Mark,
On 11-May-24 11:42, Mark Nottingham wrote:
I'm sure that this has been discussed somewhere already, but I object to this text in the draft:
Note that there is no requirement for a freely available copy of the reference after the publication of the draft as an RFC, nor is there any requirement that the copies be provided to the general public.
But there is no way the IETF can impose anything on another SDO. This is presumably why the draft says:
"Authors and editors should try to avoid such references due to the challenges they present, as they affect the IETF's ability to ensure the quality of its output. However, such references are not always avoidable."
and empowers the IESG to impose certain requirements.
The draft doesn't use BCP14 terminology, since RFC2026 itself doesn't, so "should" means what it says. I don't think there's any realistic alternative when such cases arise, much as I agree with the principle of freely available open standards.
Brian
This leaves the door open for an arbitrary fee or license being required to implement IETF standards, in direct contravention of its OpenStand commitments to have "[d]efined procedures to develop specifications that can be implemented under *fair terms*" (emphasis mine) and to "[ensure] a broad affordability of the outcome of the standardization process."[^1]
If we choose to allow this, at a minimum the draft needs to contain firm guidelines regarding the terms that such references are available to the public under -- regarding aspects such as intellectual property licensing, financial reasonableness, non-discriminatory access, and so forth.
That said, I think we can do better. One of the definitions of 'open standards' is _free to implement_, and I would hope that the IETF aspires to that.
Cheers,
[^1]: see <https://open-stand.org/resources/>, slide 3
On 11 May 2024, at 01:51, The IESG <iesg-secretary@xxxxxxxx> wrote:
The IESG has received a request from an individual submitter to consider the
following document: - 'Procedure for Standards Track Documents to Refer
Normatively to
External Documents'
<draft-kucherawy-bcp97bis-05.txt> as Best Current Practice
The IESG plans to make a decision in the next few weeks, and solicits final
comments on this action. Please send substantive comments to the
last-call@xxxxxxxx mailing lists by 2024-06-07. Exceptionally, comments may
be sent to iesg@xxxxxxxx instead. In either case, please retain the beginning
of the Subject line to allow automated sorting.
Abstract
This document specifies a procedure for referencing external
standards and specifications from IETF-produced documents on the
Standards Track. In doing so, it updates BCP 9 (RFC 2026).
The file can be obtained via
https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/draft-kucherawy-bcp97bis/
No IPR declarations have been submitted directly on this I-D.
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