Subject: IETF Meeting Survey

From: Ray Pelletier <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 18 Apr 2007 17:20:47 -0400

All;
The IAOC is interested in your feedback on IETF meetings in general and 
IETF 68 in Prague. Your responses to a short survey will help us prepare 
for and conduct these meetings.  Your participation is anonymous and 
candor is appreciated.

The survey is available until May 4th and can be found at:
http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.asp?u=920863605951

At the end of the survey you will be able to see the survey results to 
date, and thereafter at:
http://www.surveymonkey.com/Report.asp?U=360595179633.

So, whether you went to Prague or not, this survey is for you.

I do appreciate the help.
Thanks

Ray Pelletier
IETF Administrative Director

_______________________________________________
Ietf mailing list
[email-masked]
https://www1.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf

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From: Eric Rescorla <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 18 Apr 2007 14:47:51 -0700

> So, whether you went to Prague or not, this survey is for you.

Ray,

Thanks for doing this survey.

Two of the questions (18 and 19) would be much easier to answer with a
little extra information:

18. When breakfast is included in the room rate for the contracted
    hotels breakfast is not provided at the meeting to be most cost
    effective. Do you agree with this practice?

19. During the Monday and Tuesday afternoons there are two breaks. For
    budget reasons we provided only beverages and no snacks during the
    first break, approximately 2 hours after the lunch. Do you agree
    with this practice?

Could you maybe send out a mail with the rough approximate costs of
these when we run the meetings in the US (as a baseline)?

Best,
-Ekr

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From: Janet P Gunn <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 19 Apr 2007 06:55:45 -0400

There was no place for comments on the "breakfast question".
I think an important criterion is not just whether the CONTRACTED HOTEL 
provides breakfast, but whether, in addition, the OTHER HOTELS IN THE AREA 
where IETF-ers are likely to stay, provide breakfast.

If we are in a city where MOST HOTELS include breakfast, then it is fine 
to not provide breakfast at the meeting.

But if it is ONLY the "contracted hotel" that provides breakfast,  and the 
other hotels do not, then I think that the meeting should provide at least 
SOME breakfast items.

Janet

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From: Dave Crocker <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 19 Apr 2007 07:25:33 -0400

Janet P Gunn wrote:
> But if it is ONLY the "contracted hotel" that provides breakfast,  and 
> the other hotels do not, then I think that the meeting should provide at 
> least SOME breakfast items.

Whether a break period should or should not include food might be a 
reasonable question, given the limited time to forage for food elsewhere.

But what is the reason for presuming that the IETF has an obligation to 
feed us meals?  Why breakfast, but no other meal?  Why any?

d/

-- 

   Dave Crocker
   Brandenburg InternetWorking
   bbiw.net

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From: Janet P Gunn <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 19 Apr 2007 08:14:20 -0400

Good question.
But that isn't how the survey question was phrased.

The question wasn't "should IETF provide breakfast (in general)?"

The question was "should IETF skip breakfast if the contract hotel 
provides it?", which seems to presume that IETF WILL continue to provide 
(continental) breakfast if it is not included in the room rate at the 
contract hotel.

Janet

---

From: John C Klensin <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 19 Apr 2007 11:34:22 -0400

--On Thursday, 19 April, 2007 07:25 -0400 Dave Crocker
<[email-masked]> wrote:

> Whether a break period should or should not include food might
> be a reasonable question, given the limited time to forage for
> food elsewhere.
> 
> But what is the reason for presuming that the IETF has an
> obligation to feed us meals?  Why breakfast, but no other
> meal?  Why any?

I have to agree with Dave.  Recognizing that the questions
weren't included in the survey,

(1) I think it is an open question as to whether the IETF should
be feeding us any meals, including breakfast, especially if
doing so increases either the hotel room costs or the
registration fees.  The observation that the combination of
other commitments and personal habits result in many of us
missing some or all of those "included" meals reinforces that
view.  Of course, if the negotiation with the hotel is such that
the IAD and secretariat have a choice between "supply at least
one meal each day" and "pay for the meeting rooms at
significantly higher net cost", that becomes a different
question... and I don't believe the community needs to get
involved in a discussion of how that particular sausage is made.

(2) In cities where hotels routinely offer "with breakfast" and
"without breakfast" rates, I would hope that the IAD and
Secretariat would negotiate for the lowest room rates possible,
without breakfast if that is less expensive than the "with
breakfast" rate.   In a perfect world, they could negotiate for
a "breakfast supplement" to the "no breakfast" rate, but the
goal should be lowest possible participant cost.

      john