Re: on CGs incubating for a WG - was -> Re: Followup to "Supergroups" message to AC Forum

On 23/06/2016 02:25, Carr, Wayne wrote:
> 
>   Here is a Community Group Charter template for a Community Group that
>   is controlled by a parent W3C Working Group.  The Working Group writes
>   and modifies the Community Group Charter and names the Community Group
>   Chairs.  The Community Group can go beyond the current scope of the
>   Working Group Charter, but the Working Group provides the list and
>   description of deliverables.  The Working Group modifies the Community
>   Group charter to modify the deliverables over time.

I'm not sure to fully understand everything here...

So in such a model, the CG's list of documents remains under rather
tight control and it cannot really "incubate" on unchartered new ideas
without a Charter amendment coming from above? "In scope" seems to
me totally useless then.

One of the reasons incubation CGs were originally proposed was to
simplify the incubation process and respond to people saying our way
of making new stuff emerge is too complicated, too long, too
process-based. I remind all readers we have in front of us a quasi-
informal organization able to incubate and push forward new ideas
overnight.

Furthermore, Incubation CGs were meant to let the WGs above "finalize"
REC track work moving the whole imagination effort down the road to
CGs. I am under the very strong impression that Incubation CGs should
have a scope but *not* a list of specs. Deliverables are for
WGs. An Incubation CG should be able to start work on *anything* in
scope w/o any kind of authorization or control from above. Then the
above WG accepts or not to include that work in its own list of
Deliverables. Please note the question of what happens and what's the
negative impact on W3C's image if the decision is a "no" remains
unresolved at this point... And I see it as a *very* important concern.
Potentially even a critical concern.

Do we really think CG members willing to start work on ideas in
scope will wait for a Charter amendment if it's not in the current
list of CG or WG deliverables? Is that what we want and what we need?

In the model described above, and if I understood it correctly, I think
we're losing the whole CG benefit and I don't see the work division
between WG and CG useful in any way. I even see it quite harmful.

> (aside: I think the CSS WG has been treated differently than other groups like Web Platforms and Device and Sensor in allowing CSS to be looser in defining deliverables. That may be because there is less concern about patents in the areas dealt with in the CSS WG.  It isn’t a practical model for much of what W3C does.)

Not only that. The Membership of the CSS WG has a dual position here:
on one hand, some of its AC-Reps care about Charter, ETAs, etc. On
another, Members push new ideas and new drafts *all the time* and it's a
browser war. It's out of question to wait. I repeat: out of question.
So the same AC-Reps say nothing when an unchartered FPWD is published.
I have litterally dozens of live examples of that behaviour. And still,
the CSS WG is an example of a WG in good shape and resisting pretty well
to the "living standards" frenzy.

That's the very reason why I am saying our process is not in line
with our daily practice any more and we should change it.

</Daniel>

Received on Thursday, 23 June 2016 06:24:36 UTC