[anti-abuse-wg] Astroturfing?

My personal view on this (not as a co-author now), and sorry to make it long, but I guess is important and many new people contributing in the list that we never heard about before and I hope this helps many people, as a frequent participant and contributor to discussions.

I know very well the consensus process here, in all the RIRs and IETF, which I've been a contributor since about 16-18 years ago, having authored/co-authored probably more than around 75 policy proposals in the 5 RIRs, contributed in many other proposals discussions, and I think at least 3-4 times those numbers of IETF documents.

When I know very well a topic, I usually tend to invest more time to write in the relevant list, never mind I'm for or against.

Sometimes, I just say +1 or I support the policy (if I know the topic very well), because I just agree with that one, even if I may disagree with some nits on the text, because it doesn't make sense to invest my time or others time to adjust minor issues, which will make the discussion longer and I can just accept as written.

However, if I disagree I need to explain why with detail and get engaged in the discussion until we find a middle-term point.

I fully agree that is not counting +1s, but those need to be considered as well:
"Lack of disagreement is more important than agreement" I read that as those opposing should explain why and provide inputs. Those agreeing can just say nothing or say "I agree".

I understand that it is a difficult balance, and how co-chairs have a really difficult task, and that they often ask for "say something if you agree, don't stay silence".

However, I don't think we can ask for the people that agree to explain why. Otherwise, we will get tons of messages repeating it, never mind they use the same or different words.

This is my reading of consensus, in summary, and I think is the most important aspect: "Rough consensus is achieved when all issues are addressed, but not necessarily accommodated".

That means that "One hundred people for and five people against might not be rough consensus", but if there is a minor number of insignificant non-addressed issues, having many "+1", should take preference than having silence or the opposing ones.

On the other way around, "+1" to "I oppose", even if there are 1.000 of them, may mean "nothing" against, because the reason for that opposition has been explained/addressed, even if some people "disagree" or don't like it.

Now, as a co-author (in general, not for the one being discussed). I try to respond to all the inputs (unless they become repetitive), and try to accommodate my proposal to as many folks as possible. I often change my mind with discussions, and reword text, but sometimes, I can have a strong opinion on a particular part of the proposal, and not concede on that part to others opinions, but even in that case I'm always try to improve.

I'm tempted to say this is like a negotiation, but not exactly the same. I think everybody can understand what I mean (in Spanish will be much easier to explain!), and always trying my best and NEVER did a policy proposal because I've any special personal or business interest, up to each participant to believe me or not. I just do it because I think is good for the community, for Internet, even if it means investing my (small) amount of available time, out of sleep or leisure time.

May be just passion, as somebody told me a week ago.

The demonstration of that: I've authored and defended policy proposals about IPv6 PI and transfers, even if I personally though that it was the wrong thing to do (and often I've said that in my presentation), but it was good for the community, so I took the role to defend the community position, not my own one.

Again, this is a very difficult task, and not everyone can be accommodated at 100%.

I *really* prefer to write and defend 100 new policy proposals than being a co-chair (super-heroes for me!). We don't say it often, and we should repeat it much more: Thanks for all that work.

https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc7282 is a good piece of text to read.

Regards,
Jordi
 
 

El 3/4/19 12:44, "anti-abuse-wg en nombre de Sebastien Lahtinen" <anti-abuse-wg-bounces at ripe.net en nombre de md at ncuk.net> escribió:

    
    On Wed, 3 Apr 2019, Michele Neylon - Blacknight wrote:
    
    > Is someone encouraging astroturfing?
    >
    > The number of either new or inactive members of this list who have 
    > posted one line messages in support of the recent policy discussion has 
    > reached insane levels
    
    This specific discussion was highlighted to me and was the reason I joined 
    the list. I've been reading a lot of the comments and haven't responded 
    yet, but this is my first post to this list so I come under the above 
    group.
    
    As an outsider, what I would say is that there's a lot of noise here. Was 
    I not from the community in the wider sense and undertand the concept of 
    how technical communities come up with policies, I'd be put right off. I 
    think this environment makes it easier for those with more control over 
    their time to contribute. I can see some really valuable and thought out 
    contributions, alongside shorter ones where I can't see the thinking 
    process.
    
    It can be quite valid for members of this community to have a legitimate 
    view on the issues raised in the 2019-03 proposal without being willing to 
    commit huge amounts of time in debating in this environment. I'm not that 
    familiar with the RIPE policty process but my understanding is the next 
    phase means we will have a revision. What is unclear to me is whether it 
    would have outstanding questions which could be summarised such that those 
    '+1' responses could indicate more about their views on the specifics 
    around particular aspects of the proposals which are controversial rather 
    than ending up with what is almost-voting kind of support.
    
    seb
    
    
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