Re: Applying "Note Well" to side meetings

["Joel M. Halpern" <[e-mail]>]

Well...
If you have a side meeting, and discuss papers (which do not happen to 
have been Internet Drafts) and you do not invoke Note Well, then you do 
not have the right to use those papers for future IETF work.

Note Well is not just about patent disclosure.  It covers multiple things.

Yours,
Joel

On 7/22/2019 11:57 AM, Nico Williams wrote:
> On Sun, Jul 21, 2019 at 06:25:12AM -0400, Richard Barnes wrote:
>> Maybe folks could provide a citation for this?  Because I have exactly the
>> opposite impression — that the Note Well only applies in contexts where it
>> is explicitly stated that it does, e.g., official sessions.
> 
> I've long understood that Note Well applies when and only when
> ('WWHEN'?) it is invoked, and should be invoked whenever IETF work is
> discussed among participants with different employers even if the
> meeting is not an official IETF meeting.
> 
> Depending on the cast of attendees I might not invoke Note Well in a
> side meeting with an unstated understanding that we're not out to screw
> each other on IP.  However, this is a bad habit, and I should always
> invoke Note Well when discussing IETF work or potential IETF work with
> colleagues from other organizations.  It's a bad habit not just because
> my friends might purposefully or otherwise screw me, but also because I
> might forget to invoke Note Well when others are around.
> 
> Official IETF meetings are (I guess) required to invoke the Note Well,
> whether they be interim or not, whether they be remote or not, but it
> still needs to be invoked in order to really apply.
> 
> Bar BoFs are unofficial meetings, and thus not required to invoke Note
> Well, thus too arguably there is no implied intent to have Note Well
> apply to them, which is why Note Well should be invoked explicitly.  My
> advice would be that Note Well always be invoked at the start of the bar
> BoF and in any email threads for organizing a bar BoF and any
> invitations sent (so that late arrivals understand the expectation that
> Note Well applies).
> 
> It must not be a common occurrence that bar BoF participants intend Note
> Well to _not_ apply.  It would be nice if Note Well could be made to
> impliedly apply by default, but I guess that's not feasible.
> 
>> As Adrian says, there is a line.  I understood that line to be something
>> like, “The organizers of the meeting decide to apply Note Well”, just as
>> one might apply the Chatham House Rule.  So side meetings could be covered
>> if they chose, but not by default.
> 
> +1
> 
>> In any case, the premise for this thread seems a bit confused, since side
>> meetings are by definition not subject to IETF control.
> 
> A lot of work happens in bar BoFs though, so it's a fair question.  So
> either we shouldn't have them at all or we should acknowledge that they
> are a thing.  The IETF can't control a bar BoF, but a) it can provide
> advice about them, and b) it could provide rooms for ad-hoc BoFs with
> Note Well plastered on the walls :)
> 
> Nico
>