Session Date/Time: 16 May 2023 11:00

RASPRG

Summary

This interim meeting of the Research and Analysis of Standard Setting Processes Proposed Research Group (RASPRG) focused on a concrete work session to converge on key research questions and operational plans. The chairs, co-chair Ignacio Castro and the other co-chair, aimed for an interactive discussion. Key topics included identifying specific research questions related to IETF processes, discussing ethical and privacy considerations for data analysis, exploring ongoing joint work, and planning future meetings. A significant decision was made to retract the official IETF 119 San Francisco meeting slot in favor of a local side meeting and a dedicated interim work session.

Key Discussion Points

Agenda and Note-Taking: The preliminary agenda was accepted. Due to a lack of volunteers, the chairs offered to take notes from the recording.
Research Questions of Interest:
- The chairs presented an initial list of research questions focused on trending topics, main participants, and engagement duration within IETF working groups and areas.
- Influence of Non-Standard Documents: Stephen suggested researching the impact of patents and commercialization on participation and standard development, as well as linking academic papers and other outputs to IETF participation for a more holistic view.
- Patent Data Sources: Bernard provided detailed information on machine-readable patent databases (PatStat, PatentsView, EPO, UK IPO) and ongoing work linking patents to standards, including analysis of citations of IETF drafts in patent documents.
- Concept Travel: A discussion emerged around tracking how language and concepts travel between standards discussions, standard documents, patents, and research papers, to understand where innovation originates.
- Question Categorization: Colin suggested categorizing research questions by complexity and analytical dependencies to structure the work more efficiently (e.g., trivial data derivations vs. complex sentiment analysis).
- Defining Active Participants: Mirja, representing IETF leadership, highlighted the need for better understanding and defining "active participants" beyond mailing list activity, including engagement in meetings, GitHub, and potentially linking with anonymized survey data.
- GitHub Repositories: Sebastian inquired about a list of IETF-associated GitHub repositories. Rich confirmed that working group metadata includes GitHub repo links, accessible via the data tracker (though not directly via the current public API).
Research Group GitHub Repository Content: Discussion on populating the RG GitHub repo with bibliographies (categorized by discipline), links to code/tools, and accepting pull requests for new questions and categorizations.
Ethics and Privacy:
- Sebastian acknowledged that his initial ethics and privacy questions were largely addressed on the mailing list.
- The chairs noted a GDPR analysis indicating considerable carve-outs for research purposes, especially when IETF standard-setting is viewed as policymaking impacting society.
- Data Release Concerns: Colin raised concerns about releasing processed and annotated data (e.g., sentiment analysis results) if it contains personally identifiable information, suggesting that releasing tools might be preferable.
- GDPR and Purpose Restriction: The chairs clarified that commercial use of data would not fall under the research carve-out, and that licenses requiring users to confirm research purposes are being used. Sebastian, wearing his privacy scholar hat, discussed a potential discrepancy between the IETF privacy policy's emphasis on data publicity and European standards requiring a legitimate basis and purpose restriction, even for public data.
- IETF Privacy Policy: Jay clarified that the IETF's privacy statement, drafted by lawyers, is robust, relies on the public interest carve-out, and explicitly covers the purposes of operating in an open and transparent fashion. He emphasized that redoing the privacy statement would be exceptionally complex and unnecessary.
Exploration of Possible Joint Work:
- Stephen reported progress on the author recommendation tool, with code readiness for contribution to the RG repository, and emphasized the value of user feedback for tool development.
- Sebastian noted that BigBang is nearing a 0.5 release. Work on the dashboard code has paused since the last hackathon, but partners and funding sources are being explored.
Future Meetings (IETF 119 San Francisco and beyond):
- Initial discussion for an IETF 119 session. Many key contributors (including chairs) would not be physically present.
- Colin suggested retracting the agenda slot in favor of an interim meeting at a more workable time.
- Rich supported this, citing scarcity of agenda slots and less conflict.
- An "emerging consensus" indicated a preference for not using an official IETF 119 session slot for RASPRG.
- Rich offered to act as a local contact person for an informal side meeting in San Francisco.

Decisions and Action Items

Research Questions: Chairs will perform an initial categorization of research questions, share them on the mailing list, and maintain them in the RASPRG GitHub repository. Pull requests for new questions and categorizations will be accepted.
Data Access and Ethics: The chairs will share the GDPR analysis and examples of data access licenses used for research purposes.
Joint Work:
- Stephen will contribute the author recommendation tool code to the RASPRG GitHub repository.
- Sebastian will continue efforts to secure funding for dashboard development.
IETF 119 San Francisco Meeting:
- Decision: The official RASPRG agenda slot for IETF 119 in San Francisco will be retracted.
- Action: A side meeting will be organized during IETF 119 San Francisco to gather ideas and input for the next interim meeting. Rich volunteered to be a local contact.
Future Interim Meeting: A dedicated interim work meeting will be scheduled. This meeting will invite external standards researchers to broaden input and foster collaboration.

Next Steps

Chairs:
- Categorize current and proposed research questions; add to RASPRG GitHub repo.
- Share GDPR analysis and examples of data access license terms.
- Organize IETF 119 San Francisco side meeting (with Rich's local support).
- Plan and schedule a future interim work meeting, inviting external standards researchers.
Stephen: Contribute author recommendation tool code to the RASPRG GitHub repository.
Sebastian: Continue pursuing funding and partnerships for dashboard development. Release BigBang 0.5.
All Participants: Provide feedback on developed tools and consider contributing to the RASPRG GitHub repo.
Data Tracker API: Jay from IETF Secretariat flagged that the Data Tracker API is being redeveloped to use GraphQL, which will allow for faster and more direct querying. Researchers planning extensive API work are advised to contact Jay or the IESG (toast) for more information regarding the timetable and new interface.