Re: RFC 3929 on Alternative Decision Making Processes for Consens us-Blocked Decisions in the IETF (fwd)

On Oct 29, 2004, at 5:56 PM, william(at)elan.net wrote:

>
> Original:
>
> | On Oct 29, 2004, at 12:44 PM, James Couzens wrote:
> |
> | > I would consider DK before SenderID, its most certainly more 
> mature and
> | > it also hasn't spent the last ~6 months beating around the 
> proverbial
> | > bush debating stupid software patents.
> |
> | I don't know what you mean by "debating", but you might want to take 
> a
> | closer look at the IPR disclosures page.
> |
> | -andy
>
> My answer (corrected spelling, missing word):
>
> | Andrew, you should know quite well by now that just IPR disclosure
> | is not enough and until we actually see the license the patent
> | issue is still there.
>
> Andrew Newton's answer to above:
>
>> Are we talking about the same thing?
>
> Yes we're talking about same thing. You seem to have applied that for
> WG to deal with patents most important is the IPR and then the debate
> and issue is over. Its actually been backwards - we knew from the start
> the IPR is there but the debate was not about the existance of the IPR,
> but about the license.
>
> Now some in IETF might say that IPR disclosure already provides 
> information
> about what kind of license it would be (i.e free for all, etc) but it
> appears that disclosure in the IPR document is not enough and until we
> actually see the license, the WG can't be sure how much of an issue the
> patent is and this may result in intense debates at the very crucial 
> point
> of the WG's work cycle.

No, we're not talking about the same thing.

In the statement above, James used the word "debating".  And when I 
said "I don't know what you mean by 'debating'", I meant that I didn't 
understand the use of the word "debating" in his sentence since it 
seemed to have applied to "stupid software patents" ( and not stupid 
software patent licenses as you seem to have further honed in upon ).  
However, if "stupid software patents" are the issue then I have 
suggested a closer look at the IPR disclosures page given James' words 
of "I would consider DK before SenderID".  Or in other words, there is 
a patent covering DomainKeys.

-andy