Re: [idn] Assessing patent "validity"

[Keith Moore <moore@cs.utk.edu>]

> Evidently you misunderstood both of my major points:

and evidently you misunderstood mine.
 
>          1.  The IETF has no competence at assessing legal merit in an
> intellectual property conflict.

true.  but nevertheless, individuals within the IETF, who possess 
varying degrees of competence at assessing both the legal merit of 
a patent and the applicability of a patent toward a potential standard,
*DO* use whatever competence they possess (or lack thereof) to determine
whether to support a consensus toward that standard.

this is in fact the best we can do. 

>          2.  Passing a standard that has ambiguous and/or contested
> intellectual property claims, or ambiguous/contested licensing terms, is
> certain -- as in, guaranteed -- to scare vendors off from implementing the
> standard.

and this will also get factored in to whether individuals decide to 
contribute toward a consensus.

Keith