Talk:Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers

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Contents

[edit] History

The history section is very unclear and short on background.

[edit] IEC and IEEE

Why is there an IEEE when there is an IEC? Are they working competitively? --Abdull 11:53, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)

IEC is involved in standardization and certification, on the opposite the IEEE has many activities in addition to standardization.

In standardization they are not really competing as IEC and IEEE signed an agreement in 2002 to have common dual logo standards. There are already many such standards. The aim of both organization is to avoid duplication of work, there are not so many experts in the world ready to write standards, generally in addition to their "normal" work.Dingy 06:32, 21 August 2005 (UTC)

Membership models is another key difference: IEC has countries for members (the U.S., China, United Kingdom, etc.) -- IEEE has individual professionals as members. IEEE does many things beyond standards -- conferences, academic and practitoner publications, and within some of the countries where it is active, insurance programs, accreditation and even 'informing' public policy. [JDI May 2006]

[edit] Is IEEE really international?

One must study their legal documents to state this clearly. But as it has been recently discovered, US is not the whole world (yet), so the fact that IEEE has to follow the US parliament issues shows that they are not fully international yet. I hope things get smooth soon, and they really want to be independent of any single country.

The "I" stands for "International," not "Independent."

All legal organizations must have some umbrella for operation; ISO and IEC operate out of Geneva; some organizations actually hold United Nations charters (which is as international as one can get.) ... However, whatever juristiction is used for the legal formation; each of these is still subject to the legal reguirements of the jurisdictions in which it operates. U.S. law can be applied to any organization operating in the U.S. (with an exception for diplomatic immunity where folks can be kicked out for serious violations.) ... the IEEE is subject to these constraints, and also those of China, India, the UK, etc. wherever it has meetings, conferences, or even sends its publications. Which does not mean there is not a lot more IEEE can do to become more international ... as the overall membership of IEEE moves from a U.S. majority to a non-U.S. majority this will become even more important. Clearly countries like India and China are rapidly becoming major factors in the engineering world. (Joining much of Europe and Japan where this is already true.) [JDI May 2006]

[edit] Power of IEEE

Removed "They think they're god." What was meant is not clear. Obviously not literal. If the refernce is to the wide use of IEEE standards, the commenter should examine how IEEE standards are written. They are widely used because they are wirtten by a large communitiy (users, manufacturers, experts, regulators).

[edit] IEEE Standard Logic

I just came across "IEEE Standard Logic" which is a 9 valued logic standard used for digital system simulation. Seems like this should at least be linked from this page. User: fresheneesz

[edit] Coverage of Standards

It appears to me that, given the quantity of words devoted to IEEE Standards, that this article makes standards appear to be the chief business of the IEEE. Different members have different opinions of what in IEEE is important to them. I'm sure that some members regard standards to be the function of the IEEE that is most important to them. Others regard the Societies (which provide Transactions and Conferences as the most important. Still others may regard local activities or, perhaps, professional activities as the most important.

My point is that there needs to be a more equal emphasis between the various services that IEEE provides. That said, I see nothing wrong with having a separate article on IEEE Standards, which goes into as great or greater detail than does the current article.144.189.5.201 21:18, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

I'm not sure about this, because outside of the society, probably the most important contributions are the standards. The article shouldn't be written from an insider point of view, right? But I wouldn't be opposed to having a separate standards article going into greater detail. -- Superdosh 01:50, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Clean up tag removal

I removed the clean up tag from this article because after reviewing the content I really didn't see any need for it. Does anyone have any objections to this? --Lperez2029 14:21, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

Yes, there are lots of wikilinks in the "Notable IEEE Standards committees and formats" and "See also" that point to nonexistent pages. The pages should be made to exist or the wikilinks should be dewikified. Jeff G. 07:56, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the comment. Except for reviewing of the links, I read the article and it appears well composed and fairly clean. As to your comment, I do see a need for cleaning out external links (Wikipedia is not a link repository WP:EL) which don't appear to actually be used as references or just plain dont work. --Lperez2029 15:48, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Added Confusion Tag

I don't understand this paragraph:

"The transition from Associate to Member grade grants several privileges. Members are permitted to vote in general IEEE elections, while Associates are not eligible to vote. Members holding Member grade or higher are permitted to hold volunteer office positions, while Associates are not eligible for office positions."

This is under the heading "Associate Member", whereas there is no heading "Member"

74.192.41.156 14:21, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for highlighting the convoluted (SNAFU) paragraph - it was indeed very confusing, actually, the IEEE web site also contradicts the role of the "Associate" by calling them, in some instances "Associate Members" when they are not. I clarified the section and removed the confusion tag - please let me know what you think. Thanks --Lperez2029 17:54, 2 January 2007 (UTC)
See also [1]
More information on mistaken "Associate Member" relationship -- IEEE [2] --Lperez2029 18:07, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Cloaking and black-hat SEO spamming of any flavor

The oft-reverted critics of IEEE Web publishing policy may have something important to say, but the point if any is obscured in vague and vitriolic Web jargon. Perhaps if they would just say how the policy compares with other scientific and engineering publishers, they might be understood and even tolerated. 166.68.134.174 23:29, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] "Criticism" section

