Add Sustainability as a principle or value in the Vision

[michaelchampion]

[Editing and re-opening to focus on Sustainability]

I have been cross-referencing the points in the TAG EWP https://www.w3.org/TR/ethical-web-principles/ and the draft Vision. Most correspond pretty well; the TAG states some principles for the Web, and the Vision (in principle) applies them to W3C's work.

2.6 The web must enable freedom of expression

I suppose this is a question about W3C's relationship to policy makers, which is a thorny issue. I have no proposal for how the AB Vision should align with the TAG Principle.

2.7 The web must make it possible for people to verify the information they see

The Vision does mention the disinformation problem in the Introduction, I suppose that's sufficient.

2.9 The web must be an environmentally sustainable platform

I would like to see Sustainability called out as a W3C Value in the Vision document. There is a Community Group working on concrete guidance. The the Vision should explicitly endorse this principle with some "aspirational" language about working to incorporate it into W3C's review system in the future.

Specifically:

• Add "The web must be an environmentally sustainable platform" or something similar to the "Vision for the World-Wide Web" bullets
• Add something like "Encourage web standards, implementations, and best practices that minimize the energy consumed by web infrastructure" to the "We must" bullets
• Add some text crafted/vetted by someone from the Sustainability community to the "We will do this by" bullets

[cwilso]

I would again point out that the Vision isn't intended to replace the EWP; but the one Vision principle I WOULD like to add from here is Sustainability. We've been poking around that for a while.

That said, for all of these - as per the other guidance, we're trying not to impose grandiose vision without giving strategic guidance for how exactly the W3C can accomplish these goals, or adhere to these principles. TAG EWP 2.7 is a good example of something that fails this - I personally believe very much that humanity is headed in a very poor direction if we do not counter the massive misinformation, but I think we need to have a little more ideation of how the W3C could drive this principle and further this goal, before I'd want to add it to the Vision.

[michaelchampion]

Apparently not a useful ussue, closing

[cwilso]

I didn't say this was not a useful issue; I was asking what exactly you thought needed to be added, and giving my personal take - that I'm not sure how to add 2.6, or 2.7 though I think it needs to be a mission, and that 2.9 should be there. If this issue is "Add sustainability" that's a very useful issue that SHOULD be open, imo.

[michaelchampion]

If this issue is "Add sustainability" that's a very useful issue that SHOULD be open, imo.

OK, renamed and edited the issue. I have no expertise in this area so I defer to someone else to "champion" it ;-)

[tantek]

Thanks for raising this issue @michaelchampion.

As co-chair of the Sustainability Community Group (https://www.w3.org/community/sustainability/participants) I am happy to champion it.

I believe the first of your proposals is sufficient to resolve the specific subject of this issue, which is to add a sustainability principle or value in the Vision, and link to the TAG Ethical Web Principle of Sustainability accordingly.

In particular, PROPOSED:

• Add "The Web must be an environmentally sustainable platform" as a fifth item in the "Vision for the World-Wide Web" section, and link the phrase “environmentally sustainable platform” to https://www.w3.org/TR/ethical-web-principles/#sustainable

I suggest this proposal be considered in the context of my proposed resolution to #5: #5 (comment) as I believe it is consistent with and adds to that proposal.

If the Vision Task Force RESOLVES on this proposal, I am happy to create a PR for the edit accordingly.

For the remaining points @michaelchampion raised of adding specific text for “energy consumed by web infrastructure” and crafting new text for the "We will do this by" section, I’d like to do that as subsequent proposals and edits, presuming the task force resolves on the above granular proposal, if that‘s ok with @michaelchampion.

I’m ok with keeping this issue open for that, or (preferably) closing this issue per the title being resolved, and opening new issues for considering creating "how to" text for sustainability.

(Originally published at: https://tantek.com/2023/116/t3/)

[nigelmegitt]

The link to EWP §2.9 is really important here. The issue I have is that EWP §2.9 makes really important points, but the practical steps are about reducing the increase in energy use by minimising data storage and processing requirements. They're at best 2nd order improvements.

The primary correlation with energy usage of the web is with overall usage, and since our vision is to have one web for all humanity, that implies increased usage, and therefore increased environmental impact, if you look at the web on its own.

I support the vision that the web plays a strong part in reducing the overall environmental impact of humanity on the world.

However is it realistic to have a vision that has it both ways: reduce impact and increase usage? If we really want to achieve that we'd have to commit to making potentially compatibility-breaking changes, based on environmental profiling. I guess this might include things like saving transfer bits by changing the syntax of protocols in URLs to change :// to :/, or maximising server-side pre-processing to minimise client impact, or defining bit-rate and parsing-efficiency improving binary representations for e.g. HTML etc. that would push against the ease-of-adoption approach we have now.

If we collectively want to commit to environmentally profiling the entire use of the web and making potentially breaking changes to reduce impact, then I agree we should put this in our vision. But do we? Can we validate that we have consensus for that?

[this is my individual view, not validated as the view of the BBC]

[frivoal]

since our vision is to have one web for all humanity, that implies increased usage, and therefore increased environmental impact, if you look at the web on its own.

I think "if you look at the web on its own" is important here, and we should not look at the web on its own. Video, for instance, is probably one of the most resource using thing on the web. But to the extent that WebRTC supplants people taking planes to meet each-other face to face, it's still a massive win.

Between two ways of achieving similar goals, we should go for the more resource conserving one. But we should not necessarily stay away from things that are potentially resource intensive if they would enable an alternative to something that is even worse.

I do support the addition of sustainability, and what Tantek proposed seems reasonable, as I don't think it contradicts the above.

[nigelmegitt]

what Tantek proposed seems reasonable, as I don't think it contradicts the above.

I think it does contradict what you wrote above, @frivoal , which I agree with, because it talks about the Web in isolation, rather than the Web in the context of the world's overall environmental impact.

[cwilso]

As I looked at this more closely, I questioned that perhaps this should NOT be in the "Vision of the Web" section, but rather in the principles and values. I worry putting in the Vision for the WWW section elevates it too much - this is the NINTH point in the Ethical web principles, yet we only chose four here - putting this ahead of freedom of expression, for example, seems wrong, and sustainability seems to fall clearly to me under "for the good of its users". I'll work up a PR for that, but understand that this is a discussion point, and if there is consensus that it should be in the top section, I will revise.

[michaelchampion]

As I recall when reviewing the draft Vision and EWP side by side some time ago, I was struck that "sustainability" was one of the few principles explicitly mentioned in the EWP that had no counterpart in the Vision.

If the Vision is explicitly intended to prioritize the most operationally important Principles, in the interests of keeping things focused and concise, it's fine not to mention this one. But if there is general correspondence between the EWP and the Vision except for this one (and those completely out of W3C's control such as "freedom of expression") then I'd be inclined to include it.

Sustainability could plausibly be used to guide actual W3C decisions, at least in the scenario where proof-of-work (aka "proof of massive electricity consumption") approaches get traction again. "That violates our Sustainability Value, so please take that standards work elsewhere" would be a way to efficiently avoid controversy and and inevitable formal objections in that scenario.

[cwilso]

@michaelchampion i wasn’t suggesting it not be added; just that it go in the later sections. See the PR #78 .