Re: RFC Editor and IESG DNP requests

[hardie@qualcomm.com]

At 5:55 PM -0700 5/7/03, Aaron Falk wrote:
> d-
>
> This whole discussion about process and policy changes is motivated by
> IESG concern that grave damage can be caused by marketing people
> playing fast and loose with RFC numbers.  It would be a good thing,
> IMO, to have a clearly articulated rationale of the risks associated
> with this behavior.  How widespread is it?  How much should our
> process accomodate people who treat allocation of an RFC number as
> convocation of standard status?
Understanding, of course, that the plural of anecdote is not
data, let me point you at RFC 3258.  It is an Informational RFC,
but I know that virtually everyone using the technique has cited
it as "compliant with the IETF's RFC 3258"  or used similar
language to indicate that (the exception being Vixie, for reasons
not important to this discussion).  More to the point, it has turned
up in RFPs, including those overseen by ICANN for TLDs.
The market for domain hosting totally ignored the difference
between this document and a document issued as a Proposed
Standard or BCP.

Maybe that's okay in this case; maybe not.  The real point is that the RFC
number really did give a weight to the use of that set of operational 
procedures
that it did not otherwise have.


> Also, I'd like to extend an invitation to the IESG, or anyone else for
> that matter, to forward to the RFC Editor specifics of where this has
> occurred and the outcome.  I believe the ramifications are easier to
> understand in the specific, rather than the general.
>
> --aaron (speaking for aaron)
Thanks again for to you and the RFC Editor staff for all your 
continued willingness
to follow up on this discussion.
				regards,
					Ted Hardie