The only ref to criticism in the "Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers#Criticism section is one self-published source. The section should have a WP:Reliable Source or be removed. Peter Ballard (talk) 11:45, 17 November 2007 (UTC)

I completely disagree. The fact that people who criticize IEEE don't publish their criticism in "Reliable" sources does not make the critics disapear. I should add that DJ Bernstein (who wrote the page the article links to) is a senior researcher at University of Illinois. If that doesn't entitle him to have an opinion on IEEE, what does? IEEE is far from being a unanimously accepted institution, and this fact should be present in the article. BTW, the "Reliable Source" page you link to is a guideline, not a Wikipedia policy. I agree that better citations could be added though, but I didn't find any. I could use a hand there :) Joelthelion (talk) 12:53, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

There is more discussion on the subject here:[3]Joelthelion (talk) 13:13, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

There are many thousands of senior researchers at Universities around the world. Bernstein is just one. If the criticism is widespread, we should be able to do better than one prof's personal page. You also demonstrate a misunderstanding of how WP works by saying it is "a guideline, not a Wikipedia policy". Policy on self-published sources links across to WP:V which IS a policy. p.s. I'm not denying that criticism of IEEE is out there, but sorry, one prof's personal web page is insufficient. Peter Ballard (talk) 00:03, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
You should also respond to the arguments of the two wikipedia admins on the link I gave. I agree that the link could be better, but since there is no "association against IEEE", I'm not sure we can find anything better. In any case, the section should stay because IEEE criticism is widespread and not mentioning it would leave the article horribly POV Joelthelion (talk) 09:32, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
I can't respond on the archive... so I'll repeat my simple claim: self-published sources generally don't count. If there is widespread criticism, surely it shouldn't be hard to find in the mainstream press, e.g. the technology section of a newspaper, or a non-IEEE technology magazine. Peter Ballard (talk) 10:59, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
"self-published sources generally don't count" I don't really understand what reliability the publisher adds to the content. Loads of papers published by scientific publishers are pure crap. Some self-published stuff is good. Anyways, I have found that Richard Stallman shares DJ Bernstein's views of the IEEE (http://www.stallman.org). So we have two notable authors sharing criticism of the IEEE. Isn't that enough to justify a three-line mention in the article? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Joelthelion (talk • contribs) 15:19, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
As a pioneer of "copyleft", Stallman's views on the IEEE and copyright are hardly surprising. I don't know much about Bernstein, but as a writer of free software his views are also not surprising. I'll also note that Stallman and Bernstein are computer scientists, not electronic engineers, so they don't need the IEEE and can afford to be critical. I don't deny there is criticism... what needs to demonstrated is that the criticism is widespread. As for "self published sources generally don't count", please read Wikipedia:Verifiability. Peter Ballard (talk) 23:14, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
I don't see how stallman's or Berstein's websites don't provide verifiability of their opinions? How is Stallman's website not "a reliable source" to his opinions? Stallman is a reprentative of the Free software movement, so his opinions are probably shared by a couple million of persons. Bernstein is an example of those persons, and Stallman explicitely endorses his views. I think that's more than enough for "widely shared". Finally, I thought we might want to cite ( http://www.ieee.org/portal/cms_docs_iportals/iportals/publications/rights/IEEECopyrightForm.pdf ) the IEEE copyright form as evidence of their methods.Joelthelion (talk) 08:33, 28 November 2007 (UTC)
Citing Wikipedia:Verifiability: "Self-published material may, in some circumstances, be acceptable when produced by an established expert on the topic of the article whose work in the relevant field has previously been published by reliable third-party publications." Stallman is a known expert in copyright issues, which is the matter at stake (not electrical engineering). His work (the GPL) has been widely used, published and commented. I don't think you can argue that he is irrelevant to the subject. Joelthelion (talk) 08:36, 28 November 2007 (UTC)
I would rather say Stallman is a well known copyright campaigner/advocate, i.e. an expert maybe, but a very opinionated one. We know Stallman's opinions on software copyight are shared by a great many people, because a great many people repeat them. Where are all the people repeating Stallman's and Bernstein's views? Especially from within the EE industry itself? And why isn't the criticism in any sort of media except Bernstein's blog. If we can't find them, then I suggest we change the article to say, "A number of Open Source software proponents, such as RMS and Daniel Bernstein, have criticized IEEE's copyright policy..." Again, I don't deny that the criticism exists, but a couple of prominent Open Source software people don't equate to "widespread criticism". In fact, if they're all we can find, then we should use the wording I suggest above, limiting it to some OSS people. In short, we need evidence to use the word "widespread". Peter Ballard (talk) 11:21, 28 November 2007 (UTC)
I agree with you on the new wording. Joelthelion (talk) 14:40, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

I have changed the article according to the new wording. I have also added some web references, but I am not sure how to "retrieve" them for archival. Do you know how to do that? Joelthelion (talk) 14:58, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

Thanks, that looks good. And I have no problem with your web references - they look fine. Again, I myself have problems with IEEE's copyright policy - though because I work in the commercial rather than the research sector it affects me at the other end - I don't like having to pay $$$ for documents such as the Verilog or VHDL standards. But we need documented opinions, not personal opinions. WP is an exercise in researching + writing neutrually! Peter Ballard (talk) 23:51, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

The article says that "Attendance fees to conference meetings are also notoriously high." this claim is not supported and as far as I know is not true. Conferences of similar organizations (ASME, ASCE) cost about the same. I believe that this claim should either be substantiated by a source that had provided reliable comparative information, or deleted (Moshekam (talk) 00:28, 19 April 2008 (UTC)).

