Re: [idn] Re: IETF Notification of Patent Publication for WO 01/90955 A2

["James Seng/Personal" <jseng@pobox.org.sg>]

> 1.  Unfortunately, quite a few IETF engineers have had to deal with
> patent issues in recent years.  This means that they/we are in a
> position to do expert review of the technical aspects of a filing.
> Often that leads to distracting discussions in which we fall into
> the trap of forgetting that we are not attorneys, but it still can
> provide useful review of a filing's technology.

Yes. But that does not mean we (idn wg) try to play the role of patent
lawyers.

> 2.  An IETF working group has an obligation to pay attention to claims
> that are asserted over IETF work.

Definately.

The group should discuss the claims of the patents wrt to the work we
are doing. As you said, the wg have an obligation to determine if the
technology we moving forward is infringing on some potential patents. We
may then decide if we want to move forward with it or work around it or
whatever.

But the group is not responsible nor have a charter goal to assist
someone to assert the validity of their patent filing, a job best left
for patents lawyers.

If any of the individual in the group wish to assist Bill Heinze in
finding prior arts or assert validity of his patent filing, they are
free to do so in their own capacity.

Note: patent application are automatically published a year from filing,
regardless of the status of the application. From Bill's mail, it is
clear that a patent have been filed but it is not clear if their patent
have been granted.

-James Seng