[ietf-dkim] Tracing SSP's paradigm change

[Steve Atkins]

On Dec 6, 2007, at 8:57 AM, Michael Thomas wrote:

> Dave Crocker wrote:
>> Michael Thomas wrote:
>>> And as far as I can tell, you alone seem to be carrying this torch
>>> here. Changing what we agreed on with rfc5016 should require a very
>>> high barrier. I see little if any support, let alone broad consensus
>>> that we got it wrong.
>
>   You still didn't respond: did you read 5016 before it was issued?
>   In fact I know that you did because you gave a lot of very detailed
>   feedback. And this was not one of the thing you commented on at the
>   time, so charges of "paradigm change" ring rather hollow.
>
>> So, you missed the postings by Levine and Atkins?  (Perhaps some  
>> others were on "my" side of this topic, but these two were at  
>> least quite explicit.
>
>   I didn't read them as supporting your reading. Let them speak for
>   themselves. There are a lot of things being discussed, after all.

I broadly agree with most of Dave's concerns...

>
>> I guess they don't know much about the topic or anti-abuse  
>> recipient operations behavior, so it's probably ok to keep this an  
>> individual ad hominem dismissal.
>
>   Saying that you need broad consensus to change the documented
>   consensus is hardly an ad hominem dismissal.
>
>> I've tried to recruit postings by some other anti-abuse folks who  
>> have expressed strongly negative opinions, but they have declined,  
>> indicating that they try to avoid being abused, and do not see any  
>> indication of interest in serious discussion about this in this  
>> group.
>>  From the style of quite a few postings on the list, can you blame  
>> them?
>
>   Ah, the silent majority. Still silent after all these years.

... but this working group has  people who are prepared to spend
a lot of time to shout down those they disagree with, leading to an
unproductive and unprofessional environment. I find the lack of
courtesy and professionalism here unpleasant enough that I tend
not to get involved much, even though I see very poor design
decisions being made.

It's unavoidable to some degree - any mention of "antispam" tends
to bring the noisy kooks out of the woodwork - but it's not going to
lead to a well-engineered, useful protocol.

Cheers,
   Steve