From @p3.lucy.isoc.org:amr@linus.isoc.org Sun May 21 14:27:55 1995 Received: from linus.isoc.org by icarus.lis.pitt.edu (4.1/1.34) id AA12231; Sun, 21 May 95 14:27:55 EDT Received: from p3.lucy.isoc.org by linus.isoc.org id ac02986; 21 May 95 14:06 EDT X-Sender: amr@198.6.250.10 X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Version 2.1 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Sun, 21 May 1995 14:09:32 -0400 To: Michael Spring From: Tony Rutkowski Subject: Re: Paper on Process Cc: loughry@cup.hp.com, oksala@po3.bb.unisys.com, lgarcia@ota.gov, odonnell@edinboro.edu, spring@lis.pitt.edu Message-Id: <9505211406.ac02986@linus.isoc.org> X-IMAPbase: 1249813035 1 Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 1 Michael, >Jon O'Donnell, who worked to the "Turtles and Bulldogs" paper is currently Considering the recent use of the metaphor "bicycles and Ferraris" by a famous European standards person, someone might want to grab that one. >1. As you will note in the attachment, I have stated 5 assumptions which >guide our thinking. I think that these are safe assumptions, but we should >all feel comfortable with them. I would appreciate it if you would >review them and suggest changes, deletions, or additions. I will >summarize and reflect thos to you. Somehow the factor of "culture" has gotten lost here. Over the last year as I have witnessed IETF and old guard organizations again, the differences in age, style, enthusiasm, seem even more stark. Maybe you could do some kind of average age analysis that could prove interesting; or number of retirees. >most concerned that I have not misstated the positions from Tony's or >Steve's point of view. I haven't noticed anything too outrageous. :-) > unimportant. It is only to say that once a standard is > accepted, the method by which it emerged is less important > than the fact that an accepted standard exist. For example, > if we accept that TCP/IP, Microsoft Windows, SQL, and I would argue that the process and "culture" make a profound difference. > standard business paper size as 8.5x11. We don't have to I thought the standard business size was A4! > Standards are not developed for the fun of it. They are > mechnaisms which achieve either or both of two goals -- one I don't think you can always say this is the case. Here again you ignore what to many of us has gotten blurred into the background - standards organizations are as much "clubs" for people as they are production mechanisms. Perhaps even more so. There are all kinds of reasons people go to standards meetings other than just developing standards. I don't think you can ignore all these factors. Certainly no one can ignore that places like ITU-T are populated by lots of PTT retirees. Or that there are lots of pony-tailed hackers that go to the IETF. I find it amazing how people are always talking about merging work in the quest for single organization efforts, but the reality is that the people involved are so profoundly different in their values, knowledge, working styles, if not outlook on life, you'd never be able to get them into the same room. These standards development mechanisms aren't machines, they are people working together, and you need to deal with all the human factors that this invokes. And creative computer people who write good code are a very different breed than the traditional SDO types who tend to be professional standards people from large organizations who have spend their lives trying to nail down a national monopoly. --tony