Why do you want to go here today?

Greetings Mr. Berners-Lee and W3C staff,


W3C has promoted free standards that have made the Internet the huge
success that it is today. By promoting free standards, an incredible
number of developers have embraced and IMPLIMENTED (all but one) your
standards.

For the W3C to start promoting standards with possible patent AND/OR
non-GPL/BSD Copyright encumberances is a WASTE of the W3Cs time and
budget, and will probably alienate the developer community that
appreciates your past (and hopefully future) guidance.

If some company or companies want to develop some patented/non GPL/BSD
Copyrighted "standard" that happens to become accepted on the Intenet,
well they are free to do that on their own today, and there are a number
of current successes - Adobe PDF, Apple QuickTime, Macromedia
Flash/Shockwave, Windows media, mp3, etc.

So, Mr. Berners-Lee, what's the point of trying to promote
patent/Copyright-encumbered standards?

You (plural - Mr. Berners-Lee and W3C staff) have made the Internet what
it is today, and the way to make it even better is to continue your
excellent work on promoting free standards.

And the others that want to demand patent royalties can continue to do
so - ON THEIR OWN.

In the end, the market will choose, and a patent/Copyright-unencumbered
W3C will remain the succesful and well-respected Internet standards body
well into the future.

Thanks,

Rick Sullivan
Naperville, IL

Received on Monday, 1 October 2001 00:12:05 UTC