Re: [TLS] Last Call: draft-ietf-tls-extractor (Keying Material Exporters for Transport Layer Security (TLS)) to Proposed Standard

[Erick O <[e-mail]>]

________________________________
From: David Morris <[e-mail]>
To: [e-mail]; [e-mail]
Sent: Monday, July 27, 2009 6:34:54 PM
Subject: Re: [TLS] Last Call: draft-ietf-tls-extractor (Keying Material Exporters for Transport Layer Security (TLS)) to Proposed Standard



On Thu, 23 Jul 2009, Richard Stallman wrote:


> Generally speaking, standards are useful, because they enable people
> to converge what they are doing.  But that ceases to be true when the
> use of the standard is patented.  It is better to have no standard
> than have a standard that invites people into danger.

An opinion with which I would differ ... patent encumbered documented behavior is ALWAYS better than no public documentation for commonly used protocols. As a person with frequent exposure to the operational troubleshooting side of networks, lack of accessible documentation is intolerable.

There is no trap when an SDO documents a protocol and publishes that documentation with a caveat that includes documentation of one or more patent claims related to the published protocol. Any fool who implements the protocol without resolving those issues deserves what the get. The trap is the case where the patent or other IP claim isn't revealed.
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