Internet DRAFT - draft-duke-shmoo-cancel-meeting
draft-duke-shmoo-cancel-meeting
shmoo M. Duke
Internet-Draft F5 Networks, Inc.
Intended status: Best Current Practice 2 February 2021
Expires: 6 August 2021
Considerations for Cancellation of IETF Meetings
draft-duke-shmoo-cancel-meeting-01
Abstract
The IETF firmly believes in the value of in-person meetings to reach
consensus on documents. However, various emergencies can make a
planned in-person meeting impossible. This document provides
criteria for making this judgment.
Status of This Memo
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provisions of BCP 78 and BCP 79.
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This Internet-Draft will expire on 6 August 2021.
Copyright Notice
Copyright (c) 2021 IETF Trust and the persons identified as the
document authors. All rights reserved.
This document is subject to BCP 78 and the IETF Trust's Legal
Provisions Relating to IETF Documents (https://trustee.ietf.org/
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Please review these documents carefully, as they describe your rights
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Table of Contents
1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
2. Conventions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
3. Decision Criteria and Roles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
3.1. IETF LLC . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
3.2. IESG . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
4. Remedies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
4.1. Relocation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
4.2. Virtualization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
4.3. Postponement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
4.4. Cancellation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
5. Refunds . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
6. Security Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
7. IANA Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
8. Informative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
Appendix A. Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
Appendix B. Change Log . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
B.1. Since draft-duke-shmoo-cancel-meetings-00 . . . . . . . . 7
B.2. Since draft-duke-remote-meetings-00 . . . . . . . . . . . 7
Author's Address . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
1. Introduction
One highlight of the IETF calendar is in-person general meetings,
which happen three times a year at various locations around the
world.
Various events could make a scheduled IETF meeting impossible, in
that a particular time or place can be largely closed to travel or
assembly. These conditions do not always have obvious thresholds.
For example:
* The meeting venue itself may close unexpectedly due to a health
issue, legal violation, or other localized problem.
* A natural disaster could degrade the travel and event
infrastructure in a planned location and make it unethical to
further burden that infrastructure with a meeting.
* War, civil unrest, or public health crisis could make a meeting
unsafe and/or result in widespread national or corporate travel
bans.
* An economic crisis could sharply reduce resources available for
travel.
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* Changes in visa policy or other unexpected governmental
restrictions might make the venue inaccessible to numerous
attendees.
This document provides procedures for the IETF to decide to postpone,
move, or cancel an in-person IETF meeting.
2. Conventions
The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL NOT",
"SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and "OPTIONAL" in this
document are to be interpreted as described in RFC 2119 [RFC2119].
In this document, the term "venue" refers to both the facility that
houses the sessions and the official meeting hotel(s).
3. Decision Criteria and Roles
3.1. IETF LLC
The LLC is responsible for assessing if it is safe to hold the
meeting given the following criteria. This assessment SHOULD occur
eight weeks prior to the first day of the meeting, though events may
require reevaluation as late as during the meeting itself.
This document provides a consensus of principles the LLC can apply in
emergency situations, to avoid operating without such consensus or
invoking a time-consuming consensus process. In the event of
considerations this document does not foresee, the LLC should protect
the health and safety of attendees, as well as the health of the
organization, with approval from the IESG and a plan to seek a later
update of this document.
The criteria in Section 3.1 of [RFC8718] apply to venues that have
changed status. Specifically:
* Local safety guidelines allow the venue and hotels to host a
meeting with the expected number of participants and staff.
* It MUST be possible to provision Internet Access to the Facility
and IETF Hotels that allows those attending in person to utilize
the Internet for all their IETF, business, and day-to-day needs;
in addition, there must be sufficient bandwidth and access for
remote attendees. Provisions include, but are not limited to,
native and unmodified IPv4 and IPv6 connectivity, and global
reachability; there may be no additional limitation that would
materially impact their Internet use. To ensure availability, it
MUST be possible to provision redundant paths to the Internet.
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* A reasonable number of food and drink establishments are open and
available within walking distance to provide for the full number
of participants and staff.
* Local health and public safety infrastructure should expect to
have adequate capacity to support an influx of visitors during the
meeting week.
The LLC must also confirm that:
* There are no US [USSTATE], UK [UKFO], or local authority travel
advisories for the location of the meeting. The first two are
chosen to be easily accessible in English, which all IETF staff
can read. This should not be interpreted as requiring
cancellation due to a warning about a different region in the host
nation, or in the rural area surrounding a host city provided
transportation to the airport is secure.
* Air travel is assessed as safe by the relevent health and safety
authorities.
* Travel insurance is both available and priced close to norms.
* There is no quarantine or self-isolation requirement at the
location.
* Other similar international meetings (conferences) are going ahead
at a similar time to IETF.
Finally, the LLC should assess the impact of various travel
restrictions, legal and corporate, on the ability of critical support
staff and contractors to enter the host nation. The LLC can cancel
the event if it concludes it cannot adequately support it.
