Re: SUO: Clarification
At 18:47 2000-10-19 -0700, Robert Spillers wrote:
> Isn't it great to witness open processes in action! Perhaps someone else will take a turn at pontificating (somehow, I missed the white smoke).
Bob-
I'm not sure at what you are getting at ... couldn't make sense of your E-mail.
However, I'm sure you can appreciate the frustration of (1) having someone use your work (a paper I wrote), (2) who doesn't understand the work, (3) to make a bunch of erroneous arguments, (4) that waste lots of my time as I unwind their points.
FYI, the open process means that anyone can participate. It does not mean that anyone can say anything. For example, discussing a participant's business arrangements (e.g., who has funding, who has contracts) is *definitely* out of scope for the discussion in IEEE (and NCITS and many other accredited standards development organizations). Thus, the whole issue of SBIR or not, funded or not, the nature of particular government contracts, etc., is inappropriate discussion for this forum.
What one may ask is:
- Will the contributions to the Working Group belong to IEEE? (Answer: Yes. As contributors to standards documents, the copyright belongs to the standards development organization. I believe this topic has already been discussed.)
- Will everyone have fair access to the standard? (Answer: Yes. The standard is licensed (document purchase) at a reasonable price. I hear that IEEE will make the SUO standard available for free ... that's a *very* reasonable price.)
- Are there potential patent issues? (Answer: Don't know yet and not sure if applicable. Contributors and Working Group members must declare any patent claims. This doesn't restrict patented technology from becoming standardized, but if it becomes a standard, then the patent owner must license the technology at a reasonable fee.)
In terms of intellectual property:
- Copyright: Addressed above.
- Trade Secret (proprietary stuff): Not discussed, no requirement to reveal. (If you're polite, you don't ask someone to reveal informaton that you know to be proprietary.)
- Patents: Addressed above.
There is no need to ask about a particpant's business arrangements (proprietary information). Lee's question:
"Are you authorized by Teknowledge to present all the materials or only a portion? Are there any restrictions that would reserve a unique commercial advantage to Teknowledge if the materials were made the basis of a standard?"
is inappropriate for this forum because it asks Adam to discuss his company's proprietary information.
Hope that helps.
-FF
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