On 2009-07-31 11:09, Stephan Wenger wrote:
> Hi Brian,
>
> One can sit in a WG meeting for years, and never incur a disclosure
> obligation under BCP78, correct? Just sitting there and not
> saying/writing/contributing a thing does not trigger a disclosure
> obligation. Same goes for merely being subscribed to a mailing list. This
> is a major difference from the organization where that infamous case law of
> Pete's has had its playground.
Well, IANAL, so the *exact* interpretation of "IETF Contribution" in RFC3979
is not for me to state. But I think you are correct.
>
> That said, I'm in favor of keeping the blue sheets based on principles of
> record retention. But their IPR impact, I believe, is rather limited.
If A asserts that B said something, and B denies having been present
at the meeting, they could come into play. Similarly for email archives.
Brian
>
> Regards,
> Stephan
>
>
> On 7/30/09 4:00 PM, "Brian E Carpenter" <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>> On 2009-07-31 02:25, Pete Resnick wrote:
>>> On 7/30/09 at 3:03 PM +0100, Samuel Weiler wrote:
>>>
>>>> What harms would come from destroying those old records and/or not
>>>> collecting such details in the future? And how widespread is the
>>>> support for destroying them?
>>> Repeating something I just mentioned to Sam in the hallway (and IANAL,
>>> even though I teach some of this stuff to engineers):
>>>
>>> There is some case law that says that if you participate (even
>>> passively) in a standards body in which patent disclosure is required,
>>> and you choose not to disclose your patents, you may lose your rights to
>>> assert the patents. Having a blue sheet with someone's name on it may be
>>> sufficient for a court to find that the person can't assert. I think
>>> that makes the blue sheets worth keeping.
>> I think that we *care* about IPR disclosures and that we *hate* the idea
>> of people observing IETF activity and concealing relevant patents. So having
>> a record of WG attendance is important; having a record of mailing list
>> membership would be the same. We want to make sure that people can't
>> falsely plead ignorance in case of missing IPR disclosures.
>>
>> Indeed, it isn't the IETF itself that would end up in court, but our records
>> can end up in court as evidence that a patent holder did (or did not)
>> participate in a standards discussion and did (or did not) make an
>> appropriate IPR disclosure.
>>
>> That means keeping attendance records for many years - at least for the
>> lifetime of a hypothetical patent.
>>
>> I agree with Alissa that having an explicit privacy policy would be a
>> good idea, but the fact of participation in an open standards process
>> certainly cannot be considered a private matter. Exactly the opposite,
>> in fact.
>>
>> Brian
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>
>
>
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