I think that Stephan raised some very good points as to why allowing some IPR disclosures to be removed actually makes sense. Since quite often IPR disclosures are made for a specific ID in a specific working group, if that WG ultimately does not choose that technology (and the ID expires), I am curious as to what the value would be of keeping that IPR disclosure on file forever? If narrowly worded (as many are), it would not be applicable to any other ID submission or working group, and would therefore have little use but to add to the growing list of disclosures in the IETF IPR database. I would be curious to hear the reasoning for keeping these on file, apart from 'historical record', since I am not convinced the IETF IPR database is the right place to hold onto IPR disclosures simply for historical purposes that only apply to technology that will never see the light of day in an IETF standard, since the IETF doesn't see any value in keeping the IDs that they applied to in the first place. Regards, Chuck ------------- Chuck Powers, Motorola, Inc phone: 512-427-7261 mobile: 512-576-0008 > -----Original Message----- > From: ietf-bounces@xxxxxxxx [mailto:ietf-bounces@xxxxxxxx] On > Behalf Of Stephan Wenger > Sent: Thursday, August 14, 2008 9:24 AM > To: IETF Discussion > Subject: Re: Removal of IETF patent disclosures? > > Hi all, > > Nokia is one of the companies which submitted a number of > withdrawal requests for previous disclosures. In no case > (that I'm aware of) our intention has been to sneak out of a > licensing commitment. Instead, we submitted withdrawal > requests with the intention to keep the IETF patent database > a useful tool---to do our share of database cleanup, so to speak. > > For example, we removed disclosures where -the patent went > away (e.g. an abandoned application with no intention to > re-file the case) -the scope of protection changed in such a > way that the previous disclosure became irrelevant, or -an > I-D went away and, in our estimation, the protected > technology has not been picked up in any other IETF document > we are aware of. (If it were, we would submit another > disclosure for the same patent, but against a different > draft. This has happened once in case of Nokia). > > We believe that these actions have been of advantage to the > transparency of the IETF patent system, and transparency is > important. When writing "transparency", I mean transparency > to the technical IETF contributor, who typically has neither > interest, nor the qualification, to accurately interpret the > legalese of patent disclosures. (All too often guys just > state "there's a patent on this draft", because they found > something in the tracker---and in some WG, in practice, that > can kill a draft.) > > We also think that in an organization like the IETF, where > language and practice suggests the disclosure of (unstable) > patent applications against > (unstable) I-Ds, there is a need for a cleanup mechanism of > some sort. This is in contrast to organizations where one > needs to declare only once at least one of the documents is > reasonably stable. > > I personally believe that the impact of a removal of a > disclosure to a licensing promise is rather negligible. The > paper-trail of a disclosure can quite easily be reconstructed > during litigation, if a need arises. The IETF's patent > database should focus on the practicalities required for IETF > standardization only. > > My suggestion would be to either continue the current > practice, or implement something along the following lines: > -an "invisible" flag, under control of the discloser > -an "expert" mode in the database, which provides the whole > paper-trail, and > -a "standard" mode which lists only the most recent update > of a disclosure (or the information that the request has been > flagged "invisible" by the > submitter) > > Regards, > Stephan > > > On 8/14/08 12:25 AM, "Simon Josefsson" <simon@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote: > > > Harald Tveit Alvestrand <harald@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> writes: > > > >> Simon Josefsson skrev: > >>> Brian E Carpenter <brian.e.carpenter@xxxxxxxxx> writes: > >>> > >>> > >>>> > >>>> I wasn't even aware, during my tenure as chair, that the > 'remove' > >>>> button existed. The only removals I recall, which may or > may not be > >>>> in the numbers Simon quoted, were completely bogus and > nonsensical > >>>> disclosures clearly filed by someone who was just > fiddling around on the Web. > >>>> > >>> > >>> Some of the disclosures that are now removed were > certainly not bogus. > >>> For example, the patent license given in #833 was > important input to > >>> a lengthy discussion relatively recently. > >> definitely agree on that one "for the record". > >> > >> OTOH, to give a counterexample, I don't think there's any value to > >> the community to having both #941 and #942 on file - > they're duplicates. > > > > Removing one out of two duplicates doesn't remove any > > patent-disclosure related information, so I don't think it > is a good counter-example. > > > > If removals should be permitted, the reasons for accepting > a removal > > request should be well established. I can think of at least two > > reasons that are valid: > > > > * Exact duplicates > > * Spam > > > > Beyond this I'm less sure we can get away the liability concern. > > > > False positives for spam could be a issue, so I'm not even sure the > > second one is OK. > > > > /Simon > > _______________________________________________ > > Ietf mailing list > > Ietf@xxxxxxxx > > https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf > > > _______________________________________________ > Ietf mailing list > Ietf@xxxxxxxx > https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf > _______________________________________________ Ietf@xxxxxxxx https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf