Re: Acknowledgements section in a RFC (Was: Last Call: 'Matching of Lang

Jeffrey Hutzelman wrote:
> Disclaimer: IANAL, and this message is not intended as legal advice.
> Please, read RFC3979 for yourself, and if you have concerns as to what
> your obligations are or what you can get away with, consult a lawyer.
>
>
> On Wednesday, June 07, 2006 02:22:06 PM -0400 "Gray, Eric" 
> <Eric(_dot_)Gray(_at_)marconi(_dot_)com> wrote:
> >     The Note Well is not clear because it makes sweeping
> > statements about the way in which BCP 78 and 79 may apply
> > to "contributions".
Eric, there is no "may" about it. It states very clearly
that *all* contributions are covered. The definition of "contribution"
is spelled out in BCP 79 as Definition 1.c. I see no ambiguity
whatever.

> The "Note Well" is a notification that if you contribute, you have 
> certain obligations.  It is not a normative description of those 
> obligations; for that, you need to refer to BCP 78 and 79.  Those 
> documents make it quite clear that you are obligated to disclose certain 
> IPR if you make a contribution in _any_ form, including comments made in 
> a meeting or on a mailing list, or to an IESG or IAB member, or to a 
> "portion" of any working group, which is intended to cover a variety of 
> ways in which people provide input outside the context of a formal meeting.
>
> BCP79 requires you to make disclosures of your or your employers IPR in 
> a contribution you make, and normally in contributions you don't make 
> but are aware of, even if you become aware of the IPR after the 
> contribution is made.  Not becoming aware of the IPR until after the 
> document is published does not relieve you of the obligation to disclose 
> it.  Nor does having the contribution be made by someone else, even if 
> they don't work for your company and/or are unaware of the IPR.
>
> > participating in the work, I may not be held accountable
> > for IPR I may know of but which did not enter into the text
> > until sometime after I stopped looking at it.
>
> You're only obligated to make an IPR disclosure if the IPR is owned by 
> you or your company and either (1) you made the contribution, or (2) the 
> contribution was made in a discussion in which you are participating.  
> If you stop participating in a discussion, you no longer have the 
> responsibility to make IPR disclosures related to contributions made 
> after you stop participating.
Also, BCP 79 does not require a patent search - it applies
explicitly to IPR of which the contributor is reasonably and
personally aware. So it isn't an onerous obligation; you don't
have to worry about unknowns.

   Brian

> >     Similarly, if I object to work that has been done, you
> > may not attach my name to it against my objections - unless
> > either the Note Well, and the BCPs, both explicitly include
> > a provision for implied consent.  If that is the case, now,
> > then it is most certainly not "clear" that it is.
>
> Certainly, no one should be represented as supporting work which they do 
> not support.  It is entirely reasonable to request that your name be 
> removed from the list of authors, if you no longer wish to perform the 
> duties of an author, or from the list of contributors, if you did not 
> make a contribution or don't want your contribution noted.
> Acknowledgements are more of a "thanks for your input", and it's not 
> really reasonable to tell authors that he can't acknowledge people whose 
> input they found helpful - as long as an acknowledgement does not imply 
> endorsement on the part of the person who is acknowledged.  On the other 
> hand, IMHO it would be even _more_ unreasonable for an author to refuse 
> to remove the name of a person who did not want to be acknowledged.
>
>
> >     This is the negative side of the discussion going on.
> > People are focusing on reasons why someone might want to be
> > included in acknowledgements.  I am merely pointing out that
> > it is also possible that someone might not want this.
>
> And John's point is this:  There may be legitimate reasons for not 
> wanting to be acknowledged or listed as an author or contributor.  
> However, having your name removed from the document does not change the 
> fact of your contribution, or relieve you of your obligations with 
> respect to that contribution.
> Now, you made specific reference to the IPR disclosure acknowledgement 
> which is required by RFC3978 section 5.1 to be present in all I-D's.  
> Your argument seems to be that this statement imposes an additional 
> burden upon anyone listed as an author, and that one might want to be 
> removed from the author list in order to be relieved of this burden.  
> But if you read the acknowledgement carefully, the representation being 
> made by the authors is that they are in compliance with BCP 79 section 
> 6(*).  Since compliance with that section is required for _anyone_ 
> making a contribution to the IETF, being removed from the author list 
> does _not_ relieve you of that burden - it simply allows you to avoid 
> preiodically representing that you are meeting it.
> I completely agree that anyone who no longer wishes to be listed as an 
> author of an I-D should be able to have their name removed.  However, 
> doing so does not remove your obligations relating to IPR disclosures.
>
> (*) The exact text quoted in RFC3978 is "... in accordance with Section 
> 6 of BCP 79."  Ordinarily, a reference is made to a BCP or STD number 
> rather than to an RFC number when the goal is to produce a "live" 
> reference that always refers to the latest approved version of the 
> document.  We usually avoid doing this in protocol specifications, 
> preferring instead to use the stable reference that an RFC number 
> represents, but it seems appropriate to use a live reference in this 
> case.  I'm sure the IPR working group has had discussions about the 
> interactions between live references, static documents, and legal 
> language, and found the results acceptable.
> HOWEVER...  _This_ language refers to a particular _section_ of BCP79 by 
> number.  The structure of documents changes as they are revised and 
> updated, so a reference by section number tends to counteract the 
> advantages of using a live reference.  For the _next_ version of BCP78, 
> I'd suggest finding a way to reword this so that a specific section 
> number reference is not required.
> -- Jeff
>
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