Simon has hit on a valid point that not many seem to have
been considering in this discussion: it is one thing to
evaluate validity of an IPR claim and quite another to
evaluate validity of an IPR disclosure.
I think the reason for not taking a position relative to the
validity of the IPR is that this can easily become quite a
tangled mess. To perform some reasonable evaluation of an
IPR disclosure - such as has been suggested in this thread -
can probably be done without conflict with international
patent office decisions or potential damage to corporate or
personal "property."
Another point to consider is that a very-likely-to-be-valid
reason for removing an IPR disclosure is if an organization's
legal representative(s) convince the IETF's legal beagles
that an IPR disclosure was made innappropriately - such as
anonymously, or by an explicitly unauthorized person (such
as a disgruntled ex-employee or a competitor). There must
be a way to handle this situation.
Timeliness of the counter-assertion should be a factor, but
that's one to be decided by counsel.
I believe the IETF has some degree of responsibility to do
at least some reasonable amount of evaluation of an IPR
disclosure - whatever might be the policy regarding the
evaluation of IPR itself.
--
Eric Gray
Principal Engineer
Ericsson
-----Original Message-----
From: ietf-bounces(_at_)ietf(_dot_)org
[mailto:ietf-bounces(_at_)ietf(_dot_)org] On
Behalf Of Simon Josefsson
Sent: Thursday, August 14, 2008 9:30 AM
To: Andrew Sullivan
Cc: ietf(_at_)ietf(_dot_)org
Subject: Re: Removal of IETF patent disclosures?
Andrew Sullivan <ajs(_at_)commandprompt(_dot_)com> writes:
On Thu, Aug 14, 2008 at 09:25:42AM +0200, Simon Josefsson wrote:
request should be well established. I can think of at
least two reasons
that are valid:
* Exact duplicates
* Spam
As soon as you have evaluated the claim, even for "exact
duplication"
or "it's spam", haven't you done exactly what the pages claim not to
do (take a position on the validity of the claim)? I know
that sounds
silly, but it seems to me that any evaluation _at all_ is
automatically a contravention of what the pages say the
IETF does. If
the pages are just a list of claims, including bogus ones, then the
IETF has taken no position at all. As soon as some of them
have been
evaluated, we're at the top of a slippery slope, I think.
That's a safer position, yes, but I suspect it will be completely
unusable quickly because of spam.
I can't find anything about permitting anonymous patent disclosures to
the IETF, so I think it would be possible to require some human
interaction with the submitter, to verify his identity, before a
disclosure is posted. Contacting a company's counsel when feasible
would also help. I don't think this would violate the requirement not
to validate claims -- we are not validating the claims, but just
validating the person notifying the IETF.
This sounds somewhat complex though, so maybe it is overkill.
/Simon
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