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RE: You call that a standard?

• To: "'sstouden@t...'" <sstouden@t...>, Eric van der Vlist <vdv@d...>
• Subject: RE: You call that a standard?
• From: "Bullard, Claude L (Len)" <clbullar@i...>
• Date: Wed, 5 May 2004 09:48:15 -0500
• Cc: xml-dev@l...

It is the geek way to attempt to find algorithmic 
answers to what are fundamentally, social problems. 
Applying the term, "universal" to a specification 
is the most transparent way to sell any specification 
as a standard.  It does not make it so.

Eventually, in any ontological approach, one has to 
encode conditions for determining membership in a class. 
Those conditions are the real substance of agreements 
that define a community of interest.  Because of 
issues of intellectual property, the ease of large 
companies using their customers and their monopoly 
positions to create a standards patina, because 
our world wide community becomes ever more competitive 
with itself as both intellectual property and jobs 
are moving rapidly to lower cost centers, and because 
effective communications are the biggest barrier to 
the success of that, we must define some conditions 
for the use of the term 'standard'. 

In my opinion, there are three legs, an organization 
must stand on to create legitimate standards:

1.  Works through a legitimate and recognized standards organization 
with transparent processes.   This means that while a consortium can 
and should create and vette the technology, the actual work of editing 
and shepherding the standard should be done by professionals.  It 
isn't always apparent from the point of view of the technically trained 
how much of that work is legal work.   X3D goes through ISO.  ISO 
has provided much input, much technical assistance, and a great 
deal of credibility to the W3DC.   It is an exemplary relationship.

2.  Must insist on participation agreements that clarify 
the status of all Intellectual Property constraints.  Ideally, this 
is royalty-free implementation and indemnification for all 
members against lawsuits.   This stops the SCO nonsense up front. 
We can't fix spilt milk but we can get smarter by learning how 
to stop the IP wars before they start.

3.  Must offer conformance testing with a service mark for 
products which pass the conformance tests.   This proves 
legally and technically that a product is what it says it is 
with regards to the standard.

With these three legs, one knows:

a) What a standard is.  It isn't a specification.  It isn't 
proprietary and encumbered technology with a patina 
of 'standard wording' on it.

b)  What one must do to comply and how to prove it.

c)  What to expect.  It is safe to implement the technology 
without keeping a stash of money for the lawsuits.

Without such conditions, terms such a 'standard' in today's 
market are virtually meaningless, and the grand experiment 
in open systems, open source, and equal access will grind 
to a halt. 

len

From: sstouden@t... [mailto:sstouden@t...]

Eric, i think maybe you are right, universal might not be the right word
to apply to a particular object but it does seem to fit a top of the
domain ( a class of objects ). 

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