Subject: What is at stake?

From: Ed Gerck <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 23 Jan 2002 18:53:25 -0800

List:

U.S. Census data from Feb 19 stress the Internet time warp and
hint at the risk of ignoring it. What is at stake when a RFC is
faulty or not correctly implemented, for example hurting interoperation
or security, grows exponentially in time, and fast.

The Internet broke the 60 percent penetration barrier in the U.S. faster
than any other medium. For example, some 35 percent of the U.S.
population had phone use in 1920, but penetration didn't reach 60
percent until 1950. With the Internet, a comparable increase in
usage only took two years.

Telephone - surpassed 60 percent in 30 years
Cable TV - surpassed 60 percent in 27 years
Computers - surpassed 60 percent in 15 years
Radio - surpassed 60 percent in 10 years
VCR's - surpassed 60 percent in 10 years
Television - surpassed 60 percent in 5 years
Internet - surpassed 60 percent in 2 years

In this scenario, and with all due respect to everyone's opinions,
policies that might have been justifiable some 10 or 15 years ago,
such as laissez-faire interoperation, conformance verification and
trust, cannot be justified by saying "the existing system is quite
effective" or "in doing this for the last 10 years, i've yet to suffer a
mishap because of this..."  What was, aint' any more.

In addition, within the last ten years the Internet has changed radically
from a centrally controlled network to a network of networks -- with no
control point whatsoever.  There is, thus, further reason to doubt the
assertion that what worked ten years ago will work today in the same
way.

Cheers,

Ed Gerck

---

From: "Gary E. Miller" <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 23 Jan 2002 19:39:46 -0800 (PST)

Yo All!

Well Al Gore invented the internet in the early '80s, and the internet
penetration was not 60% by the early '90s, SO I think these numbers
are bogus.

RGDS
GARY
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Gary E. Miller Rellim 20340 Empire Blvd, Suite E-3, Bend, OR 97701
	[email-masked]  Tel:+1(541)382-8588 Fax: +1(541)382-8676

---

From: Ed Gerck <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 23 Jan 2002 20:04:45 -0800

The lesson from these numbers of 1999/2000, and that is why (somewhat
tongue-in-cheek) I quoted them and did not comment on the "Internet
being 2 years old",  is that they reflect what the public *sees* of the
Internet.

Let me be clear. The Internet as we know of today really started to
"exist" when it become possible for anyone to have a website AND
connect to the Net -- not just those who were university- or military-
affiliated.  And this was 1995/1996.  The US Census only started to
collect data on the Internet in 1997 -- before that, the Internet was
not even in the radar screen.

So, it is no surprise that to the Census the Net started in 1997. That
is when it started to matter. We should take note of that date as well.

In this process and with all due respect, it seems that many in the
IETF were like a frog being slowly boiled -- the frog dies and never
jumps before, because the temperature rises so so slowly.  Many
never realized that the Internet they were talking about -- and some
still are -- is just a relic of the past.

The lesson that I wanted to drive home is that "10-year arguments"
are really not appropriate here.  The Internet as we know of today did
not exist 10 years ago.  Ten years ago it was not even really an internet,
it was more like a network -- with a central control point.

Cheers,

Ed Gerck

---

From: Ari Ollikainen <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 23 Jan 2002 20:57:14 -0800

>assertion that what worked ten years ago will work today in the same

	Really?

	Could you name the entity (and network) that you claim
	centrally controlled "the Internet" a decade ago?

	BTW, how accurate do you suppose the US Census Bureau data
	can be in regard to what homes/individuals have/do whatever,
	given that it collects its data every decade...?

---

From: [email-masked]
Date: Thu, 24 Jan 2002 00:12:21 -0500

> 	centrally controlled "the Internet" a decade ago?

I'm pretty sure that there was a total Bozo the Clown in charge of
"the Internet" at that time - I remember foolishness like one site that
announced a route for 127/8 which was actually believed by a lot of sites.

I'm sure if anybody clueful had been in charge, things like that would
not have happened.

> 	given that it collects its data every decade...?

Odd.  I just got a survey from them the other week.  They *do* run other
surveys than their big constitutionally-mandated one every decade, you know.

-- 
				Valdis Kletnieks
				Computer Systems Senior Engineer
				Virginia Tech

---

From: George Michaelson <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Jan 2002 15:36:45 +1000

We'll know when the Internet 'matters' on this measure, when they
take the management and oversight away from the IETF.

Like all other conspiracy theories, this falls down on defining
who 'they' are and 'matters'.

Australian State and Federal statistics on Internet only began a couple
of years ago. But Australia was connected back in '87/'88. 

I think Jon Crowcrofts descriptions of the 'smoke filled room' days
which proceeded the IETF might dispute the idea that 'they' ever
a) failed to know what they were doing or b) relinquished control
in the first place.

What is at stake, is that its very late, and we all need to stop
sending email.

-George

---

From: Michael StJohns <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 23 Jan 2002 22:24:30 -0800

Umm... ok - 15 years ago.  US DOD, Defense Communications Agency under an 
agreement with ARPA ran the Internet (all 20-50 networks of it) and its 
"core routing system". In fact the internet was actually called the "DOD 
Internet".  It wasn't until around '87 that a non-government  sponsored 
system (e.g. a system that wasn't sponsored or under contract to DOD, NSF, 
DOE...) was connected to the ARPANet/MILNET core.

