Under the proposed policy, anyone participating in the W3C process must agree to disclose license patents essential to a specification on a royalty-free basis, but there is a way to avoid these requirements not present in previous drafts.
According to W3C spokesperson Janet Daly, the policy has a rigorous exclusion track for companies that have a patent on part of a potential spec, but don’t want to make it available for implementation royalty-free.
A full proposal, justifying why the patent is absolutely necessary must be compiled, Daly said. A review by the W3C membership, W3C director and the public must be carried out. On the rarest occasions, a patent holder will be able to charge a royalty.
The W3C started working on the policy three years ago after development of the P3P online privacy standard was stalled when a company claimed it had a patent on technology used in the specification.
Controversy erupted in October 2001, when it emerged the W3C was considering allowing patent holders to charge reasonable and non-discriminatory license fees to organizations implementing standards on which they held patents.
Many said that this could lead to the fragmentation of the web, and could help kill off the open source and free software movements. Opponents proposed a royalty-free-only policy, and the latest draft reflects that movement.
The exclusion policy is new, but the W3C characterizes it not as a loophole for royalty-hungry tech firms, but as a last-resort avenue for companies with patents essential to specs that simply cannot license them freely.
What [the W3C] managed to do is build a common policy where no one is excited about it, but where they will say ‘We can live with this’, Daly said. It’s hard to please both sides of the debate, IP holders and open source advocates.
Source: Computerwire
