Donna claims:
> (i'm NOT blasting tony -- really....)

gee.....  and I thought she did such a good job doing just that...
     ;-)


>> we have been adamant about is that we don't work under
>> public scrutiny

> how very interex-ish of this group!  the bod also likes doing
> things with no (or too little to late) public scrutiny.  for heaven
> sakes, this is a major reason why there's such a blow-up right now.

touche !!


>> We have adopted the strategic area.

> 'big brother' is deciding what's best for the mpe community
> under a veil of secrecy?

One of the biggest problems with making "strategic" decisions
"behind the veil" is the blunders that can result when there is
a total (or near-total) absence of stringent, extended, and
objective technical peer review;  i.e.:  Even if the small group
of people making the decisions have the best of intentions, the
smaller the group the more likelihood that they will overlook one
or more serious flaws in what they promulgate...  that's why
professional scientific societies have what some might consider
ruthless peer review requirements:  If ideas cannot stand up to
pubic scrutiny, they need to go back to the drawing board...  and
as some of us know from long and occasional sad experience,
getting mistakes corrected after the fact is 10 times harder...

.... and I'm afraid I don't buy any theory that says "high-level"
strategic decisions don't need to get into much if any detail:
"The devil is in the details" comes up in one form or another
almost right away.....  just one example:   A lot of people said:
"Gee, we *really* need a good web server on the 3000"... well,
since you certainly don't want to go to the effort of putting *all*
web servers on one platform, you almost immediately come up
against the next question:  Which one(s) ??..  followed by the
need for an educated technical evaluation of the options....  for
which a broad-based peer review by a good cross-section of
experts is highly preferable....  HP stumbled on the "which web
server" question a couple times before they got it right (not
nearly all HP's fault, I realize):  Apache/iX.


>> Our major dependency is on funding, and at present that is working
>> out very well with Interex.  ....

> funding?  funding?  take away my 'funding' (as a sig) and what
> have i got?  hmmm, so i need to make my own copies and pay my
> own way to a conference?  ....

....  and with the ability to easily put stuff up on the web, people
can make their own copies if they want;  don't even have to do
that....    :-)


>> .....  prefer to operate quietly and as far behind the scenes as
>> our personal tastes for anonymity allow.

> i'm profoundly disappointed <sigh>

....  and if the end result of that "far behind the scenes" effort
is that HP expends some large amount of effort on something
that ends up being the next "wrong" thing ??...  I recognize
and agree there are times when stuff needs to be done under
non-disclosure, but having HP respond to a major "strategic
planning" effort produced by a very small closed committee (if I
understand it right) that does not submit proposals to serious
peer review scares me....


my hmmm...:  We may have another subject for the Interex
Business Meeting @ HPW.....  y'all come....

Ken Sletten