---

From: Camile Howe <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Jan 2002 01:38:36 -0800 (PST)

Obviously standards non-conformance abuse by industry
is "major concern" of IETF members, 'cause I haven't
seen this type of "chat-discussion" email (over 100)
since TCP.  

Would expect that it is an ISOC & IAB joint "internet
management/oversight" decision as to how we implement
industry conformance oversight.  Believe most IETF
members agree that there would be (industry) incentive
to follow an "internet compliant" certification
program. If implemented properly (& inexpensive enough
for the little guys, perhaps $scaled to business size)
would most definitely ease the quantity of offenders. 
 IETF members will gladly assist in the process
development of IETF Protocol standards compliance
methodology. Below is one possible(high-level) method
of implementation.

Per the mass/chat-mail discussion...

The IETF is not an oversight/management org of
Internet. 
That is the IABs charter. Policing corporations'
standards implementations
surely is beyond our scope (& $..ha!).
IETF is to engineer/develop standard protocols.

It seems quite appropriate that our IETF chairman
denounce any product known (proven by any IESG member)
to deviate from an IETF standard, in the event that
the deviation will/might impede the Internet's
operation or performance.  However, this is risky
since in all probability will have a very negative
effect... media and politics in the development of
standards is bad business. Remember that is why we
segregated domain naming. Publicity breads political
intervention and inevitably limits innovative
development.

Believe this area should be the IAB's charter. Since
most of us discover short-coming of products during
our own employment endeavors, we should establish a
new procedure that facilitates us to provide
standard-offensive data (perhaps an impact rating
scheme), by which the appropriate working group can
independently validate and pass on to our chairman...
better yet...
the IAB (or even ISOC since it a profit/fee org). This
would give our spokesman/representative what is
required to make such a "damning" non-conforming
statement.

As far as certification of any standard.  Again, it is
not the IESG charter, however it is would be
appropriate for the IAB to approve certain "test
centers" to perform validation/certification
endorsement on behalf of the IAB.  Most large
companies, Sun, MS, IBM etc have the same sort of
program.  The IAB then gets a percentage of what the
"test center" makes.  Could be the most cost-effective
way to implement policing world-wide.  The IAB could
be our public voice as well.

Camile

PS A quote from the IAB... 
"Another fuzzy boundary is "how far up or down do we
go?" With the international political drive for
information superhighways, the IAB is expecting the
Internet to become the infrastructure for the
"Information Infrastructure." Does this mean that
every information handling protocol must be developed
by the IETF? Certainly not!"
http://www.iab.org/connexions.html

--- George Michaelson <[email-masked]> wrote:
> ...

Hrm,

SoUL = Software Underwriters Laboratories

but I thought the UL was a distinct company in it self
that other 
companies
send stuff to for testing.
So some one withe means and clout in the industy needs
to take it up.

Suppose could put of a website like
http://www.underwriters.org...     
hrm
www.sul.org

and gear it as a contact point for software testing.

At 10:08 AM 1/23/02 -0600, Alex Audu wrote:
>Great idea, but you also should not leave out the
issue of compliance
testing.
>May be an organization like
>the Underwriters Laboratories,..or some other newly
formed group
>(opportunity,.. anyone?) could take
>up the role of compliance testing.
>
>Regards,
>Alex.
>
>
>Franck Martin wrote:
>
>> I support the idea, what needs to be done is the
IETF to come with a
>> trademark and someone to Inform the ISOC about all
this discussion 
and also
>> to register this trademark...
>>
>> Lynn, Could you please read this thread from the
IETF archives, it 
could be
>> interesting for the development of ISOC/IETF.
>>
>> Franck Martin
>> Network and Database Development Officer
>> SOPAC South Pacific Applied Geoscience Commission
>> Fiji
>> E-mail: [email-masked] <mailto:[email-masked]>

>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Kyle Lussier [mailto:[email-masked]]
>> Sent: Wednesday, 23 January 2002 4:04
>> To: Donald E. Eastlake 3rd; [email-masked]
>> Subject: Re: Fwd: Re: IP: Microsoft breaks Mime
specification
>>
>> We need stronger enforcement of the RFC's, and we
need creative
>> thinking as to how to go about that.  I like the
idea of an easy
>> in "IETF Certified" trademark, if you abuse it, it
can be revoked,
>> and then vendors building contracts around
supporting IETF Certified
>> products.
>>
>> It gives CIOs something to rattle about as well. 
I.e., they
>> can require IETF Certification of products, which
guarantees them
>> standards support, as enforced by the IETF
community.
>>
>> Just a simple precise trademark construct, with an
"easy-in"
>> application that costs maybe $100 per product, and
supported
>> by the IETF.  That certification could be revoked
down the road.
>>
>> IETF doesn't have to be a conformance body or
litigator.  It just
>> merely needs to be the bearer of the "one true
mark" :).
>> Kyle Lussier
>> AutoNOC LLC

----------------
...
> 
> keith - may i refer you to don eastlake's earlier
reply? viz., the 
existing
> system is quite effective because products that
don't play by the 
concensus
> rules have a much harder time thriving or even
surviving.

sometimes this works.  as a generalization, it doesn't
hold up.

