IAMCP suing Swedish branch of ISO (SIS)?

As my friend nd writes).

Do they not think SIS understand they have to review their process already? SIS has already said they are doing the review.

Updated: The chairman of IAMCP Sweden has posted a comment to this post of mine. He in this post explains his view on the situation. You should read his comments here. I will just respond to them.

Being someone that has been working with standardization in the Internet for many years now (I think I started actively 1992) I have some view myself of what is a good and a bad process, and given that I think mr Berti is wrong (he explicitly asks what I think). First of all, the central management of an SDO should not micromanage the working groups (or whatever the groups are called where the actual work is done). The central management has of course different tasks depending on the SDO, but decisions should be made locally. Among the people working with the standard. In different SDOs the rules are different for how to become such a participant and how the decisions are made. Because of that, I think SIS made the correct decision to not interfere beforehand in the meeting on August 27. The working group could among themselves decide to not use strict voting at that meeting, simply because there where so many new participants in the work. New participants in the process that had already been going on for so long time. No one was forced to vote. New members in the wg could have abstained. Or become members of the wg after the voting. That responsibility to try to resolve the issues do lie on the chair of the wg. So I disagree with mr Berti there as well. mr Berti even think this is bad management, something I strongly disagree with.

After the voting SIS received the result and descriptions of what actually happened on August 27, and the board then made a decision that Sweden would not vote at the meeting of ISO. That is the responsibility SIS board has, and I see nothing wrong with that. The wg come with a recommendation, and why would the board always follow that recommendation? That the board can vote differently show the strength of the SDO. But of course the number of such situations must be minimized. What the board base their decision on? Maybe a report from the wg chair on what really happened? Maybe some board members where on site of the August 27 meeting and draw their own conclusions? I do not see any reason for the board to disclose more than necessary from their internal discussions. And to say that Sweden would abstain due to the chaos of the August 27 voting I think is enough. I disagree with mr Berti here as well.

Lastly mr Berti explain why he feel he has to use legal action, and that is because SIS do not want to discuss the reasons with him anymore. This view I think is completely out of the blue. What would the legal action help with? An SDO process is supposed to be a constructive process, not a destructive one, and looking back at what has happened instead of forward on what can and should be improved just create enemies, and increase the gap between individuals that possibly already do not like each other.

And about the actions Microsoft too, mr Berti say there where similar to what IBM and FFII did. That is wrong as well. One can also look at the meeting on August 27 and see what really happened. One description you can find here. On top of this, if the people that where friends of Microsoft that went there had withdrawn their interest in voting on site (as some other people did) the mess should not have been so messy.

Mr Berti and whoever of the new members that signed up on August 27 could themselves have known (he say himself that SIS could have known about the mess before the meeting…) what was going to happen, but they still choose to pay and become members. They knew it was a mess and because of that, there was a risk that the SIS board would not follow the recommendation from the wg. A membership fee is btw not only payment for a vote, but to be able to participate in the wg.

I have absolutely no feelings for the people in any SDO that do not accept the final decision by the SDO (in this case the board of SIS) and because of that want to get their membership fee back. If the decision is very rough (as in this case) then the people not liking the decision still has to accept it. Else they work harder in the wg to create a recommendation that create not as hard feelings. Everything boils down to a responsibility that lies completely with the member(s) of the wg. If they want things rough, things will get rough. If they want consensus, things can go smoother (but sometimes take more time).

So, no, I do not agree with mr Berti at all, and I do not think any legal action help any SDO in making their process better. Only cooperation and not confrontation helps. Now SIS has to spend time and money in defending themselves in a legal case instead of working on improving their process. So dear IAMCP Sweden, you have not made the most vise decision in the history of SDOs.