- From: David Pendell <davidp25@yahoo.com>
- Date: Tue, 2 Oct 2001 13:20:47 -0700 (PDT)
- To: www-patentpolicy-comment@w3.org
To Whom It May Concern: I am an application developer. I have in many instances been called upon to build n-tier business applications based on Internet technologies. As a developer who uses Internet technologies I am very concerned regarding the proposed change in policy to allow patented technologies become part of the W3C standard. Currently there are very few web technologies that are patented (cascading style sheets being one). I am very concerned that if this trend continues it will lead to an environment in which independent contractors and small firms may have trouble competing with large companies. Small companies and certainly independents would lose business to larger firms due to the larger firm having a license to use a technology that the small firm/independent lacks. Also I have in dismay watched as corporate interests have eroded technologies that were built on open standards and free exchange of information. The Internet and related technologies have a proud tradition of openness and freedom. Individuals are completely free to use any ethical means to develop web sites and applications for fun and profit. I fear that if corporate interests are allowed to continue unchecked this proud heritage will disappear forever. I am also an open source software enthusiast. I am greatly concerned that if patents were allowed the amount of damage that could be done to the open source community would be devastating. Many of the projects that are used to power the Internet are developed by organizations and individuals with little or no money to fund their efforts. These people would be greatly hindered in their efforts to provide quality software for free. With Netcraft showing that Apache is currently the leading web server used on the Internet, I believe that the stakes are high. Not to mention that Linux/*BSD is being used to power e-mail and ftp servers worldwide. I understand that part of this proposed policy change is to address the problem of software patents. It has been stated that software patents have been the cause of halted development of new web Internet standards. Perhaps a more stringent set of requirements for submission of a proposed standard needs to be adopted. Something that would provide legal recourse in the event that a member of a standards development team secretly patents a standard while it is being developed. I am not a lawyer and I understand that this may be simplistic, however I do not believe that the solution to the question of software patents is to capitulate. In recent years there have been many software patents that were either undeserved (the aforementioned Cascading Style sheets patent being a candidate) or very questionable. As I understand it this is not necessarily due to the increase in software developments as much as it is a change in the Patent Application process. From what I understand the amount of time to do patent research has been severely limited in recent times. Please do not contribute to the problem by allowing for these questionable patents to become a part of the W3C standards. As a Standards body you have a responsibility to provide a system of checks and balances for open standard technologies. I feel that overall you have done an excellent job in this role. Please do not allow corporate pressures to sully this admirable record. Sincerely, David Pendell ===== David Pendell Information Technology Consultant davidp25@yahoo.com __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Listen to your Yahoo! Mail messages from any phone. http://phone.yahoo.com
Received on Tuesday, 2 October 2001 16:20:48 UTC