David Morris <dwm@xxxxxxxxx> writes: > On Thu, 23 Jul 2009, Richard Stallman wrote: > > >> Generally speaking, standards are useful, because they enable people >> to converge what they are doing. But that ceases to be true when the >> use of the standard is patented. It is better to have no standard >> than have a standard that invites people into danger. > > An opinion with which I would differ ... patent encumbered documented > behavior is ALWAYS better than no public documentation for commonly > used protocols. As a person with frequent exposure to the operational > troubleshooting side of networks, lack of accessible documentation is > intolerable. I agree, but I don't see anyone making an argument against that. What the question here is about is to classify this (already accessible) documentation as an Internet Standard. That sends a message that the document is what the IETF recommends to use. There is a significant difference. > There is no trap when an SDO documents a protocol and publishes that > documentation with a caveat that includes documentation of one or more > patent claims related to the published protocol. Any fool who > implements the protocol without resolving those issues deserves what > the get. The trap is the case where the patent or other IP claim isn't > revealed. I believe the problem with this patent disclosure is that it isn't clear what is claimed. People are trying to resolve the issue, and this is what the IETF process is about: we need to evaluate things on a document-by-document basis. Fear of patent claims have been successfully used as arguments to publish documents as Informational instead of Proposed Standard before, compare, e.g., RFC 5054 on TLS-SRP. Thanks, Simon _______________________________________________ Ietf@xxxxxxxx https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf