Re: [rtcweb] VP8 IPR agreement announced.

[Rob Glidden <[e-mail]>]

Stephan:

I'm sure you are aware this is straight from the official ISO web site 
where you are listed as the liaison from IETF.

Perhaps I confused you by paraphrasing the term "shall" as "must".  I 
think they mean the same thing here, the former just seems oddly formal 
to use in an email.

Rob

On 3/9/2013 3:07 PM, Stephan Wenger wrote:
> Hi Rob,
> Please see inline.
> Stephan
>
> From: Rob Glidden <[e-mail] <mailto:[e-mail]>>
> Date: Saturday, 9 March, 2013 12:21
> To: Harald Alvestrand <[e-mail] <mailto:[e-mail]>>
> Cc: "[e-mail] <mailto:[e-mail]>" <[e-mail] 
> <mailto:[e-mail]>>
> Subject: Re: [rtcweb] VP8 IPR agreement announced.
>
>     Interesting.  Potential licensees will be aided by the provision
>     of a clear list of the portfolio patents, said the 1997 US
>     Department of Justice review letter of MPEG LA.
>
>
> AFAIK, neither a patent list nor a list of potential pool licensors 
> were ever published.  What is known is that there were originally 12 
> parties which each submitted at least one patent (which was found 
> essential) into a possible future pool, and 11 parties (which may or 
> may not be related to the original 12 parties) decided, apparently 
> with MPEG-LA's help, to furnish a sublicenseable license to google 
> (but not to the world).  So we have a closed group of 11 licensors, 
> and a single licensee, who came to an agreement using a facilitator 
> which also happens to administers pools.  To what extent that 
> transaction qualifies as a pooling arrangement from an antitrust law 
> viewpoint surely has been looked at carefully by the parties in 
> question.  Apparently, they came to the conclusion that they do not 
> need to name the licensors, nor the patents in question. 
>  Otherwise, I guess we would know by now.
>
>
>     ISO/MPEG IPR rules are clear that proposers must ask for, and
>     rights holders must provide, patent statements for a proposal to
>     proceed.
>
>
> Huh?  Is that something special for this MPEG subgroup?  If yes, would 
> there be a doc you can share explaining such procedures?
> My understanding is that ISO/IEC patent matters are generally dealt 
> with under the joint ITU/ISO/IEC patent policy, which requires in 
> practice declarations with RAND terms towards the end of the process 
> (before final approval of the standard, but after it is clear that the 
> patent claim reads on the future standard).  Chairs are also under the 
> obligation to request disclosure during each meeting, but (AFAIK) 
> there are almost never replies to these calls.  When participating in 
> a meeting, I usually to not reply, because I'm not quite sure that a 
> patent claim reads on the final standard before that standard is 
> reasonable frozen.
>
> I know that the video coding joint teams (JVT, JCT-VC, JCT-3V) have 
> additionally adopted a policy requiring in practice some form of RAND 
> language in each contribution.
>
> As some here know, I do not participate in this MPEG effort, 
> so I really don't know.
>
>
>
>     Rob
>
>     On 3/9/2013 2:08 AM, Harald Alvestrand wrote:
>>     On 03/08/2013 09:14 PM, Stephan Wenger wrote:
>>>     Hi Serge,
>>>
>>>     This is a great development for VP8.  Congratulations.  I'm sure
>>>     it took a few cycles and dollars to get something like this
>>>     arranged.  I wish your PR would have come out a bit earlier, but
>>>     licensing discussions do take time…  So better now than never.
>>>
>>>     I want to ask two more pieces of information that would allow me
>>>     to put this announcement into context.
>>>
>>>     First, who are those 11 rightholders?  I'm sure you agree that,
>>>     in order to make a meaningful risk assessment, that information
>>>     is needed.
>>
>>     Stephan, at the moment, we have no agreement with the
>>     rightsholders that permits us to disclose their names. We're
>>     discussing that topic with them, but we will not name them
>>     without an agreement to do so.
>>
>>     Of course, the rightsholders are free to disclose themselves.
>>>
>>>     Second, the link provided to "preview" the possible sublicensing
>>>     terms (http://www.w3.org/2001/07/SVG10-IPR-statements) lists a
>>>     bunch of company statements that vary widely among the
>>>     rightholders listed there, which do not include google.  It
>>>     would be great if you could provide more specific information as
>>>     early as possible, especially with respect to the essential
>>>     claims definition and the reciprocity conditions.  That does not
>>>     have to be final legal text, but should be a clear indication of
>>>     your business intentions.  To me, term-sheet level is OK.
>>
>>     That link was a bit weird - the real W3C definition of
>>     "royalty-free" is
>>     http://www.w3.org/Consortium/Patent-Policy-20040205/#sec-Requirements
>>     - I think the intent of the link was that if you don't find any
>>     of the RF terms listed on that page objectionable, you'll not
>>     find the Google RF terms objectionable either.
>>
>>
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>