Re: w3process-ACTION-47: Produce a proposal for addressing wayne's "comment 9" - allowing appeal where the director's decision isn't the same as the proposal sent for review.

Alternate text to correct the problem:

Current: "When Advisory Committee review immediately precedes a 
decision, Advisory Committee representatives MAY only appeal when there 
is dissent <http://www.w3.org/2014/Process-20140801/#def-Dissent>. "
Proposed: "When Advisory Committee review immediately precedes a 
decision and the Director approves the proposal, Advisory Committee 
representatives MAY only appeal when there is dissent 
<http://www.w3.org/2014/Process-20140801/#def-Dissent>. "

The text is trying to get rid of the case where the director approves, 
no one disagreed in the AC review and then an AC rep appeals because, 
while they didn't submit a review, they later decide they don't like 
it.  But, it also removed the case where there was no dissent because 
everyone in the AC approved, but the director rejected it.

Not a big deal, but why needlessly have this wrong when there is a 
trivial wording fix?

Here's wording for the other fix - adding "Relicensing Unfinished 
Specifications <http://www.w3.org/2014/10/relicense.html>" to 
http://www.w3.org/2014/Process-20140801/#ACAppeal
That's because that policy has an AC review and it also does say the AC 
can appeal -- so another approved appeal that was approved after the 
last Process update -- so the Process needs to change to reflect that.

[[

When Advisory Committee review immediately precedes a decision, Advisory 
Committee representatives MAY only appeal when there is dissent 
<http://www.w3.org/2014/Process-20140801/#def-Dissent>. These decisions are:

  * Publication of a Recommendation
    <http://www.w3.org/2014/Process-20140801/#rec-publication> or
    Publication of a Rescinded Recommendation
    <http://www.w3.org/2014/Process-20140801/#proposed-rescinded-rec>,
  * Activity creation
    <http://www.w3.org/2014/Process-20140801/#ActivityProposal>,
    modification
    <http://www.w3.org/2014/Process-20140801/#ActivityModification>, or
    extension <http://www.w3.org/2014/Process-20140801/#ActivityExtension>,
  * Working or Interest Group creation
    <http://www.w3.org/2014/Process-20140801/#cfp> or extension
    <http://www.w3.org/2014/Process-20140801/#charter-extension>,
  * Relicensing Unfinished Specifications
    <http://www.w3.org/2014/10/relicense.html>
  * Changes to the W3C process
    <http://www.w3.org/2014/Process-20140801/#GAProcess>.



]]

On 2015-03-18 13:24, David Singer wrote:
>> On Mar 18, 2015, at 13:01 , Wayne Carr <wayne.carr@linux.intel.com> wrote:
>>
>> I think there is a misunderstanding of what I was asking for.  I'm not asking for something new.  I think the current wording doesn't express what I would think everyone thinks the policy is. Before addressing that, I want to bring up the other part of this that is simpler.
>>
>> The new policy to be able to relicense abandoned, unfinished specs that was approved by the AC and Director and that has a new AC appeal of the Director's decision on that in it.  That just needs to be added to the list in the Process of the things that can be appealed  That is just reflecting what we did already in the Process document.
> Do you mean AC appeal or AC Rep appeal (they are different)?

A single AC member asks for an appeal.  If 5% of the AC agree there is 
an up/down vote to override the decision.

>
>> Back to this other wording change.
>>
>> Background.   I think there is some confusion about AC Appeals are.  It is more like an override than an appeal. "An Advisory Committee representative initiates an appeal by sending a request to the Team (explained in detail in the New Member Orientation). The Team MUST announce the appeal process to the Advisory Committee and provide an address for comments from Advisory Committee representatives. The archive of these comments MUST be Member-visible. If, within one week of the Team's announcement, 5% or more of the Advisory Committee support the appeal request, the Team MUST organize an appeal vote asking the Advisory Committee to approve or reject the decision. "    http://www.w3.org/2014/Process-20140801/#ACAppeal
>>
>> Example 1:  AC Review on publishing a Recommendation.  400 AC reps approve publishing.  0 formal objections.  The Director rejects publication.  The AC cannot appeal even though support of the AC was unanimous.
> has this ever happened?

It's an extreme example.  The point is the wording says something we 
don't mean.   Better example below.

>
>> Example 2:  AC Review on publishing a Recommendation.  399 AC reps approve publishing.  1 formal objections.  The Director rejects publication.  The AC can appeal because 1 AC rep agreed with the Director to reject publication.  If no AC member had agreed, it is example 1 and the AC cannot appeal.
> But that’s exactly what FOs are for; someone thinks that a bad mistake is being made and asks the Director. It needs to be possible for him to agree, otherwise the FO is pointless.

Sure, and it's good the AC can appeal.   But do we want:

- AC cannot appeal a rejection when every AC rep who submitted a review 
disagrees with the Director
- AC can appeal a rejection when  every AC rep who submitted a review 
agrees with the Director

We can try to override (appeal) if everyone in the Review  agrees with 
the Director.  We cannot try to override if everyone in the Review 
disagrees with the Director.

Because that is the rule we have now :)

>
>> I'd think no one intends for that to be the case.  It's an error due to wording.  What the wording is trying to say is that the AC cannot appeal in the following case:
>> Example 2:  AC Review on publishing a Recommendation.  400 AC reps approve publishing.  0 formal objections.  The Director approves publication.  The AC cannot appeal.  No AC member can ask to override if there were no formal objections in the AC review.  That's good, but they worded it so it also bans appeal if the Director rejects publishing when no one objects to publishing!
> I think that may be intentional.

right, it's a wording error.

>
>>
>>
>> On 2015-03-18 10:28, chaals@yandex-team.ru wrote:
>>> 18.03.2015, 18:23, "Michael Champion (MS OPEN TECH)" <Michael.Champion@microsoft.com>
>>> :
>>>
>>>> It's not worth our time to pursue a fix to a hypothetical corner case unless the fix is quick and obvious.  It's clear from the call yesterday and this continuing thread that there is no easy consensus on this topic, so let's close it.
>>>>
>>>> If this scenario ever comes up, it's a symptom of far worse problems than some vague wording in the process document, and clarity in the process document will do little to solve those problems.
>>>>
>>> For what it is worth, while it is clear there isn't an easy consensus on whether the fix is worth making, there seems to be very little complicated about the fix itself.
>>>
>>> cheers
>>>
>>>
>>>> -----Original Message-----
>>>> From:
>>>> chaals@yandex-team.ru [mailto:chaals@yandex-team.ru
>>>> ]
>>>> Sent: Wednesday, March 18, 2015 9:19 AM
>>>> To: David Singer; Jeff Jaffe; Revising W3C Process Community Group
>>>> Cc: Wayne Carr
>>>> Subject: Re: w3process-ACTION-47: Produce a proposal for addressing wayne's "comment 9" - allowing appeal where the director's decision isn't the same as the proposal sent for review.
>>>>
>>>> 18.03.2015, 17:11, "David Singer"
>>>> <singer@apple.com>
>>>> :
>>>>
>>>>>>    On Mar 17, 2015, at 17:20 , Jeff Jaffe <jeff@w3.org>
>>>>>>   wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>>    On 3/17/2015 6:36 PM,
>>>>>> chaals@yandex-team.ru
>>>>>>   wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>>>    + wayne.carr@
>>>>>>>    - sysbot+tracker@
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>    I propose changing the second sentence of section 8.2 from
>>>>>>>    "When Advisory Committee review immediately precedes a decision, Advisory Committee representatives may only appeal when there is dissent."
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>    to
>>>>>>>    "When there is dissent in an Advisory Committee review, or the director reaches a decision other than that proposed (including simply not doing what was proposed), Advisory Committee representatives may appeal the decision."
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>    I think I understand the theory by which some would like to have more of the Director's decisions available for appeal.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>    But before I (or someone else) takes this proposal to the Director, it would be useful to provide some actual use cases.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>    For example, if a WG proposed a transition and it was rejected by the Director, and the WG felt so wronged that they wanted to appeal this rejection, that would be a sample use case.  Can someone give several examples where that happened in the last five years?
>>>>>>
>>>>>   That would be useful.
>>>>>
>>>> Actually, if this were a common enough problem to make that feasible, I would suggest that we would already have very serious problems.
>>>>
>>>>>   Also (though I know the process is vague about this in most cases) — appeal to whom?  The scenario envisaged is that the WG and AC were of a like mind and recommended course A, and the Director decided on course B, correct?
>>>>>
>>>>>   Presumably the Director was well aware of the WG and AC opinion and decided B anyway.  Would it not be rather superfluous for someone to say “we think you are wrong”, and appeal (presumably to the Director), when he made the decision knowing full well that the WG and AC disagree?
>>>>>
>>>> The director is unlikely (IMHO) to have a good standard for measuring the degree if disagreement across W3C as a whole. We hope this provision isn't exercised, but it provides a way for the message to be put by the AC that the director seriously misjudged, and should think hard about the decision again. Which is why an appeal process to the person who made the decision being appealed is actually a useful thing.
>>>>
>>>> cheers
>>>>
>>>> --
>>>> Charles McCathie Nevile - web standards - CTO Office, Yandex
>>>> chaals@yandex-team.ru - - - Find more at http://yandex.com
>>> --
>>> Charles McCathie Nevile - web standards - CTO Office, Yandex
>>>
>>> chaals@yandex-team.ru - - - Find more at http://yandex.com
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
> David Singer
> Manager, Software Standards, Apple Inc.
>
>
>
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