Re: w3process-ISSUE-104 (AB-transparency): AB should conduct all non-sensitive e-mail on a Public or Member list [Advisory Board]

On Wed, 09 Jul 2014 17:51:42 +0200, Chris Wilson <cwilso@google.com> wrote:

> On Wed, Jul 9, 2014 at 5:09 AM, Arthur Barstow <art.barstow@gmail.com>  
> wrote:
>> On 7/8/14 1:32 PM, Michael Champion (MS OPEN TECH) wrote:
>>> - Assuming that people are going to be more frank in their analysis  
>>> and advice in a private setting than if they could set off a  
>>> Twitterstorm by saying something >>>politically incorrect, in what  
>>> circumstances do the benefits of openness outweigh the loss of  
>>> frankness?
>>
>> The AB's deliberations are pretty much a "black hole" for the Public as  
>> well as for Members. The lack of transparency makes it difficult to get  
>> qualified >>candidates to run for open positions and IMHO, that is bad  
>> for the Web and the Consortium.
>
> I agree with Art's concern here; I think it is quite hard to see what  
> the AB thinks they do from the outside, and I'd support putting more  
> discussions in an openly >readable forum.

Ditto. That this group exists, and the AB discusses process here, is a  
tangible proof that this goal isn't very new.

As another part of the problem statement, it provides a much faster sanity  
check for things the AB is doing that aren't especially sensitive, and are  
instead just about having a small group who have taken responsibility deal  
with things that would be more unwieldy but not done any better if we  
tried to involve e.g. the whole AC.

>>> - What counts as "sensitive"?
>>
>> Although I have only seen AB e-mail for a few weeks, I don't recall  
>> anything that could not be Public.

The rest of that paragraph isn't repeated here but
1. It presented the AB's standing (and documented) practice for  
minute-taking out of context, and with a pretty clear derogatory tone  
("dog whistling" is the term Australians use for doing this, and it isn't  
complimentary). I don't think that's appropriate. In addition, except by  
publishing a lot of material given in confidence there is no way to judge  
whether the remarks or implications are reasonable. I don't think that is
2. What is on the AB list is posted in confidence. Selectively breaching  
that confidence is likely to make people more reticent in a forum where  
the point of privacy is to get frank advice given for the benefit of W3C  
rather than the employer of the person giving it.

> I think there are some discussions that the AB has - around staffing or  
> strategy, or administrivia - that are easier to have in a non-public  
> forum.  There are few, >however.

There are also discussions where people give advice or make statements for  
the good of W3C, where those statements could cause problems for the  
person making them if they were attributed to a particular company, e.g.  
by being public.

>>> I'll use public-w3process but perhaps we should just create public-ab  
>>> now and use it. Do any AB members object to creating that list?

The place to ask AB members what they want to do is on the AB list, not  
this one.

In particular AB members who don't want to be part of the Process Task  
Force haven't had any reason to subscribe to this list, and in general  
it's off topic (see below).

> No.  You should not use public-w3process for non-Process discussions in  
> the meantime, however, and you should use public-w3process for Process  
> discussions >in the future.  (IMO.)
Agreed.

cheers

-- 
Charles McCathie Nevile - web standards - CTO Office, Yandex
chaals@yandex-team.ru Find more at http://yandex.com