On Sun, 03 September 2000, John Hawkinson wrote:

...

I believe it was you who pointed out to me several years ago, real operators have more important things to do than volunteer for public service stuff.

Perhaps some of us think the IETF is more important than "public service stuff."

Whether you call it volunteer, or pro bono, or contributing to the community; the nature of IETF does seem to be changing. I don't know if operators are finding the IETF less useful, or the folks interested in working in the IETF have migrated to positions in other types of organizations.