Hi -
From: "Dave CROCKER" <dhc2(_at_)dcrocker(_dot_)net>
To: "John C Klensin" <john-ietf(_at_)jck(_dot_)com>
Cc: "IETF discussion list" <ietf(_at_)ietf(_dot_)org>
Sent: Wednesday, December 17, 2008 1:05 PM
Subject: Re: IPR Questions Raised by Sam Hartman at the IETF 73 Plenary
...
That is: Working groups are part of the IETF and 'authors' of working group
documents are acting as when writing IETF documents.agents of the IETF.
While
I assume the missing word is "editors"
there might be underlying intellectual property owned by the companies that
authors work for, the actual document is commissioned by, and copyright
should
be owned by, the IETF.
AMEN!
Let me carry it further: When Erik Huizer and I wrote the first IETF Working
Group Guidelines document, it was at our initiative. (Well, really, Erik's.)
When it was adopted by the IETF, I automatically assumed that the IETF owned
it.
That has always been my understanding regarding work I've done for the IETF.
That is, after all, what we assert when outside technology is brought into
the
IETF and we insist that they are handing over "change control". What is
change
control if not the authority to make changes to the document?
Yup.
So when Scott Bradner did the revision to the IETF Working Group Guidelines
document the idea that he had a legal obligation to get our permission would
have -- and certainly now does -- strike me as silly.
Particularly since the permission to create derivative works and successor
standards has been granted as part of the boilerplate for a long long time.
That's me talking as a participant, about pragmatics, not me pretending to be
a
attorney, talking about copyright law.
Ditto. Consequently, as a WG co-chair who wants his WG to finish up
in this century, I read RFC 5378 section 5.3 as giving working
groups what they need so they can ignore all this stuff about tracking
down long-gone contributors, and that it's merely a re-incarnation of what
has long been the intent behind the NOTE WELL text.
One can easily imagine a situation in which a disgruntled party named
as a contributor in an early version of work might refuse to give permission
under some readings of an RFC 5378 regime, effectively killing the work.
As John says, paraphrase is *not* a realistic option, especially with
carefully-crafted
WG compromise text.
Randy
_______________________________________________
Ietf mailing list
Ietf(_at_)ietf(_dot_)org
https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf