Patent Policy

Dear W3C Patent Policy Working Group:

I am deeply concerned about the recent Patent Policy Framework draft, and 
the possibility of charging royalty fees for technologies
included in web standards.

In particular, I object to the inclusion of a "reasonable and
non-discriminatory" (RAND) licensing option in the proposed policy.
I believe that the exclusive use of a "royalty-free" (RF) licensing
model is in the best interests of the Internet community, and that
RAND licensing would always necessarily exclude some would-be
implementors, especially among open source and free software
developers.

Quite simply, I believe that members of the engineering community should 
strive to keep the Internet as free as possible for as long as possible. 
RAND licensing will necessarily inhibit the standardization of the Internet 
and inhibit the growth and spread of technology.

I applaud the W3C for its tradition of providing open-source
reference implementations and its work to promote a wide variety of
interoperable implementations of its open standards. The W3C can
best continue its work of "leading the Web to its full potential"
by continuing this tradition, and saying no to RAND licensing.

Sincerely,
Susan Margulies
Software Engineer
Oakland, CA

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Received on Friday, 5 October 2001 10:51:08 UTC