[ih] This Review is for Everyone

[Steve Crocker]

Adding one minor but relevant detail to Dave's note,

Carl Malmud and I chaired the POISED working group thatresulted from the
Kobe Trauma.  POISED made two significant changes to the IETF's
organizational structure.  The authority for approving RFCs moved from the
IAB to the IESG, and a Nomcom was created to fill  IETF leadership
positions and the IAB.  These changes also established a judicial
function.  The IAB became the primary body to hear appeals, but ISOC was
given an appellate role above the IAB.  If I recall correctly, ISOC never
expressed any desire or need to take on this role, but they were a
convenient choice for a level above the IAB.  I don't know whether this was
ever exercised, and I don't know if this role still persists.  (POISSON was
the follow-on effort to POISED.  I did not track the details., so I don;t
know if ISOC's role continued, expanded or was diminished.)

Steve


On Fri, Mar 13, 2026 at 3:23 AM Dave Crocker via Internet-history <
internet-history at elists.isoc.org> wrote:

> On 3/12/2026 9:56 AM, Craig Partridge wrote:
> >
> > As you well know, the IETF did exist before ISOC.  But we had to
> > reverse engineer things so that when ISOC was created, IETF was
> > subordinate to it, so you that you and I (and others) as members of
> > the then IESG and IETF would not be sued for standards decisions.
> >
> > As a result, I suspect if ISOC disappeared now, yes IETF would too...
>
>
> I suspect it wouldn't.  And I was not (merely) being snarky.
>
> Unless things have changed profoundly, in recent years, ISOC provides no
> operational direction to the IETF and never has.  When I say the IETF
> 'contracted with' ISOC for some services, I mean that as substantive,
> relational reality.
>
> It's not that the services ISOC provides are not valuable, but that they
> were delegated /to/ ISOC, rather than coming /from/ within ISOC and then
> being imposed on t/he IETF.
>
> In operational terms, nothing about the way IETF has ever conducted its
> decision-processes has ever had a feeling of subordination to ISOC.  (I
> suppose annual funding discussions might be taken as, at most, roughly
> egalitarian.)
>
> I'll add that nothing about ISOC's conduct -- unless this has changed in
> very recent years -- has ever had the tone of a superior.  Quite the
> opposite, based on the diligent caution I always saw, in how ISOC
> interacted with the IETF.
>
> Ignoring who generated what and why, note that be basic creation history
> was:
>
>     1986: IAB and IETF formed
>
>     1989: IETF Area Directors first appointed
>
>     1992:  Kobe Trauma, Poised working group, authority revision
>
>     1992: ISOC formed.
>
> As one of those first Area directors, the facts and tone of that
> sequence were interesting.
>
> The IETF was fully subordinate to IAB authority, which was quite
> vigorously asserted.
>
> What I'm calling the Kobe Trauma happened three years later, producing
> what was largely a reversal of the authority relationship, in terms of
> IETF operations.
>
> Up through the formation of ISOC, these activities survived with what
> was sometimes called a "Daddy Pays" model.  Arguably, that's still the
> model, although Daddy now pays only a percentage.  But even when it was
> earlier Daddies, the sources of funding exerted close to no visible
> control over the processes.
>
> If ISOC went away, the IETF would have a funding shortfall, and it would
> have some holes in its oversight and appointment model.
>
> Funding is called that because it is never fun to satisfy the
> requirement, but I suspect it would at least be a tractable task.
> Filling the other holes would probably be no more than a hassle.
>
>
> d/
>
> --
> Dave Crocker
>
> dhc at dcrocker.net
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>
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