From: ned.freed@mrochek.com
Date: Tue Jan 07 2003 - 00:20:14 CST
> I wrote:
> >> I have a simple question. What can a UTF-8 subject header
> >> communicate that an RFC 2047 one can't? Other than inelegance,
> >> what's the downside of 2047, when the upside is a huge increase in
> >> backward compatibility?
> Charles Lindsey responded:
> > No, it's just the inelegance. Plus the fact that the backward
> > compatibility issue is nowhere so huge as you imagine. In fact, it is
> > rather small.
> Here, I believe, is the crux of the disagreement between the working
> consensus of usefor and the unanimous agreement of email folks from
> ietf-822.
> Usefor recently conducted a straw poll [1] in which raw UTF-8 headers
> barely won out [2] over using 2047/2231. (Specifically, in the #1 vs.
> #5 vote, the tally was 9 to 8.) The chair, Dave Barr, declared "rough
> consensus" [3] and suggested the group should move forward on that
> basis.
> I suggest to the usefor chair that the group should conduct the poll
> again, based on a new piece of information. Specifically, they've seen
> the applicable area director react in such a viscerally negative fashion
> [4] that it is nearly impossible to imagine anything resembling the
> current usefor approach being approved by the IESG. I.e., the backward
> compatibility issue is nowhere near as small as the group seems to
> believe.
> (Ned, if I'm overstating your viewpoint and its implications, my
> apologies, and please correct my error.)
It overstates things, but only slightly. First, I'm not the apps AD presently
responsible for usefor; Patrik Falstrom is. However, I am on the IESG, and at
some point this will be something I have to vote on.
My current position here is first that the use of message/rfc822 in the
proposed way is unacceptable, period. As for the general use of utf-8 in the
context of news, I'm having a great deal of trouble buying the argument that
this doesn't disenfranchise any number of gateways between the two
environments.
I have to say I find the recent claim that "in the reverse direction
News->Email, such general-purpose gateways just Do Not Exist" to be pretty
amazing, if for no other reason that I have years of direct personal experience
with such gateways. For example, as many of you know, I used to be a frequent
contributor to the info-pmdf mailing list, and that list was for several years
gatewayed bidirectionally between netnews and email. (This particular gateway
was discontinued in the news->email direction at some point, but other gateways
of this sort continue to operate.)
> Based on this new information, I would suggest that the group consider
> rechartering with a more precise plan and schedule, both approved by the
> IESG, in such a matter that successful publication of a standards-track
> RFC is a likely (or at least possible) outcome.
An excellent idea, one I would fully support.
> Alternatively, if the group decides it's not interested in the IESG
> imprimatur, I'd suggest that the group consider reforming outside the
> aegis of the IETF.
That's also an option, of course.
Ned