Re: Dealing with LLMs in IETF discussions draft

> On Aug 9, 2026, at 4:51 PM, Jay Daley <[email protected]> wrote:
> 
> Brian
> 
>> On 9 Aug 2026, at 08:30, Brian E Carpenter <[email protected]> wrote:
>> 
>> On 08-Aug-26 00:37, S Moonesamy wrote:
>>> Hi Chong,
>>> One of the points in your email was about who makes the technical
>>> claims in an Internet-Draft.  At the other end there is a person who
>>> reviews the technical claims and dispute/disagree with those
>>> claims.  That person (it can be more than one person) previously did
>>> not use a LLM to assess the correctness of the claims or to submit
>>> his/her disagreement.  Is it okay for the person to use a LLM to do that?
>> 
>> I think that question is unimportant. What is essential is that the
>> preson sending the message is 100% responsible for the message. Whether
>> they used a slide rule, a pocket calculator, a dictionary, a spell checker,
>> a search engine, or an AI tool, to prepare the message is irrelevant.
> 
> The key difference being that you can’t ask a slide rule, pocket calculator, dictionary, spell checker, search engine, Wikipedia, text book, online video (etc) to write the email for you and in their own words not yours.
> 
> I’m with Stephen here that accepting responsibility is irrelevant - all it will mean for some is "I commit to sending any replies to my AI so that it can write a response for me" not "I take responsibility for understanding what is written and understanding any responses".

I appreciate Stephen’s point about many readers for one writer. However, while personal responsibility may not be the full solution, I still think we have to have it. It can’t be irrelevant. We don’t want to get anywhere near “let your AI go and say whatever it thinks for you". IMO, Personal responsibility must include “I fully understood that message I just posted and it fully represents my view”. Not taking that level of personal responsibility should have consequences with peers, WG chairs, and moderators. The IETF should state this explicitly.

I don’t have any comments about what to do in addition to personal responsibility, but can see we might want some because as Stephen says: many readers for one writer.

LL