IEEE conference fees are very high considering the service they offer. They ask the organizers of IEEE conference to pay a huge sum of money to the central organization, even though they provide very minimal service to the organizers. Smaller conferences (not endorsed by a major publisher) are usually cheaper. I agree the claim is not substantiated, though. I don't know what I could cite to show that? Joelthelion (talk) 09:35, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] IEEE Transactions on Plasma Science

IEEE Transactions on Plasma Science is being debated as being a fringe journal in relation to the article tired light. 132.205.99.122 (talk) 22:52, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] IEEE acronym

According to the official website, IEEE stands no more for Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers. So, it should only be called IEEE (eye triple e). What do you think? Sergioroa (talk) 22:58, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

The URL is http://www.ieee.org/web/aboutus/home/index.html and The comment in full is "The IEEE name was originally an acronym for the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc. Today, the organization's scope of interest has expanded into so many related fields, that it is simply referred to by the letters I-E-E-E (pronounced Eye-triple-E)"
But I just looked in my nearest printed journal, and it said, ".... is published monthly by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc." So it seems to me that the full name is still the official name. I'm not sure which way to go on this one. Peter Ballard (talk) 23:40, 13 January 2008 (UTC)
Yes, Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers is still the official name as they wish to maintain the history associate with it. As time passes though, IEEE has advanced from an organization serving hundreds specializing in electricity and electronics into one that servers hundreds of thousands ranging from systems engineers, computer engineers, robotics specialists, electrical control systems engineers, electrical engineering educators, and everything in between. Furthermore, IEEE has become quite active in establishing standards for various fields of electrical engineering. Generally, IEEE is the preferred method of referring to the organization. --JadeFox (talk) 00:40, 11 April 2008 (UTC)


[edit] IEEE Standards category

I was bold and found a few things I thought should be in Category:IEEE standards, so I added that category to a lot of articles. Reading more, I'm not sure I did the right thing in all cases. It is not clear to me which IEEE #### are standards, and which are working groups. Nor am I sure that the IEEE standards category is appropriate for "groups of standards". If someone who understands the IEEE better than I do could double check this category and the work I did, I would great appreciate it. Wrs1864 (talk) 14:52, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Looking at the IEEE web sites, I don't think you need to worry about the difference between a "working group" and a "standard" - proposals always have a P before the numerals, but the working groups seem to be known by the standard number they're working on. I think you can lump in both in the category with little risk of confusion between a bound set of printed pages (the standard) and a bunch of people e-mailing each other ( the working group). --Wtshymanski (talk) 15:41, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Not the President

The current President of the IEEE is Lewis Terman, however the link goes to the page of a different Lewis Terman (born 1877, died 1956), possibly the grandfather of the current president. I could de-link the name, but that probably isn't the right solution... 220.253.14.162 (talk) 08:29, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

It's always right to unlink a wrong link. I've also condensed the discussion of membership grades because, really, who cares? I don't and I've been a member for 30 years. --Wtshymanski (talk) 18:31, 21 March 2008 (UTC)
Condense, but don't truncate. You have been a member for 30 years, other people may have no idea what an "IEEE Fellow" is, and look it up on wikipedia :) --Raistlin (talk) 20:28, 27 March 2008 (UTC)
Ok, I've tried to condense. Though there were a lot of words in what I edited out, there was no information. This whole article is full of puffery that needs trimming. --Wtshymanski (talk) 22:21, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

I have unlinked the Lewis Terman link. It leads to the wrong person! I was shocked when I started reading the article without seeing the date of death of the person. I was wondering why the IEEE would elect a eugenecist as its president! [:D] —Preceding unsigned comment added by 130.203.194.136 (talk) 19:36, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Unlinked again - careful reverting vandalism, since the Terman article is not the IEEE president Terman. --Wtshymanski (talk) 13:25, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Copyright and payment criticism

Do scholarly journals usually pay authors for their submissions? If you get an article into "New England Journal of Medicine" or "SIAM Journal on Applied Mathematics", do you get a royalty check each year for all the reprints published? I don't think so - can anyone cite a source saying that IEEE journals are unusual in this respect? --Wtshymanski (talk) 13:25, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Nobody claims they are unusual. Notable people have criticized the IEEE's copyright policy, and it should be reflected in the article. That's it. Joelthelion (talk) 09:37, 27 April 2008 (UTC)
So this article should say Like other sciteific and technical journals..., so that readers don't get the idea that journal authors get paid. Stallman et. al. aren't arguing particularly with IEEE, but with all of technical publishing. --Wtshymanski (talk) 14:18, 27 April 2008 (UTC)