Re: [sieve] Second Last Call: <draft-ietf-sieve-notify-sip-message-08.txt> (Sieve Notifica tion Mechanism: SIP MESSAGE) to Proposed Standard2012-01-26 10:10:54
As I've mentioned to others, since I'm one of the people who will have
to judge the consensus on this question, my comments will remain
strictly based on the facts of the events as I know them and on the
relevant IETF procedures. It is up to the IETF community to decide on
what the appropriate course of action shall be. That said, I have some
comments and questions:
On 1/26/12 3:31 AM, John C Klensin wrote: It seems to me that a key question here is whether the original author's decision to not disclose was made in violation of company policy or whether the sequence of posting the I-D, getting the document through the WG and Last Call, and then posting the disclosure is a matter of company policy. We were told by the other company employees who facilitated the disclosures, at the time of the disclosures, that this was strictly an individual's failure to comply with the IETF IPR Policy, that the author in question claims not to have understood the IETF IPR Policy, and that the company proceeded to make these disclosures as soon as it discovered that this IPR existed. I have no information to contradict that claim. Consequently, I believe that at least the following should be required: (1) Revision of the IPR statement so it identifies the responsible individual by name, department, and title. I do not believe that the rather anonymous "Director of Licensing" is compliant with the intent of the IPR disclosure rules. I will leave it to the lawyers to advise on whether a document issued without the name (not just title) of a responsible individual would even be held to be valid in the various jurisdictions in which the patent might be recognized. Are you asking that the IPR statements be updated with the name, department, and title of the "Director of Licensing", or that of the author of the documents and patents in question? It seems to me that the former is a procedural question that is separate from the disposition of these particular documents, and seems like a reasonable requirement for any IPR disclosure. If you're asking for the latter, are you asking that the sanction against the author be a new obligation on the author? Section 6 of RFC 3979 clearly says, "A participant's obligation to make a disclosure is also considered satisfied if the IPR owner or the participant's employer or sponsor makes an appropriate disclosure in place of the participant doing so." (2) A request to the company involved for someone who can formally speak for that company to publicly clarify that this sequence of behavior occurred in violation of company policy. If there are internal rewards to individuals for filing and/or being awarded patents, I assume that a decision that the actions violate company policy would cause such awards to be withheld in this case, even though the IETF would have no way to verify whether or not that occurred. The IETF Chair has in the past sent messages to companies to inquire about their handling of IPR disclosures, so I imagine such a message could be sent if the IETF community desires it. (3) A request to the company involved to remove the reciprocity clause from the license stated in the disclosure statement. As a show of good faith, they should agree to derive no benefit from the patent other than what praise accrues from having it awarded. I'll ask to bring this topic up with the IETF attorney. I am pretty sure we can *ask* that they do this as a show of good faith. I am also pretty certain that we can't negotiate the terms of a license agreement. (4) Removal of the offending individual from the list of authors to the acknowledgments with text similar to that suggested by Adrian. Unless the company involved is willing to provide the clarification suggested in (2) above, and possibly the license modification suggested in (3) above, all names of authors associated with that company should be removed to the acknowledgements and the company affiliation explicitly identified there. In either case, this should be viewed as a response to a policy violation and not entangled with any more general discussion of listed authors on I-Ds or RFCs. Of course, removal of individual document editors is well within the rights and responsibilities of the chairs, so if this is the consensus of the IETF, I am sure it can be done. I would like you to elaborate on the issue of the authors who are employees of the company but *not* the author of the patent in question. Are you saying that their names should be removed because, as co-workers of the author in question, they ought to have known (or been more diligent in confirming) that the IPR existed and therefore should be sanctioned for failing to comply with the IPR rules, or are you saying that this is a sanction that should be levied against the company and therefore its employees? I will note that RFC 3979 does not put a responsibility on individual participants to go discover IPR that may exist, nor does it make any overt requirements of companies since it applies only to the individual participants in the IETF (caveat the recognitions in sections 6.6 and 7). (5) Unless the clarification suggested in (2) can be provided, each IETF participant who is associated with the relevant company and who is in an IETF-related leadership or decision-making position (WG Chairs; Editors; IESG, IAB, IAOC, Nomcom, members; etc.) should be asked to make a conscientious personal review as to whether this type of action sufficiently compromises his or her position that resignation or some other action would be appropriate and, as appropriate, to review IETF policies with whatever management chains are relevant. I am _not_ suggesting that anyone be asked to resign, only that they engage in careful consideration of the issues and their implications. I believe this last one is outside of the scope of the decisions the IETF has to take regarding the disposition of the particular documents. It may indeed be reasonable for every IETF participant to review the policies and actions of their own employer as they relate to IETF participation and make a conscientious decision whether they can continue to participate in the IETF, whatever their role, given those policies and procedures. pr -- Pete Resnick<http://www.qualcomm.com/~presnick/> Qualcomm Incorporated - Direct phone: (858)651-4478, Fax: (858)651-1102 _______________________________________________ sieve mailing list sieve(_at_)ietf(_dot_)org https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/sieve |
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