Re: [codec] WG Review: Internet Wideband Audio Codec (codec)

Jean-Marc,

FWIW, I agree with the "other encumbrances" issues that Stephan raises.

The "Co-Marketing" requirement assumes that a logo (or other
acknowledgement form) has marketing VALUE to the rightholder. In that
sense, such a requirement has a worth (i.e., has some value related to
money) that is the equivalent of a monetary payment for some. Indeed,
many companies would reject use of the technology for this reason (this
has been the case for some audio codecs already).

The "co-marketing" encumbrance does NOT affect the easiness or hardness
of the redistribution per se ... but rather the attractiveness of the
receiving company to accept it.

These "annoyances" are sticky wickets indeed ... limited only be
creativeness of people to put "non-monetary" conditions on the
technology after-the-fact (as is their right).

FWIW#2 - I think you have probably addressed the issue as far as
feasible for now.

Ciao,

Michael Ramalho

-----Original Message-----
From: codec-bounces@ietf.org [mailto:codec-bounces@ietf.org] On Behalf
Of Jean-Marc Valin
Sent: Thursday, January 07, 2010 3:13 PM
To: Stephan Wenger
Cc: codec@ietf.org; Russ Housley; ietf@ietf.org; iesg@ietf.org
Subject: Re: [codec] WG Review: Internet Wideband Audio Codec (codec)

Hi,

I'm not sure royalties are the *least* of out problems, but I certainly
agree with Stephan that annoyances go further than just royalties. I
understand that BCP79 restricts what we can say about that in the
charter,
but at least mentioning the problem as Stephan suggests is a good idea
IMO.
In some sense, this is again part of the "making it easy to
redistribute".

	Jean-Marc

Stephan Wenger wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> Russ' language is an improvement.  But let's not forget that there are
> encumbrances that have nothing to do with paying royalties, but are
equally
> problematic from an adoption viewpoint.  Examples:
> 
> 1. Co-marketing requirement: need to put a logo of the rightholder
company
> on one's products acknowledging using the protected technology.
> 2. Unreasonable (from the viewpoint of the adopter) reciprocity
> requirements: one of many examples would be "if you use this
technology, you
> agree not to assert, against me or my customers, any of your patents.
> Otherwise your license terminates.".
> 3. Requirement for a "postcard license".  Such a requirement may rule
out
> open source implementations under certain open source licenses.
> 
> I believe strongly that a charter that discusses IPR issues should
mention
> at least those three aspects, and/or provide sufficiently vague
language to
> allow for an appropriate reaction to those and other encumbrances that
may
> show up.
> 
> Royalties are the least of our problems.
> 
> Regards,
> Stephan
> 
> Disclaimer: I have clients that would have problems with all three
> encumbrances mentioned above.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> On 1/7/10 11:08 AM, "Peter Saint-Andre" <stpeter@stpeter.im> wrote:
> 
>> On 1/7/10 9:46 AM, Russ Housley wrote:
>>> Andy:
>>>
>>>>> Although this preference cannot guarantee that the working
>>>>> group will produce an unencumbered codec, the working group shall
>>>>> attempt to adhere to the spirit of BCP 79.  This preference does
not
>>>>> explicitly rule out the possibility of adapting encumbered
technologies;
>>>>> such decisions will be made in accordance with the rough consensus
of
>>>>> the working group.
>>>> I appreciate the potential difficulty of guaranteeing the
unencumbered
>>>> status of any output of this group. However, I would like this
>>>> statement to
>>>> be stronger, saying that this group will only produce a new codec
if
>>>> it is
>>>> strongly believed by WG rough consensus to either be unencumbered,
>>>> or freely licensed by the IPR holder(s), if any.
>>> I do not think that anyone wants the outcome to be yet another
>>> encumbered codec.  I think these words are trying to say what you
want,
>>> but they are also trying to be realistic.
>>>
>>> Does the following text strike a better balance?
>>>
>>>   Although this preference cannot guarantee that the working
>>>   group will produce an unencumbered codec, the working group shall
>>>   follow BCP 79, and adhere to the spirit of BCP 79.  The working
>>>   group cannot explicitly rule out the possibility of adapting
>>>   encumbered technologies; however, the working group will try to
>>>   avoid encumbered technologies that require royalties.
>> That seems reasonable. Although I was only the BoF co-chair, I'll
>> volunteer to hold the pen on edits to the proposed charter.
>>
>> Peter
> 
> 
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