> > Just to pick a small example: MIME has been out
for nearly 10 years 
and
> > I'm still receiving, on a daily basis, MIME
attachments that are
> > unreadable because they lack proper content-type
labelling.
> > That's not what I would call "effective".
> 
> then ignore it or fix it. obviously, the pain isn't
at the point 
where it
> bothers you... for myself, the program that handles
my incoming mail 
dumps
> MIME-bad stuff into an audit file and then ignores
it. if it was
> "important", then whoever sent it can get on the
phone... in doing 
this for
> the last 10 years, i've yet to suffer a mishap
because of this...

that kind of solution is easy for you or me. 
unfortunately, it doesn't 
scale to a user base of 100s of millions of people
that's trying to use 
email to ship around attachments and wondering why
they don't work.
...
Keith

...One common way for an idea to be half-baked is for
it to utterly fail 
to 
consider the needs of some constituency or another. 
As the Internet
has become larger and more diverse our organization
has also become 
fragmented, its participants representing very diverse
interests. 
Probably 
for this reason it's become fairly common for working
groups to produce 
results that are half-baked in this way.  Throwing
such half-baked 
ideas 
to the marketplace usually hasn't resulted in
refinement, but it has 
resulted in harm to the Internet's ability to support
new applications.  
And by the time the harm is understood, it's way too
late to kill the 
bad idea. 

As for making non-conformance public, I would very
much like to see 
that happen.  Whether IETF is in a good position to do
this is a 
different
question.  Since (perhaps unfortunately) most of
IETF's energy comes 
from 
vendors who pay their employees to work within IETF
working groups, and
some of those same vendors have reputations for
producing dangerously 
non-conformant implementations, I think it puts IETF
in a precarious 
position if it starts pointing fingers at the vendors
who produce such 
things

Keith

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Great stuff seeking new owners in Yahoo! Auctions! 
http://auctions.yahoo.com

---

From: Lloyd Wood <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Jan 2002 12:50:24 +0000 (GMT)

> take the management and oversight away from the IETF.

The IETF has neither management nor oversight.

Have you been paying attention to ICANN, or to that hubbub over
Postel's 1998 'unsanctioned' DNS root server move?

> of years ago. But Australia was connected back in '87/'88.

in an intermittent fashion.

L.

'Australia's fallen off the net again!'

<[email-masked]>PGP<http://www.ee.surrey.ac.uk/Personal/L.Wood/>

---

From: George Michaelson <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Jan 2002 23:00:06 +1000

> 'Australia's fallen off the net again!'

Actually, that was Britain in 1985/6, when the BBN butterfly lacked sufficient
memory to handle the routes and the UK dropped off the bottom.  Ah, where
would we be without fixed price contracts. no cash, no fixums. 

Better yet the hosts.txt file and telnet death on a 60 second login: timeout
before it could scan the file...

So if the IETF doesn't manage the Internet, how come it keeps defining MIBs?

Judging by the IRTF session on content, the lawyers own it all anyway...

cheers
	-George

---

From: "Ramanathan" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Jan 2002 08:28:58 -0500

Here is my two cents worth on the subject. As all of you know there are many
oversight bodies. One of the great aspects and advantage of IETF is the free
flow of ideas and the freedom it allows for implementations. There are
methods already in place to change specifications. As the proverbial saying
goes; "if someone invents a better mouse trap" they can submit a DRAFT RFC
for consideration.

Another point to consider is while, oversight bodies start of with good
intentions, it gets bogged in turf wars and internal fiefdoms over time. The
same violators starts influencing the outcome, usually the big guys that are
breaking or violating implementation specs today at the expense of the
little guys. This will eventually kill the spirit and workings of IETF as we
know today.

Pall

-----Original Message-----
From: [email-masked] [mailto:[email-masked]]On Behalf Of Camile
Howe
Sent: Thursday, January 24, 2002 4:39 AM
To: George Michaelson; [email-masked]
Cc: [email-masked]'; [email-masked]; [email-masked];
[email-masked]
Subject: IAB/ISOC not IETF Charter Re: What is at stake? Re: IP: Microsoft
breaks Mime specification

Camile

Hrm,

issue of compliance
testing.
formed group
IETF to come with a
this discussion
and also
IETF archives, it
could be

specification
need creative
idea of an easy
can be revoked,
I.e., they
guarantees them
community.
"easy-in"
supported
down the road.
litigator.  It just
mark" :).

----------------
...
reply? viz., the
existing
don't play by the
concensus
surviving.

for nearly 10 years
and
attachments that are
labelling.
at the point
where it
my incoming mail
dumps
it. if it was
phone... in doing
this for
because of this...

Keith

---

From: "Ramanathan" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Jan 2002 08:28:58 -0500

Pall

-----Original Message-----

Camile

Hrm,

issue of compliance
testing.
formed group
IETF to come with a
this discussion
and also
IETF archives, it
could be

specification
need creative
idea of an easy
can be revoked,
I.e., they
guarantees them
community.
"easy-in"
supported
down the road.
litigator.  It just
mark" :).

----------------
...
reply? viz., the
existing
don't play by the
concensus
surviving.

for nearly 10 years
and
attachments that are
labelling.
at the point
where it
my incoming mail
dumps
it. if it was
phone... in doing
this for
because of this...

Keith

---

From: vint cerf <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Jan 2002 08:38:03 -0500

Mike,
actually DCA had only responsibility for the ARPANET 
and MILNET, officially. The rest were the responsibility
of the network operators - usually schools and research labs.
In 1981 the CSNET project brought up non-DoD components
including PhoneNet and the X.25 extension of Internet 
developed by Univ Wisconsin. This was an NSF-funded initiative.

The first NSFNET backbone came up in 1986 (Dave Mills' fuzzballs).

Vint

At 10:24 PM 1/23/2002 -0800, Michael StJohns wrote:
>Umm... ok - 15 years ago.  US DOD, Defense Communications Agency under an agreement with ARPA ran the Internet (all 20-50 networks of it) and its "core routing system". In fact the internet was actually called the "DOD Internet".  It wasn't until around '87 that a non-government  sponsored system (e.g. a system that wasn't sponsored or under contract to DOD, NSF, DOE...) was connected to the ARPANet/MILNET core.
>
>

---

From: "Meritt James" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Jan 2002 08:59:01 -0500

Which number?  The " Al Gore invented the internet in the early '80s"?

Yup.  Bogus.

I'm finding the inoperable wishes quite entertaining.  Nice thoughts,
but impractical.

-- 
James W. Meritt CISSP, CISA
Booz | Allen | Hamilton
phone: (410) 684-6566

---

From: "Meritt James" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Jan 2002 09:01:10 -0500

No one, let alone Bozo the clown, claimed to be "in charge of the
Internet" a decade ago with any degree of realism. International,
remember?  An item that would be well considered with the dreams
espoused...

[email-masked] wrote:
>   ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>    Part 1.2Type: application/pgp-signature

---

From: Ed Gerck <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 23 Jan 2002 23:21:01 -0800

>         centrally controlled "the Internet" a decade ago?

ARPA.

Control was injected into the original ARPANET by the ARPA
Contracts, which controlled all users and uses of the initial
ARPANET and the Early Internet.  The Appropriate Use Rules
dissolved slowly between 1986 an 1995.  Thus, one of the ARPA
roles was to instill trust by holding the power to remove badly
behaving users.  Very few were removed, but in the early days,
everyone knew that had better behave, or else...

However, when the Appropriate Use Rules dissolved slowly
between 1986 an 1995, it seems that the denizens of the Net did
not become aware of the loss of trust until it was truly gone (now!)...
and now they wonder where it went, or if it ever existed, cause
they did not see it going away;-)...

Stef has an interesting chronology of these events, in terms
of the paradigm shifts that hit the Net as it developed. I am
indebted to his clear formulation (some of which I repeated
above) as well as to his Frog analogy. What has happened,
is that as the ARPA controls slowly dissolved with the
evolution of the Internet, it has had the effect of Boiling The
Frog, where-in the Frog does not notice that anything is
happening  until now it is too late for the Frog to do anything
about it.

>         given that it collects its data every decade...?

;-) That would be the best job in the world, if it were true. The US Census
collects data every day.  Please see their interesting report "Home
Computers and Internet Use in the United States: August 2000 " at
 http://www.census.gov/prod/2001pubs/p23-207.pdf

Cheers,

Ed Gerck

---

From: Ed Gerck <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Jan 2002 07:55:44 -0800

vint cerf wrote:

> this formulation does not take into account the transfer
> of responsibility and authority for policy increasingly
> to NSF and to the so-called Federal Networking Council
> after about 1988. NSF's role increased substantially
> with the creation of the NSFNET.

Yes. Other points were also left out, such as the role
played by BBN in showing that it could work, and
the gradual decrease of NSF's role  to the point were the
NSF was prohibited from spending money on it.

> In any case the principal point is that the USG has
> deliberately relaxed its control over policy as the
> Internet has become increasingly commercialzed and
> internationalized.

Yes, this is the big picture.  But, as central control
was relaxed, trust has evaporated because it was based
on control (or, better yet, fear of control -- see Postel
1998).  However, trust can be based on other factors
in addition to control or even fear of control.

So, the really principal point behind the conformance
discussion (which, BTW, I think should be about how to
make non-conformance public rather than certifying
conformance) is that these other factors must now be
introduced in order for trust to be induced without
re-introducing control or fear of.

Since the cat can, and indeed may, go back to the
bag in this case, it seems to be in our best interest
to find ways to induce trust without recourse to
control (or fear of) as the only solution.

Cheers,

Ed Gerck

---

From: Joel Jaeggli <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Jan 2002 08:12:43 -0800 (PST)

<SNIP>

> Internet - surpassed 60 percent in 2 years

I seem to recall 1968 being the lower-bound year for internet 
penetration... notwithstanding that, which two years are you talking 
about?

joelja

-- 
-------------------------------------------------------------------------- 
Joel Jaeggli	      Academic User Services   [email-masked]    
--    PGP Key Fingerprint: 1DE9 8FCA 51FB 4195 B42A 9C32 A30D 121E      --
The accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive, and judiciary, in 
the same hands, whether of one, a few, or many, and whether hereditary, 
selfappointed, or elective, may justly be pronounced the very definition of
tyranny. - James Madison, Federalist Papers 47 -  Feb 1, 1788

---

From: Michael Hammer <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Jan 2002 11:03:18 -0500

Quick question:  Could one university communicate to another university 
without going through the ARPANET?

Mike

At 08:38 AM 1/24/2002 -0500, vint cerf wrote:
> >Umm... ok - 15 years ago.  US DOD, Defense Communications Agency under 
> an agreement with ARPA ran the Internet (all 20-50 networks of it) and 
> its "core routing system". In fact the internet was actually called the 
> "DOD Internet".  It wasn't until around '87 that a 
> non-government  sponsored system (e.g. a system that wasn't sponsored or 
> under contract to DOD, NSF, DOE...) was connected to the ARPANet/MILNET core.
> >
> >

---

From: vint cerf <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Jan 2002 11:11:05 -0500

yes - Phone Net (University of Delaware developed) and the Telenet (X.25)

vint

At 11:03 AM 1/24/2002 -0500, Michael Hammer wrote:
>Quick question:  Could one university communicate to another university without going through the ARPANET?
>
>Mike

---

From: Dave Crocker <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Jan 2002 08:23:07 -0800

>re-introducing control or fear of.

Let's see.  You initially post a statement about Internet history that gets 
the time and players wrong.

Then you post a clarification that cites lots more detail, some of which 
you still get wrong.

Conformance discussions like the current one have been regular fodder for 
Internet mailing lists for, perhaps, 15 years.  They crop up every couple 
of years.  The group "script" for the discussion is highly consistent.

As a consequence, citing the current occurrence as being for new reasons is 
entirely unfounded.

And wrong.

d/

----------
Dave Crocker  <mailto:[email-masked]>
Brandenburg InternetWorking  <http://www.brandenburg.com>
tel +1.408.246.8253;  fax +1.408.273.6464

---

From: Dave Crocker <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Jan 2002 08:35:53 -0800

>The first NSFNET backbone came up in 1986 (Dave Mills' fuzzballs).

Folks,

1.  The historical significance of NSFNet on Internet technology and 
operations is often missed.  As I recall, it broke the single-backbone 
routing model that existed and required a fundamental change to the 
exterior routing protocol, to support multiple backbones.  This was a key 
technical enhancement for permitting the current open, competitive 
backbone.  Steve Wolff, then at NSF and now at Cisco, deserves particular 
credit for driving this basic improvement to Internet design and operation 
choices.

2.  Oddly enough, Steve characterizes CSNet as having turned out to be a 
kind of market research effort for the later NSFnet project.

3.  An oddity to Vint's wording might lead one to think that Univ. of Wisc. 
did the Phonenet work.  Harumph!  Vint knows differently but others might 
not.  (Vint gave Univ. of Delaware an ARPA contract for doing an NCP/TCP 
email gateway contract for the transition to TCP/IP in 1983.)  Anyhow, 
Phonenet was done entirely at Univ. of Delaware.  Dave Farber  was the 
PI.  I did the development and operations, except that another grad 
student, Ed Szurkowski, did the telephone link-level protocol, which had 
interesting flexibility compared with equivalent telephone data link 
protocols of the day.

Phonenet was the link protocol.  MMDF was the email relay software.  The 
project began with Army funding and later got CSNet funding.  The service 
was email relay between Arpanet (and later Internet) email hosts and host 
accessible only over dialup.  Hence this broadened the Internet email 
community dramatically, since getting on the Arpanet/Internet was quite 
constrained by policy and cost.

d/

d/

----------

---

From: Tony Hansen <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Jan 2002 11:58:04 -0500

and there was always uucp, the favorite of unix lovers back then. :-)

---

From: Bill Manning <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Jan 2002 09:25:08 -0800

BITnet played a part also, though it was a later on.

---

From: Vernon Schryver <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Jan 2002 11:08:17 -0700 (MST)

> From: Dave Crocker <[email-masked]>

> of years.  The group "script" for the discussion is highly consistent.

It's a syndrome far older than the SuperHypeWay.  If you read the
letters to the editor section of your local newspaper, you'll find
"activists" singing very similar songs about schools, traffic lights,
and a zillion other issues in hopes of enhancing their power, authority,
and influence, but without personal cost or risk.

The HypeWay version was refined in the old com-priv mailing list.
Standards committee go-ers and others without responsibilities or clues
begin yammering about an impending disaster that can be averted only
if there is a new oversight organization to force lazy or evil workers
to straighten up and fly right.  Some of these "consumer activists"
and "stakeholder representatives" (as they style themselves in recent
years) graciously offer to serve in the new oversight organization,
but only if they get the power and authority of being a commissar
without bearing any responsibility, risking personal consequences, or
needing a clue about what they're overseeing.  The other activists
demand that incumbent pooh-bahs pay attention and discipline those
lazy, evil workers, and hereafter pay more attention to activists.

The activists always claim to have been present and influential from
the start, but they have special definitions of "present," "influential,"
and the subject itself.  Anything that happened before their appearance
is mere prelude.  Recent events and actors unknown to them are entirely
irrelevant.  Everyone else is either ignorant, part of a conspiracy
to cause the disaster, or in silent agreement.

If "conformance activists" really cared about their issue, they'd do
something themselves instead of only demanding others risk and act.
Some would register a service mark like "Internet RFC Compliant"
and start charging $100 to use it.

Others would register a domain like "rfc-violations.org" and create
web pages for their public standards non-compliance list.  They might
contact people who have already done something like that, complete
with a DNSbl for rejecting mail.  See http://www.rfc-ignorant.org/

(Never mind that rejecting mail for RFC non-compliance breaks the
fundamental rule of "Be strict in what you send and generous in what
you accept.")

