Japanese representative and other topics

["Scott E. Fahlman" <Fahlman@C.CS.CMU.EDU>]

I had hoped to hear from a few more of the Japanese biggies before we
did anything, but we shouldn't let this hang for too long.  Maybe we
should go along and propose to Ida the structure that I suggested
earlier (the JEIDA committee gets to pick a delegate, which will almost
certainly be Ida) and if it sounds OK to him we'll announce the plan
on Common Lisp, to which many other Japanese are now listening.

Maybe we should also send the statement I proposed earlier to Chailloux
and/or to the Eulisp mailing list?  People receiving the Eulisp
transmissions have recently seen a reiteration of their view (at least,
Fitch and Stoyan's view) that Common Lisp, as it is presently
constituted, ought not to be standardized.  They've got this idea that a
Lisp standard must be some sort of ideal of perfection that industry
ought then to try to live up to, while our view is (I think) that we've
already got a de facto standard, for better or worse, and we may as well
try to formalize it and clean it up a bit in the process.

My earlier proposal on copyrights and such seems not to have led to much
action.  Until we find out if Digital Press and Lucid will grant us the
rights I described and if ANSI will agree to the "anyone can use it"
permission, we're effectively dead in the water.  I believe that Mathis
should get an answer from ANSI on this, Steele from Digital Press, and
Gabriel from Lucid.  Are there problems that need to be resolved before
this can be settled?

As I said earlier, I'm pretty well buried with work through mid-May, but
I expect to make quick progress in resolving a lot of technical issues
after that.  If necessary, we can try to settle various issues and put
the decisions in a list, but I'd sure rather have an emerging document
at the center of this effort.  Sometime soon, I'll try to come up with a
statement of principles about much change we think is desirable in this
process.

I guess the Technical Committee election is over, and I am your new
chairman.  Thanks for the vote of confidence.  I'll try to keep up a
steady beat on the drum.

-- Scott