From: Valdis(_dot_)Kletnieks(_at_)vt(_dot_)edu
Patents *in and of themselves* are not a Bad Thing. As far as the IETF goes,
the problem only arises when the patent is used to enforce a restrictive
licensing policy.
Can anybody think of a reason the IETF should object to patented tech *per se*,
as opposed to objecting to *hard-to-license* patented tech (the latter I think
we have consensus as being a Bad Thing)...
In real life, every patent that is enforced is hard-to-license. Every
patent that is not ignored by everyone including the holder has a
restrictive licensing policy, official IETF, IEEE, and other dogma
notwithstanding. Any sort of real patent licensing requires dealing
with lawyers, negotiations, and the rest of that very painful, incredibly
slow, and cripplingly expensive show. The phrase "non-restrictive
patent licensing policy" is an oxymoron. The entire and only point of
a patent is to restrict that other people can do. At best, you can
have a "take equal money from anyone patent licensing policy."
In still other words, don't you remember the years of pain
Motorola/Codec caused PPP with those two bogus patents?
Vernon Schryver vjs(_at_)rhyolite(_dot_)com