Re: Call for Consensus to Request Revision to Web Payments Working Group Charter

I promised the chairs that I would not formally object to this CfC as
clearly the group wants to have as many implementers involved as possible.
However, since the deadline for this CfC has now passed I wanted to put on
record some concerns I have about this issue.

Re-chartering is a major undertaking and risks tying up the WG in
meaningless work and objections when that energy could be better spent on
advancing useful standards like Payment Handler and Secure Payment Request.

While not stated explicitly in the CfC, the purpose of this charter change
is to make Apple's lawyers happy and allow Apple to re-join the group.

However, Apple's participation in the work of the Web Payments WG to date
doesn't fill me with confidence that their participation will have a
positive impact on the output of the WG or the adoption of its work.

Apple has steadfastly refused to engage (at all) in the development of the
Payment Handler specification and has only ever implemented a limited
version of the Payment Request recommendation that only supports Apple Pay.
Somehow this counts as a second implementation just because it's on a
different browser engine but that's another whole can of worms.

I feel confident that, had Apple engaged in any meaningful way in the
development of the Payment Handler API, major industry players would have
implemented Payment Handlers and we would likely already have a thriving
ecosystem of implementations that work across the Web irrespective of the
underlying platform. I can say for a fact that there are critical ecosystem
players that passed on implementing a Payment Handler because it would
never work on iOS.

Unfortunately, as is further evidenced by Apple's steadfast reluctance to allow
any browser engine but their own in iOS <https://open-web-advocacy.org/> (which
makes the problem infinitely worse), Apple appears to only be interested in
open standards when they leave a wide enough gap to keep their own
ecosystem closed. Being "active" participants at W3C certainly looks good
when you're under heavy scrutiny by regulators all over the world for
anti-competitive practices.

In my opinion, re-chartering the WG is yet another issue that will drain
resources from the W3C and other members just to allow Apple to participate
in meetings by saying nothing, doing nothing, and committing to nothing.

I hope Apple prove me wrong





On Mon, Apr 24, 2023 at 5:57 PM Ian Jacobs <ij@w3.org> wrote:

> Dear Web Payments Working Group Participants,
>
> This is a Call for Consensus to request that the Director propose a
> revised Web Payments Working Group Charter to the W3C Membership:
>
> Draft charter:
> https://www.w3.org/Payments/WG/charter-2023.html
>
> Diff from current operative charter:
> https://www.w3.org/Payments/WG/charter-diff-2023.html
>
> PLEASE RESPOND to the proposal by 1 May 2023 (16h00 UTC).
>
> For example, if you support the proposal, respond to this list with "1.
> Support the proposal."
>
> For the co-Chairs,
> Ian Jacobs
>
> ----------
> BACKGROUND
>
> This proposed charter restores a paragraph of text previously in the
> charter. The following timeline helps to explain this change:
>
> * December 2019: W3C enacts a charter [1] for the Web Payments WG
> that includes the following text:
>
> "User interface specifics are out of scope; this Working Group is
> chartered to Recommend programming interfaces, not user interface
> specifics. However, it is in scope for the Working Group to discuss
> user experience, for example as part of understanding user journeys
> during a checkout experience."
>
> * August 2021: W3C publishes the First Public Working Draft of
> Secure Payment Confirmation (SPC) [2].
>
> * November 2022: W3C enacts an updated charter [3] for the Working
> Group that does not include the above text. It was removed from the
> charter to avoid confusion about the group's work on Secure Payment
> Confirmation, which describes functionality related to the user
> experience of confirming a transaction.
>
> * March 2023: The Working Group receives a request [4] to restore the
> text to the charter.
>
> Although the group's chartered end date is 31 December 2024, the
> proposal is to renew the charter now to facilitate participation in
> the group. In addition, this charter revision includes updated
> milestone expectations regarding the publication of the SPC Candidate
> Recommendation and eventual Recommendation; see the full diff [5].
>
> [1] https://www.w3.org/Payments/WG/charter-201912.html
> [2] https://www.w3.org/blog/news/archives/9243
> [3] https://www.w3.org/Payments/WG/charter-2022.html
> [4] https://github.com/w3c/webpayments/issues/262
> [5] https://www.w3.org/Payments/WG/charter-diff-2023.html
>
> --------
> PROPOSAL
>
> That the Web Payments Working Group request that the Director propose
> a revision to its Charter to the W3C Membership.
>
> Please indicate one of the following in your response:
>
> 1. Support the proposal.
>
> 2. Request some changes, but support the proposal even if suggested
> changes are not taken into account.
>
> 3. Request some changes, and do not support the proposal unless the
> changes are taken into account.
>
> 4. Do not support the proposal (please provide rationale).
>
> 5. Support the consensus of the Web Payments Working Group.
>
> 6. Abstain.
>
> -----------------
> FORMAL OBJECTIONS
>
> * If you wish your LACK of support to publish to be conveyed to the
> Director and reviewed, please include the phrase "FORMAL OBJECTION"
> in your response and be sure to include substantive arguments or
> rationale.
>
> * The W3C Director takes Formal Objections seriously, and therefore
> they typically require significant time and effort to
> address.
>
> * Silence will be taken to mean there is no Formal Objection.
>
> * If there are Formal Objections, the Chairs plan to contact the
> individual(s) who made them to see whether there are changes that
> would address the concern and increase consensus to publish.
>
> For more information, see:
> https://www.w3.org/2021/Process-20211102/#Consensus
>
> ----------
> NEXT STEPS
>
> * In the case where this Call for Consensus results in a decision that
> the proposal carries, the staff contact will request that the
> Director announce the charter to the Membership. If the Director
> agrees, the usual charter review process would begin:
> https://www.w3.org/2021/Process-20211102/#CharterReview
>
> * Review by the W3C Membership may result in Formal Objections to the
> charter. To mitigate this risk, in the announcement of the proposed
> charter, we will emphasize that there are no changes to deliverables
> in this charter, only restoration of previous charter text.
>
> * While Member review of a proposed charter is ongoing, or in the case
> that the charter is not approved (or not approved in a timely
> fashion), the Payments Working Group can continue to operate under
> its current charter through 31 December 2024.
>
> --
> Ian Jacobs <ij@w3.org>
> https://www.w3.org/People/Jacobs/
> Tel: +1 917 450 8783
>
>
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