Internet-Draft Open Participation Principle August 2020
Kuehlewind, et al. Expires 18 February 2021 [Page]
Workgroup:
Network Working Group
Internet-Draft:
draft-kuehlewind-shmoo-remote-fee-00
Published:
Intended Status:
Best Current Practice
Expires:
Authors:
M. Kuehlewind
Ericsson
J. Reed
Akamai
R. Salz
Akamai

Open Participation Principle regarding Remote Registration Fee

Abstract

This document proposes a principle for open participation that extends the open process principle as defined in RFC3935 by stating that there must always be a free option for online participation to IETF meetings over the Internet.

Status of This Memo

This Internet-Draft is submitted in full conformance with the provisions of BCP 78 and BCP 79.

Internet-Drafts are working documents of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF). Note that other groups may also distribute working documents as Internet-Drafts. The list of current Internet-Drafts is at https://datatracker.ietf.org/drafts/current/.

Internet-Drafts are draft documents valid for a maximum of six months and may be updated, replaced, or obsoleted by other documents at any time. It is inappropriate to use Internet-Drafts as reference material or to cite them other than as "work in progress."

This Internet-Draft will expire on 18 February 2021.

Table of Contents

1. Introduction

Remote participation for IETF in-person meetings has evolved over time from email-only to live chat and audio streaming, and, currently, to a full online meeting system that is tightly integrated with the in-room session and enables interactive participation by audio and video. Due to this evolution, and because most participants paid in-person fees, online participation has historically been free for remote attendees.

Given this more full-blown participation option, the IETF has started to observed an increasing number of remote participants. This increase can be explained by the ease with which new participants can join a meeting or only attend selected parts of the meeting agenda, and also by a less strongly perceived need to attend every meeting in person, either due to financial reasons or other circumstances. In order to better understand these trends the IETF started requiring registration as "participant" (in contrast to an "observer") for remote participation, still without any registration fee applied.

With the recent move to full online meetings, however, there is no distinction between remote and other participants anymore which lead to the introduction of a meeting fee for all participants, removing the free remote option.

This change led to concerns about the impact both on those who regularly remotely attend meetings, as well as people looking to attend IETF meetings for the first time. In both cases, even a small registration fee can be a barrier to participation.

2. Principle of open participation

This document outlines the principle of open participation and solicits community feedback in order to reach consensus on this or a similar principle that the IETF LLC can use to guide future decision about registration fees for full online meetings.

The principle this document states is simple: there must always be an option for free remote participation in any IETF meeting, whether or not that meeting has a physical presence.

This principle aims to support the openness principle of the IETF as defined in [RFC3935]:

"Open process - any interested person can participate in the work, know what is being decided, and make his or her voice heard on the issue. Part of this principle is our commitment to making our documents, our WG mailing lists, our attendance lists, and our meeting minutes publicly available on the Internet."

While the principle in RFC3935 is explicitly noting that this principle includes a requirement to open basically all our documents and documentation and making them accessible over the Internet, it was probably written with mainly having email interactions in mind when talking about participation. This document extends this principle to explicitly cover online participation at meetings.

In order to fully remove barriers to participation, any free registration option must offer the same degree of interactivity and functionality available to paid remote attendees. The free option must be clearly and prominently listed on the meeting website and registration page. If the free option requires additional registration steps, such as applying for a fee waiver, those requirements should be clearly documented.

3. Financial impact

Online meetings have lower costs than in-person meetings, however they still come with expenses, as do other services that the IETF provides such as mailing lists, document access over the datatracker or other online platforms, or Webex accounts for working groups and other roles in the IETF.

These and other running costs of the IETF are also cross-financed by income generated through meeting fees. The intention of this document and the principle stated herein is not to make participation free for everyone but to always have a free option that can be used without any barriers other than the registration procedure itself.

It is not in scope for this document or the shmoo working group to make suggestions for changing the IETF's overall funding model. This is the responsibility of the LLC Board taking agreed principles like the one proposed in this document into account.

4. Acknowledgments

5. Normative References

[RFC3935]
Alvestrand, H., "A Mission Statement for the IETF", BCP 95, RFC 3935, DOI 10.17487/RFC3935, , <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc3935>.

Authors' Addresses

Mirja Kuehlewind
Ericsson
Jon Reed
Akamai
Rich Salz
Akamai