3.2. IESG
The IESG assesses if projected attendance is high enough to capture
the benefit of an in-person meeting. In some cases, corporate travel
restrictions may lower attendance in the absence of any formal
guidance from authorities. If it concludes that attendance is too
low, it can cancel the meeting regardless of the LLC's safety
assessment.
The IESG is discouraged from relying on a simple head count of
expected event attendance. Even dramatically smaller events with
large remote participation may be successful. The IESG might
consider:
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* Are many working groups largely unaffected by the restrictions, so
that they can operate effectively?
* Is there a critical mass of key personnel at most working group
meetings to leverage the advantages of in-person meetings, even if
many participants are remote?
The IESG is encouraged to solicit information from the IRTF char,
Working Group chairs, and Research Group chairs to make this
assessment.
4. Remedies
In the event cannot be held at the scheduled time and place, the IETF
has several options. The remedies below should be consdered in light
of these principles, presented in no particular order:
* Hold the scheduled sessions of the meeting in some format
* Provide benefits of in-person interactions when possible
* Avoid exorbitant additional travel expenses due to last minute
flight changes, etc.
* The available time and resources allow the alternative to be
adequately prepared.
4.1. Relocation
For attendees, the least disruptive response is to retain the meeting
week but move it to a more accessible venue. To the maximum extent
possible, this will be geographically close to the original venue.
In particular, the IETF should strive to meet the criteria in
[RFC8718] and [RFC8719].
Relocation that requires new air travel arrangements for attendees
SHOULD NOT occur less than one month prior to the start of the
meeting.
4.2. Virtualization
The second option, and one that has fewer issues with venue
availability, is to make the meeting fully remote. This requires
different IETF processes and logistical operations that are outside
the scope of this document.
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4.3. Postponement
Although it is more disruptive to the schedules of participants, the
next best option is to delay the meeting until a specific date at
which conditions are expected to improve. The new end date of the
meeting must be at least 30 days before the beginning of the
following IETF meeting.
Due to scheduling constraints at the venue, this will usually not be
feasible. However, it is more likely to allow attendees to recover
at least some of their travel expenses than other options.
4.4. Cancellation
As a last resort, IETF may cancel the meeting totally. This is a
last resort in the event that worldwide conditions make it difficult
for attendees to even attend remotely. Not holding a meeting at all
has wide implications for the rhythm of IETF personnel policies, such
as the nomination process and seating of new officers.
Cancellation is likely the only practical alternative when
emergencies occur immeidiately before or during the meeting, so that
there is no opportunity to make other arrangements.
5. Refunds
The IETF SHOULD NOT reimburse registered attendees for unrecoverable
travel expenses (airfare, hotel deposits, etc).
However, there are several cases where full or partial refund of
registration fees is appropriate:
* Cancellation SHOULD result in a full refund to all participants.
It MAY be prorated if some portion of the sessions completed
without incident.
* Upon postponement, the LLC SHOULD offer refunds to registered
attendees who claim they cannot attend at the newly scheduled
time.
* When the meeting becomes remote, the LLC SHOULD attempt to recover
whatever venue-related payments, past or future, it can and rebate
this to registered attendees, up to a maximum of their total cost
of registration.
These provisions intend to maintain trust between the IETF and its
participants. However, under extraordinary threats to the solvency
of the organization, the LLC may suspend them.
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6. Security Considerations
This document introduces no new concerns for the security of internet
protocols.
7. IANA Considerations
There are no IANA requirements.
8. Informative References
[RFC2119] Bradner, S., "Key words for use in RFCs to Indicate
Requirement Levels", BCP 14, RFC 2119,
DOI 10.17487/RFC2119, March 1997,
<https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc2119>.
[RFC8718] Lear, E., Ed., "IETF Plenary Meeting Venue Selection
Process", BCP 226, RFC 8718, DOI 10.17487/RFC8718,
February 2020, <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc8718>.
[RFC8719] Krishnan, S., "High-Level Guidance for the Meeting Policy
of the IETF", BCP 226, RFC 8719, DOI 10.17487/RFC8719,
February 2020, <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc8719>.
[UKFO] Office, U.F., "Foreign Travel Advice", n.d.,
<https://www.gov.uk/foreign-travel-advice>.
[USSTATE] State, U.D.o., "International Travel", n.d.,
<https://travel.state.gov/content/travel/en/international-
travel.html>.
Appendix A. Acknowledgments
Appendix B. Change Log
B.1. Since draft-duke-shmoo-cancel-meetings-00
* Added mention of IRTF
* Discussed consensus on cancellation
B.2. Since draft-duke-remote-meetings-00
* Defined "venue"
* Added principles for selecting remedies and rewrote alternatives.
* Added local authority travel advisories
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* Added some criteria from IETF 109
Author's Address
Martin Duke
F5 Networks, Inc.
Email: martin.h.duke@gmail.com
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