RFC vs STD
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Problem is IETF functions can't be ignored. Well, the meetings and jollies can be, especially if you can't get T&S signed off to attend them. Which is part of the challenge for a commercial IETF, ie how much it'll cost to run, what it'll do with the money and whether fund raising will create real or perceived conflicts of interest.
But RFCs have a strength and a weakness in that pretty much anyone can submit one. Whether it gets any further depends on whether any significant vendor actually implements it. Then how they implement it, because RFCs can be more losely worded than STDs, or ITU specifications. So if an RFP asks for ITU ODU service per G.709, you should be reasonably certain you can abuse the GCC 1& 2 bytes, or your hardware vendor can. If an RFP asks for 'Which RFCs do you support?', it can be harder to answer. A lot won't be, or might require feature licences, or not play nicely with other vendor's implementations. And in the standards world, there can be a lot of lobbying by vendors to get their preferred method standardised. Or just lobbying from standards bodies themselves, ie ITU vs IETF turf wars. If this proposal gets it wrong, it'll probably give the ITU an excuse to jump in and take over.