- From: Charles McCathieNevile <chaals@opera.com>
- Date: Thu, 25 Jun 2009 11:31:45 +0200
- To: Smylers <Smylers@stripey.com>, "HTMLWG WG" <public-html@w3.org>
On Wed, 24 Jun 2009 16:50:20 +0200, Smylers <Smylers@stripey.com> wrote: > However what should be irrelevant when considering a recommendation is > the expert's expertise. Obviously his expertise has a great impact in > influencing his recommendation and making it what it is -- so it's > likely to be far superior to recommendations made by those ignorant of > the domain. But once it has been formed, it should be judged purely on > its merits; its success should be identical to that if submitted > anonymously. > If the recommendation really is superior then that will be apparent from > its technical merits. It will have no need of special pleading because > of its authorship. Nonsense. You can't anonymously be an expert, and the weight attached to the expert's opinion derives directly from a recognition of their expertise. If you're not an expert, then the argument may not be clear to you (although this suggests that the expert in question is clearer on their own speialty than on expliaing it to others, which is a problem). > An expert's recommendation should be justified with an explanation as to > why it is the right course of action (with data, ideally!), just like > anybody else's. It would be a dereliction of this working group's > duties to give any proposal a 'free pass' just because of its > provenance. Indeed. There is of course an important difference between a 'free pass' and believing statements made by experts which influence the interpretation of part of the input that leads to an overall decision. It's not nearly as clear cut as you make it out, unfortunately. If two experts disagree, it isn't the smartest course to just pick the one you like - you actually ahve to work out how to weigh their expertise and objections - and because this is phenomenally hard for people who aren't experts, W3C favours a process whereby the expets are expected to find a consensus - and not through the various tactics collated (from "Yes MInister" and some US government publication, apparently) at http://ian.hixie.ch/bible/handling-people or everyone settling for whatever gets them to lunch, even though it is unacceptable, but an actual consensus on what is the right decision. It's hard to do, and requires a lot of goodwill. But done properly it is far better than a bunch of people with no idea picking options because they understand one, or like the proponent, or any other of many ways to select a winning proposal. cheers Chaals -- Charles McCathieNevile Opera Software, Standards Group je parle français -- hablo español -- jeg lærer norsk http://my.opera.com/chaals Try Opera: http://www.opera.com
Received on Thursday, 25 June 2009 09:32:31 UTC