Vernon Schryver    [email-masked]

---

From: John W Noerenberg II <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Jan 2002 10:54:30 -0800

At 8:23 AM -0800 1/24/02, Dave Crocker wrote:
>Conformance discussions like the current one have been regular 
>fodder for Internet mailing lists for, perhaps, 15 years.  They crop 
>up every couple of years.  The group "script" for the discussion is 
>highly consistent.
>
>As a consequence, citing the current occurrence as being for new 
>reasons is entirely unfounded.
>
>And wrong.

At least one other membership organization that develops 
telecommunication protocols does not impose any overt sanctions 
against those members who fail to comply (3GPP2).

It is a practical impossibility for ISOC (and by extension, the IETF) 
to act as a protocol compliance judge.

But can a society have a rule of law, if there is no explicit cost to 
the member who fails to conform? This is the essence of Ed's question.

Is it wrong for the IETF?  In a practical sense, yes.  Is this a 
question which applies to the IETF or to ISOC?  To ask this a 
different way, does the IETF and its protocols constitute a society? 
(Looking up the etymology of society, its root is also found in the 
word "persecute".)

best,
-- 

john noerenberg
[email-masked]
   ----------------------------------------------------------------------
   While the belief we  have found the Answer can separate us
   and make us forget our humanity, it is the seeking that continues
   to bring us together, the makes and keeps us human.
   -- Daniel J. Boorstin, "The Seekers", 1998
   ----------------------------------------------------------------------

---

From: Michael StJohns <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Jan 2002 11:15:16 -0800

Yup - agree with all this.  Question was not the component networks, but 
the "Internet".  In 1987 we still had the core routing system - EGP - and 
that was run centrally by the DOD.  It wasn't until around '89-90 (later?) 
with the inception of the CIX and the NAPs that we got away from that model.

Sorry for the imprecision in my previous post - but in '87, unless you had 
a government sponsor you didn't get on the Internet and the actual 
'control'  and approval point for new connections was the DOD DCA.  The 
inception of the NSFNet changed this somewhat but the original connections 
to the NSFNet were agreed to by ARPA who then directed DCA to make the 
connections.

Later, Mike

---

From: vint cerf <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Jan 2002 10:37:04 -0500

Vint

---

From: Ed Gerck <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Jan 2002 11:55:59 -0800

These events happened gradually and under central
delegation (that could be revoked, see 1998 root incident),
moving from a fully centrally controlled internet (that looked
an awful lot like a network) to what we have today,
where no one can control both ends of a communication
channel, neither sending nor  receiving. Nor the route.

Even though it was so gradual that it was  almost
unnoticeable, the transformation from a centrally controlled
network to a true internet where no one is "in charge" can
and did of course cause much uncertainty and conflict. And
this just gets harder as the Net expands to more than 60%
US houselholds served and brings in new users who
are utterly clueless. IMO, the solution is to learn how to
trust that which we cannot control. To some this may
sound even sacrilegious, but life is no different  ;-)

Cheers,

Ed Gerck

Bill Manning wrote:

> -
> This message was passed through [email-masked], which
> is a sublist of [email-masked]. Not all messages are passed.
> Decisions on what to pass are made solely by Raffaele D'Albenzio.

---

From: Dave Crocker <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Jan 2002 12:26:53 -0800

>and did of course cause much uncertainty and conflict. And

Ed,

There have now been multiple postings that explained how reality was 
substantially different than you have been claiming.

As a consequence, actual history does not support your conclusion.

In other words, Ed, the Internet does not have the problem that you are so 
tenaciously promoting.

d/

----------

---

From: Ed Gerck <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Jan 2002 13:34:29 -0800

Dave,

It is OK if you do not agree with what I wrote below or
if reality seems a bit different to you, or me. But I don't know
what it is that was so different.  Maybe you saw the Net
being born exactly as it is today, and there was no evolution
from a fully controlled network to an internet that no can
control as whole.  Or maybe you see the Net as still fully
centrally controlled. Those are the two possible scenarios
where you would not see a problem because everything
is as it was 25 years ago. No need for change.

So, if it  is important,, can you please explain what it is that
you disagree with in my pragraph below?  Please, excuse
my lack of understanding.

Cheers,

Ed Gerck

---

From: Keith Moore <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Jan 2002 17:03:09 -0500

> In other words, Ed, the Internet does not have the problem that you are so

no, it doesn't follow.  it follows only that Ed has failed to demonstrate
the problem.

Keith

---

From: Ed Gerck <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Jan 2002 14:10:04 -0800

> no, it doesn't follow.  it follows only that Ed has failed to demonstrate

And so that we might all agree, what would that problem be?

Cheers,

Ed Gerck

---

From: grenville armitage <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 25 Jan 2002 10:16:32 +1100

Ed Gerck wrote:
	[..]
> unnoticeable,

Almost unnoticeable to whom?

gja

---

From: Einar Stefferud <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Jan 2002 18:02:23 -0800

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
>And so that we might all agree, what would that problem be?
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Well, my initial goal of seeing a serious discussion of the 
"conformance problem" seems to have been met, though some seem to 
think this is a non-issue, or perhaps that it is of no great 
consequence.  Or maybe "A fools's errand!"

