- From: Becky Kearns <beckykearns@hotmail.com>
- Date: Mon, 01 Oct 2001 03:01:10 +0000
- To: www-patentpolicy-comment@w3.org
... only those who are able to afford the royalty fee(s) will be allowed to implement and/or use the technology. Can you say "to make distinctions on the basis of class or category without regard to individual merit"? While these proposed changes might not seem like a big deal to those who work for or own companies that have substantial amounts of capital, it *is* a big deal for literally thousands of smaller companies, individual developers, and so forth. It isn't just open source and free software developers who stand to get burned by royalty fees. All around the world there are small software companies and startups which struggle to make ends meet. What is a "reasonable royalty" from the perspective of an organization which hasn't yet turned a profit or which can't even afford to pay its employees for all the hours they work? How about companies which have very low margins? In today's world where billion dollar companies dominate the news it is easy to lose track of the fact that small companies greatly outnumber the number of large companies. I've always considered the W3C's efforts as the admirable pursuit of open standards - which serve to level the playing field and *maximize* both the number of users and developers. Which is exactly what is needed if the Internet and "web" are to continue to grow and prosper. This new proposal of yours is totally inconsistent with that, and thus represents a significant threat to the future of that which we all have come to rely upon. It appears there are over 700 objections to your proposal posted today. Which is quite impressive considering the lack of awareness and how lazy we all are about taking the time to comment on things. I sincerely hope you'll get the message. BK _________________________________________________________________ Get your FREE download of MSN Explorer at http://explorer.msn.com/intl.asp
Received on Sunday, 30 September 2001 23:01:41 UTC