Hello Paul,
On 5/5/26 20:14, Paul Wouters wrote:
On Tue, 5 May 2026, Jacob Appelbaum wrote:
Hello Paul,
The below is fairly long message where you reason that the onus is
on the IETF rejecting its core principles in favour of a single
individual not playing along with the core principles, where in fact
the least friction solution is not for the IETF to ignore or change
it rules, but for that participant to simply remove its bogus
Derivative Clause.
No, that is not my argument, and it is not an accurate characterization
of what I wrote.
Reducing the objections of around a dozen people to one individual is
not a reasonable characterization of the situation. And given that this
kind of moderation is itself relatively new, I do not think "core
principles" can simply be assumed in the way you suggest here.
When moderation affects a complaint about moderation during a live
consensus process, the burden is on the process owners to act promptly
and transparently, regardless of the separate dispute you want to
foreground. This is thankless work, to be sure, but declaring
"consensus" without a visible explanation for the unresolved objections
and requests for clarification is not persuasive.
You are blaming the messenger and the receiver, instead of talking
to the entity causing what you deem to be a major issue.
I am not blaming the messenger. Part of my objection is that there was
no message and there has been very little transparency about the
handling of the matter.
Have you talked to them on why their derivative clause is more
important than your grave concerns that this author's discussion
points are not being heard by the TLS WG?
They were directly CC'd on the email in question. Have I missed a reply?
The derivative-rights dispute and the moderation issue are distinct.
Both are also distinct from the consensus call itself.
Even if one assumes the disclaimer language is improper, it does not
follow that a complaint about moderation, or a complaint about
consensus, should simply disappear into moderation without any
acknowledgement during WGLC.
Stephen requested clarification about consensus and explicitly
questioned whether rough consensus had been reached. Do you see that
reasonable request being addressed? I do not. Did I miss a message? If
so, I would welcome a link to the email that I missed.
I have nothing further to say on this (somewhat off)topic, so I'll
step back again to prevent further noise from distracting from the
on-topi discussions.
Paul
Understood. Thank you for taking the time to reply to emails that you
deem as fairly long.
The process point remains: the moderation complaint was not
promptly acknowledged or posted, and there was no visible response to
the consensus concerns that were raised, including about the
consensus call itself.
In terms of IETF core principles, rough consensus is among the most
important. I do not see evidence here that the underlying rough
consensus concerns have been resolved or that the principle is being
honored here. I see unresolved objections, requests for clarification,
and a continued shift away from the process and results questions raised
by roughly a dozen people.
Kind regards,
Jacob Appelbaum
On 5/5/26 16:35, Paul Wouters wrote:
On Mon, 4 May 2026, Jacob Appelbaum wrote:
I am even more surprised that your complaint hasn't been
acknowledged, nor has it been released from list moderation in
the ~ five days since you sent it.
Based on your quoted message, it seems djb once again added this
erroneous and misleading disclaimer to the message. So I am
surprised you are surprised.
It is a choice of when and how to enforce rules, and that
enforcement can fairly be perceived as having a problematic
appearance.
Also, note that you violated DJB's "no derivative" clause when
your mail client modified djb's content when republishing it.
My legal counsel disagrees; but thank you for your perspective and
your concern.
You should also not be the delivery vehicle for djb's moderated
messages by quoting his message verbatim in a list reply as
this also contains djb's bogus "no derivative" clauses that
violate RFC5387.
This is beside the point.
My point was not to endorse any disclaimer language. My point was
that a complaint about moderation of dissent in an active WGLC
appears to have been left unacknowledged and unposted for days.
That is a process issue regardless of anyone's views on
derivative- rights language.
https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/rfc5387/
I assume you meant RFC 5378, not RFC 5387 ("Problem and
Applicability Statement for Better-Than-Nothing Security (BTNS)
RFC 5387").
For an enourmously detailed response of the IETF community to
djb, see:
https://datatracker.ietf.org/group/iesg/appeals/artifact/232
https:// datatracker.ietf.org/group/iesg/appeals/artifact/220
https:// datatracker.ietf.org/group/iesg/appeals/artifact/129
https:// datatracker.ietf.org/doc/statement-iesg-statement-on-
clarifying- derivative-works-rights/ https://
datatracker.ietf.org/group/iab/ appeals/artifact/229 https://
datatracker.ietf.org/group/iab/appeals/ artifact/228 https://
datatracker.ietf.org/group/iab/appeals/ artifact/140
Those older disputes do not answer the narrower point I raised
here.
Note that there isn't unanimity that the IESG has primacy over
BCPs, RFCs, etc., as Simon and Rob have discussed as recently as
today on the ietf list:
- https://mailarchive.ietf.org/arch/msg/
ietf/1hzXylWOjyrwErIKO67uE2P5cno/
Moderating a complaint about list moderation during and directly
after a live consensus process remains a serious matter.
Moderating your complaint seems plainly and directly related
to your views on hybrid cryptography, and to the views of
others who were ignored in the consensus call.
It does not. Simply read the above links for context instead of
jumping to conclusions of ill intend of the TLS WG.
Intent is not the issue; results are the point. Intent is often
hard to establish, but the result here is directly observable.
I'm not responding to the rest of the message, as it is
responding to quoted text from a message that contains bogus and
misleading derivative rights statements. If that message is
posted by the original author without such restrictions, it can
be discussed on its merit.
Paul
That is your choice, and it does not resolve the underlying
concern. Consensus was not reached, and delaying the message
further suppresses dissent while again placing the burden on those
who raised unresolved concerns.
If the TLS WG wants to show that moderation here was unrelated to
the substance of the complaint, the straightforward way to do that
is to acknowledge the complaint and release it, or clearly explain
the basis for not doing so.
Kind regards, Jacob Appelbaum
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