Eric, Thank You for your comments and for your suggestions (below) I like your proposal for how to clarify and improve the wording of the draft legend text. Best Regards, Ed J. -----Original Message----- From: trustees-bounces@xxxxxxxx [mailto:trustees-bounces@xxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Eric Rescorla Sent: January 12, 2009 6:17 PM To: Russ Housley Cc: trustees@xxxxxxxx; ietf@xxxxxxxx Subject: Re: [Trustees] ANNOUNCEMENT: The IETF Trustees invite your reviewand comments on a proposed Work-Around to the Pre-5378 Problem Ed, I'd like to thank the Trustees for working to resolve this situation. Unfortunately, after reviewing the new text, I don't think it's really adequate. To recap, the the old text required the contributor to affirm (and consequently to verify) that adequate permissions had been obtained to publish legacy (pre-5378) material under the 5378 rules. This was impractical both because of the difficulty of obtaining such permissions and the difficulty of tracing every portion of the document. This new text, reproduced below, solves the first problem, but not the second: This document contains material from IETF Documents or IETF Contributions published before November 10, 2008 and, to the Contributor?s knowledge, the person(s) controlling the copyright in such material have not granted the IETF Trust the right to allow modifications of such material outside the IETF Standards Process. Without obtaining an adequate license from the person(s) controlling the copyright, this document may not be modified outside the IETF Standards Process, and derivative works of it may not be created outside the IETF Standards Process, except to format it for publication as an RFC and to translate it into languages other than English. The first problem here is the phrase "and, to the Contributor's knowledge, the person(s) controlling the copyright in such material have not granted the IETF Trust the right...". As I read this, I am directly affirming my belief that there are copyright holders who have not granted these rights. This is all fine if I know exactly who the original copyright holders are and that they have not given permission, but the more likely case is that I don't know one way or the other, and am simply unwilling to affirm the converse. However, I am equally unwilling to affirm my knowledge and belief that the persons controlling the copyright have not made grants. I simply don't know. This text should be rewritten as: This document contains material from IETF Documents or IETF Contributions published before November 10, 2008. Some material may be subject to copyright claims for which the holders have not granted the IETF Trust the right to allow modifications of such material outside the IETF Standards Process. In addition, the final sentence "Without obtaining..." seems overly strong. It's phrased as if it were a condition imposed by the contributor, i.e., I the contributor doesn't license you to use this document unless you obtain "adequate" permission from the original copyright holders (with the contributor to be the judge of adequate, perhaps). But that's not what's in play here. Rather, it's that I the contributor can't give me license to material I don't control. So, this sentence serves as advice, not a license restriction and should be rewritten accordingly. Perhaps: Modification or creation of derivative works outside of the scope of RFC 4978 may require obtaining a license from the person(s) controlling the copyright on the relevant sections of the document. Best, -Ekr _______________________________________________ Trustees mailing list Trustees@xxxxxxxx https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/trustees _______________________________________________ Ietf@xxxxxxxx https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf