On October 12nd and 13th the IESG (Internet Engineering Steering Group) and IAB (Internet Architecture Board), the two IETF management bodies, held a joint design session on OAM. I was a bit surprised that the IETF leadership would be interested in devoting a separate meeting (not coinciding with an IETF conference) to the subject of OAM; OAM has never been an area of IETF expertise. Indeed, when