Re: IPR Notice

[Thomas Narten <narten@us.ibm.com>]

I'll probably regret this... :-)

Geoff Huston <gih@apnic.net> writes:

> The instruction of the ADs in this case was that the Working Group
> must be satisfied with the IPR claims in relation to technology that
> they are passing to the IESG for publication as proposed standards
> for SHIM6..

Right. The WG needs to either agree to ship the documents,
understanding they have associated IPR that might impact their ability
to ship products or for others to implement and ship products (which
presumably impacts how widely deployed the technology can become)...

Or, they need to decide that they can come up with an alternate
approach that "routes around" and avoids the known IPR
concerns. (Usually rather tricky, and does nothing to protect against
other IPR that we don't know about...)

Or, they need to conclude that they'd rather not advance the documents
at all, until or unless the IPR situation changes.

These are the basic choices, and I'd urge the WG stick with postings
that have direct bearing on answering these questions.

> I have voiced some objection to this instruction on the basis that I 
> know I am no IPR lawyer, and I suspect that the overall majority of 
> the SHIM6 WG are not IPR lawyers either, and the IETF would be better 
> advised to seek professional advice at the IESG level, but the 
> outcome of that discussion with the ADs was that IPR is a WG matter.

Actually, I do not see the point in having the IETF (or IESG) ask for
advice. Since this topic is all about potential liability to vendors
who ship potentially infringing technology, only those vendors can
decide what risk is acceptable for them (i.e., do they need a license,
are the stated terms and conditions acceptable to them, etc.) Vendors
employ their own legal folk for making those decisions and are not
likely to listen to what anybody else says, including the IETF.

What individuals should be doing is talking with their own legal teams
and getting opinions and education from their own legal
teams. Opinions of engineers are pretty much irrelevant in this space,
since the lawyers call the shots here.

Thomas