 and consider IETF 107 as one of the last five meetings, so that NomCom eligibility would be based on attendance at IETFs 103 through 107.
In judging rough consensus the IESG has considered the arguments and levels of support in favor of and against each option: largely, issues of fairness to newer participants, acceptance of more participants in the volunteer pool, and greatest adherence to the spirit of the rules defined in BCP 10, which is the community-consensus basis we are working from.
On 25 March a message was posted to the IETF discussion list , asking for final comments by 30 April. This document serves as a recommendation for review during that last call period. As such, this document could substantively change, depending upon the last-call discussion. Note: The previous sentence will be removed before publication.
The following text modifies, for the 2020-2021 NomCom selection only, the first two paragraphs (quoted above) of Section 4.14 of BCP 10 :
Members of the IETF community must have attended at least three of
the last five in-person IETF meetings in order to volunteer.
The five meetings are the five most recent in-person meetings that
ended prior to the date on which the solicitation for NomCom
volunteers was submitted for distribution to the IETF community.
Because no IETF 107 in-person was held, for the 2020-2021
Nominating Committee those five meetings are
IETFs 102, 103, 104, 105, and 106.
This update is an emergency interpretation of the intent of BCP 10 for this current exceptional situation only, and applies only to the 2020-2021 NomCom, which is expected to be seated prior to IETF 108. It will explicitly not apply to any future NomCom and does not set precedent: another update to BCP 10 will be necessary to address future eligibility, as there will be time for proper community work on such an update.
There are no IANA considerations for this document.
This document is purely procedural, and there are no related security considerations.
IETF 107 Vancouver In-Person Meeting Cancelled
IETF
Email to the IETF discussion list:
https://mailarchive.ietf.org/arch/msg/ietf-announce/XenAlx4Nw6Jmg69QpXRUOwbzsXY/
NomCom eligibility & IETF 107
IETF
Email to the IETF discussion list:
https://mailarchive.ietf.org/arch/msg/ietf/cc3rdjSTz8Vrzps8Ci6fi-VIDq8/
WHO Director-General's opening remarks at the media briefing on COVID-19
World Health Organization
https://www.who.int/dg/speeches/detail/who-director-general-s-opening-remarks-at-the-media-briefing-on-covid-19---11-march-2020
NomCom eligibility & IETF 107
IETF
Email to the IETF discussion list:
https://mailarchive.ietf.org/arch/msg/ietf/uBt8FeKeN4CRl7YTDMoy6m8leS0/