Re: Proposal to create IETF IPR Advisory Board

["Steven M. Bellovin" <[e-mail]>]

On Tue, 17 Feb 2009 19:24:20 -0800
"Lawrence Rosen" <[e-mail]> wrote:

> Ted Ts'o wrote:
> > So you've done the equivalent of submit Windows source code and
> > assume that it can be ported to a Unix system "left as an exercise
> > to the reader"....  care to give a detailed suggestion about *how*
> > it could be revised to work with the IETF's more open procedures,
> > and still be useful in terms of meeting your stated goals? 
> 
> I've made no such assumptions. I've submitted a couple of process
> documents from W3C that can be modified easily to fit the IETF model.
> I thought John and Steven would be satisfied with a rough draft. Sort
> of like Windows might provide a model for a Linux open source
> program, without the actual code being yet written. :-)
> 
> Now that I've submitted this draft, I refuse to be told it isn't a
> draft, although I admit it isn't in the proper format. Any process
> bigots want to comment on that flaw tonight too?
> 
> I specifically said that the W3C Patent and Standards Working Group
> (PSIG) charter (http://www.w3.org/2004/pp/psig/) and *section 7* of
> the W3C Patent Policy
> (http://www.w3.org/Consortium/Patent-Policy-20040205/) would be
> models for an IETF IPR Advisory Board. Neither of those specific
> document sections implies anything mandatory about RAND or
> royalty-free or any other of the political patent battles that divide
> us. They are merely open process descriptions, just like a draft here
> ought to be. 
> 

I think it's a fair start, though I note that 7.5.3 carries with it a
fairly strong bias towards royalty-free terms.  But let me translate.

Rather than a standing board (which was what I thought you had
intended), you're suggesting (translated IETF terms) that when a WG
encounters a patent thought to be related, a group will be formed
consisting of the AD, the WG chair(s) ex officio, representatives of
the WG (presumably designated by the chair(s)), perhaps an IAB liason
-- and the IETF patent counsel.  What is the analog to "representatives
of each member organization"?  Volunteers not from the WG?  Selected by
whom?  The usual IETF practice would be appointment by the AD and/or
the IAB, I suspect.

What would the possible alternatives be?  The W3C version has a strong
bias towards royalty-free, since that's W3C's overarching policy.  The
IETF's policy is different, and the board's charge would have to be
different.  Really, with the exception that it needs legal input, such
a group would actually be a design team that is supposed to look at the
tradeoffs (per our policies) and make a recommendation to the WG.

Anyway -- I think this is a promising suggestion, and not inconsistent
with IETF practice or policy.  But a fully-fleshed out I-D -- one that
addresses the membership and the alternatives -- is probably needed, if
only as a matter of form.


		--Steve Bellovin, http://www.cs.columbia.edu/~smb