Re: [dane] AD review of draft-ietf-dane-smime-14

["John Levine" <[e-mail]>]

>The patent is dated 11-27-2013.

It's not a patent, it's a patent application, and if you read the
first page of the application, it claims priority from a provisional
application dated March 15, 2013, which is earlier than July.

>The first openpgpkey draft is dated July 15, 2013.
>https://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-wouters-dane-openpgp-00

>The patent is also completely unrelated to email, and instead mumbles
>about using DNSSEC to publish policy for public consumption.

You might want to reread the application.  If you say that a S/MIME
certificate expresses policies, which is not much of a stretch in
patent-ese, then this applies directly to publishing a bunch of DNSSEC
signed certificates.

I agree that the application is pretty weak, and there is probably
lots of prior art, but I'd also note that an e-mail message from long
ago saying that one wanted to do something is not necessarily prior
art if you can't show that someone actually did it.  I would also note
that it is an application, not a patent, and many, perhaps most,
applications never turn into patents.  But it's definitely relevant.

FYI, there are also patent applications pending in Europe and China.

R's,
John