Re: Incorporating proprietary formats in any recommendation is a BAD idea! from Glenn Randers-Pehrson on 2001-10-04 (www-patentpolicy-comment@w3.org from October 2001)

From: Glenn Randers-Pehrson <glennrp@home.com>
Date: Thu, 04 Oct 2001 12:39:20 -0400
To: www-patentpolicy-comment@w3.org
Message-Id: <3.0.6.32.20011004123920.00d2e410@netmail.home.com>

Bruce Heerssen wrote:
>The problem with incorporating proprietary technologies in official 
>standards (W3C or otherwise), as I see it, is that governments often 
>rely on direction from an applicable standards body.

This is not idle speculation.  For example, the US Department of Defense
relies on W3C and mandates the use of the HTML-4.01, XML-1.0, and the
PNG graphics format, and includes several other W3C documents in its
"emerging standards" list.

See for example paragraphs 2.2.2.1.4.1 and 2.2.2.1.4.2 of JTA 4.0 at
http://www-jta.itsi.disa.mil

Glenn

Received on Thursday, 4 October 2001 12:42:06 UTC