- From: <mattias.inghe@idg.se>
- Date: Tue, 2 Oct 2001 14:40:36 +0200
- To: www-patentpolicy-comment@w3.org
Dear Sirs at W3C, I would like to point out what I belive would be the most major mistake in supporting RAND and non-free standards. Pepole tend to follow the infamous Path Of Least Resistance. The reason that the major standards for constructing the web (HTTP; HTML, XML) as it looks today are the ones that you have developed are not simply because you say it is The Standards. It is the delelopers, the sers of the standards that has given you the mandate to define what the standard is. The reason you are given this mandate is because you have your very existance have been a guarantee for a free, nondiscriminating standards open for anyone to use. If a fee - any fee - were issued for using a protocol or language defined as the standard, there is a major risque it will in fact not become one. The idea of a standard is that by coordinating efforts and using the same techniques everyone will save time and money. The big software corporations, the small , independent developers, and the end users, John and Jane Doe surfing the web. If (say) the current HTML standard would suddenly be taxed with a fee for developing or use in publications, the majority of developers would start looking for alternatives. Development of new and innovative tools for writing in the standard by independent software makers would probably cease. However "reaslonable and non-discrimiate" a lisence fee might be, it will alienate the majority of the developers and ISPs in the world, and put numerous out of business. A standard is what most pepole use. Not what W3C say they should use. By deciding to go with the RAND proposal I fear that W3C's position as an institution for standards will get severely damaged. That would not benefit anyone. regards (still), --- Mattias Inghe client web developer, IDG.se mattias.inghe@idg.se
Received on Tuesday, 2 October 2001 08:59:08 UTC