Since Ed has quoted and referred to me, and since Ed and I have been 
thinking and working together on this for about 4 years in the 
context of the existence or non-existence of interpersonal 
(inter-subjective) trust among Internet users and systems, I would 
like to now insert a few (more or less) new ideas.

I think today's massive flood of mail does demonstrate that the 
Internet once upon a time was totally controlled from a single point 
of control, namely ARPA and a sub-hierarchy of ARPA Contract Agents, 
such that anyone using the ARPANET cum Internet could be said to do 
so under cover of certain ARPA Office Central Control Delegation of 
Permissions.

This "control" caused all of us pioneers, including Vint and some 
Dave's, and other users to be careful of what they said or did so as 
to be assured of continued access to the net.  This fact is 
documented (in the late 1970's with a message from Dave Farber to the 
MsgGroup discussion list that spelled out the fact that we all should 
be careful not to exceed certain group and individual behavioral 
bounds because it might bring the wrath of congress or other Govt 
Critters down on ARPA and on us network users (ummm... Pioneers).
So, let it be known that we all knew we were pioneers in some new 
kind of wilderness with unknown species of beasts to fear, but the 
new vistas were very enticing, and so we all joined in the 
exploration with enthusiasm, and some caution.

So, we were all careful, more or less, mostly.

This controlling pressure was loosely applied, but when rules are 
loose, sometimes they are more effective for inducing good behavior, 
because no one knows quite where the disbarment boundaries might be, 
and everyone stays well back from them.  It is when we are too 
familiar with the rocky coastline that we are willing to sail too 
close, and thus find our boats crashing and sinking.  Reminds me of 
ENRON;-)...  They thought they knew where the limits were;-)...

For myself, during that period (1975-1993), I always made certain 
that I had at least one US Govt Consulting Contract that called for 
my use of the ARPA Internet to deliver my consulting work products. 
I expect all of us pioneers  did this, whether consciously or not. 
(I do recall a few people heading for the exits though, looking for 
piece of mind in the Forests of Oregon, etc.)

Very few people were ever removed, or even chastised, though in one 
notable incident on the MsgGroup Mailing List, someone in DEC (more 
or less) accidently posted what might be considered the first spam 
EMail (addressed to every ARPANET Directory Person with a west coast 
EMail address, including the entire ARPA office in Virginia;-)... 
with an announcement of the showing of a new DEC-20, Model 20, 
computer at some location in the Silicon Valley.  ARPA officers 
officially notified DEC by signed letter of its having broken the 
Appropriate Use Rules, and DEC was instructed to not make this same 
mistake ever again.  Everyone that learned of this episode took 
careful note of it.

This message is also lodged in the full MsgGroup archives at 
<http://www.tcm.org/msggroup>.  If need be, I will locate these 
MsgGroup messages and forward the URLs to interested parties...

Also of note was the fact that in 1983, ARPA ordered a sort of flash 
cutover of all ARPANET IMPs and HOSTS from NCP to TCP/IP protocols. 
(The flash took a lot longer than flashes are supposed to take, but 
the intention was for a "Flash" to occur.  That was the last time 
anyone was able to actually shut down the entire ARPA/INTERNET by 
command or by system failures from any central "control point" or 
"single point of failure"..

Of course, the UUCP and CSNET sub-systems kept running over their 
telephone dialup connections for their own connected sites, so in 
some sense even then we saw the beginnings of the loss of total 
central control by any given single lowest common reporting point for 
the whole Internet (as we think of it now).  But, this trend was not 
visible then because the UUCP and CSNET segments we saw were "only 
attachments" to what we saw then as "The Net".  Indeed, no one at 
ARPA or anywhere else had enough authority to shut down the UUCP 
network.
CSNET was running from a single central EMail Service Host so it 
could have been shut down for the cutover, but there was no logical 
reason to do so  for its dialup telephone connected users.

 From that point forward, central control continued to diminish slowly 
enough for the decline to be more or less imperceptible, unless one 
looked back over some non-trivial number of years.  Certainly at the 
time of the TCP/IP cutover, no one sensed any hint of the thought 
that from then forward, central control capabilities would 
monotonically diminish until it was no longer possible.  And most who 
saw some hint of it then, now seem to have said "good riddance!"

I know I did.

I do recall Steve Wolfe saying clearly, after the cutover:  "The net 
will never again stop turning packets!  They will continue flowing 
somewhere in the net till the end of time!"

And, no one thought to plan ahead for such a long slow loss of 
central control, though as a network management consultant then, I 
had some sense that there was going to be some revenue generating 
work for me to do in the field of decentralization!  And so there 
was!  Much of the work of building out the net proceeded with many 
people feeling secure in knowing that there was someone in charge and 
in control, until suddenly one day some of us woke up and said

	"Hey, Look, The Emperor has No Clothes!".

Even today in this very thread, we can see denials of this lack of 
central control, and even denials of the existence of a problem with 
it.

So, indeed, we Internet Denizens have been boiled like the Proverbial 
Frog, and we suddenly find our souls existing in a new world, though 
we seem not to have died in the process.

Now, Ed Gerck's main point is that the original cozy feelings of 
inter-personal trust and broad trust in the net that we had for each 
other and for the net as a whole, were induced by the initial sense 
of certain central control with punishment for bad behavior (e.g., 
banishment from the net user community).

The belated discovery that trust has disappeared since 1995 when the 
NSF Appropriate Use Rules were dropped has led to some thinking about 
why and where our trust went, and about what to do about it, such as 
for instance, finding a new way to induce trust in the net as a whole 
and among its users, without resorting all the way back to total 
central control of user behavior and control of the content of their 
information exchanges.

	Internet Driver's Licenses anyone?

but take note: Societies do not depend on central control for trust 
inducements among their many citizens, and the same is true of our 
local and global economies.

In Short:  "Houston, We Have A Problem!".

How can we develop a new source for trust?

This is the problem that just came to the surface here with a 
forwarded observation about some application conformance failure of 
some vendor, and a question regarding what might or might not be done 
about it.  Or, in other words, what can we do to improve our sense of 
trust for vendors when they do not conform of Open IETF Standards?

Now, for my part, I recall apologizing for inappropriate posting by 
means of the EUDORA ReDirect Command (thus damaging your trust in 
me), and also noting that my initial suggestion that the IAB should 
write someone a letter that takes note of the non-conformance facts 
(inducing even more distrust).  I indeed had not thought carefully 
enough about the fact that the IETF does not have the authority to 
issue any such signed letter, and I was directly advised that we 
should not even want the IAB to have such authority.  I agreed then 
with this point, and have never since repeated my unsound first shot 
at a solution.  So, lets pass on my faux pas, and get the to core of 
the issue.

Since then, a very robust discussion arose, which suggests that there 
really might be a problem to be solved, if we could only figure out 
what that real problem is or was.

So, I am here trying to nail down the problem.  Unfortunately, it has 
turned into a bit of an essay after laying down some kind of factual 
base, with citations of historical events and activities.  Those who 
hate reading my essays  will no doubt have abandoned the effort by 
this point, so I will assume that if you are still with me, you find 
some common sense here-in.

So, here is what I think is the problem, and I sense that trying to 
solve it with denial or efforts to solve some other subproblem will 
not succeed in solving the real core meta problem.

As I see it, the meta problem is that our initial primary trust 
induction tool, namely "Our Original Lowest Common Single Control 
Point" has disappeared into the mists of time.  And nothing has moved 
in to fill the gap.  With no obvious inducement for trust induction 
and no other available tools for inducing trust among the elements of 
the net, including its users and their computer based application 
tools, we are now faced with the fact that everything we see (or 
sense) on our workstation screens just might be false.  Even EMail 
from our trusted friends!  Or virus or Worm  bearing messages from 
IETF-Discuss!

Any similarity with the great mind experiment of Rene' DesCartes, is 
surely an accidental synergy, since this was not the objective of the 
founding of the ARPANET or the INTERNET, or anything in between. 
But, none-the-less, here we all are, trying to figure out what we 
actually know, in the face of this distrust of what we see on our 
screens.

It is interesting to watch from the sidelines as the entire Internet 
population engages in the Modern Internet Version of DesCartes Mind 
Experiment without knowing what was the Primary Experimental Question.

So, the contemporary question is:

	"Assuming that all that you sense on your screen might be false,
	 what do you know?"

Or in this situation:

	"Where did our trust go, and how can we get it back?"

Until we get it back:

	"Houston, We Have A Problem!"

Cheers...\Stef

---

From: Einar Stefferud <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Jan 2002 18:02:23 -0800

I know I did.

Or in this situation:

Until we get it back:

Cheers...\Stef

---

From: "Tony Hain" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 25 Jan 2002 11:59:59 -0800

Stef,

This is actually a superset of the recommended work item I suggested for
the IAB last year on establishing a trust infrastructure. While my
recommendation was focused the policy issue of establishing points of
trust, your note points out that may be premature because we know that
some of the Internet participants will act to defy trust and we have no
recourse. On the other hand, if technical mechanisms existed for global
multi-party trusts to be established, recourse could be fully
distributed as people could choose to ignore untrusted parties.

Tony

> From: [email-masked] [mailto:[email-masked]]On
> Behalf Of Einar
> Stefferud
> Sent: Thursday, January 24, 2002 6:02 PM
> To: [email-masked]
> Subject: Re: What is at stake?
>
>

---

From: "Tony Hain" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 25 Jan 2002 11:59:59 -0800

Stef,

Tony

---

From: Einar Stefferud <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 25 Jan 2002 20:47:44 -0800

Please pardon my strange FROM address, as my primary posting SMTP is 
refusing my mail, so I am using my (ugly)  backup FROM address at 
Verizon;-)...\s

>Almost unnoticeable to whom?

++++++++++++
To everyone!

Do you know of anyone that noticed it as it was beginning to happen?...
In the 1980's?  Or in the 1990's?

I noted some of it some time in the 1990's when I began presenting a 
story about a series of paradigm shifts that followed development and 
growth of our beloved Internet.

Computers > Networks (with central control) > Internets (without 
central control).
But, I was not focused entirely on control, or on its impacts on trust.

But what was really happening in terms of the loss of trust was not 
clearly articulated until the Third Millennium.

Ed and I have been discussing these ideas together since 1997.
They are clearly not yet fully articulated as we continue to find new aspects.

In the late 90's there were a lot of people around the world 
discussing trust with Ed in his MCG discussion list, without fully 
connecting it with the Internet Control phenomena we are discussing 
here.  See <http:/www.mcg.org..br>.

Cheers...\Stef