Subject: TIFF use issue

From: Scott Foshee <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 24 Oct 2001 19:26:04 -0700

Dear Everyone,

I appreciate everyone's desire to contribute to this discussion. 
However, the central point from Adobe's perspective remains unchanged 
and the same since September of 1997.

**  Adobe desires to support the efforts of the IETF (and the ITU) in 
their use of TIFF.  As such, Adobe provided a limited use license for 
TIFF in September of 1997 and has been in ongoing contact with the 
IETF as primary developer of TIFF FX since that time.  This license 
grant is the only contribution by an officer of Adobe.  It is Adobe's 
continuing legal position that TIFF FX (RFC 2301) and all derivative 
works are outside the scope of this license.  Since the ITU has the 
same license as the IETF, this would directly affect any ITU 
re-publication of TIFF FX as well as other derivative works. This has 
been communicated to the IETF editors throughout the process and to 
senior IETF officers during the IETF last call process. Additionally, 
the IEEE has been notified that they need a license to proceed with 
standards based on TIFF or its derivatives.

It is our understanding that legal analysis and business discussions 
are outside the scope of any technical standards organization.  It is 
the activity of the working group to make technical decisions while 
considering legal issues, not to engage in legal activity as a body. 
Thus, Adobe recommends that the IETF working group focus attention on 
a discussion of TIFF FX development, but do so being fully aware that 
legal issues are in contention. Adopters of TIFF FX implicitly 
consider these same issues.

      1.  No amount of working group discussion or analysis can change 
the terms and conditions of the written license granted 9/97.
      2.  Adobe will not participate in business discussions that 
could be construed as being in conflict of anti-trust regulations.
      3.  It would seem that IETF officers have offered and/or 
reiterated legal analysis and/or conclusions as the basis for working 
group actions and/or progression of TIFF FX under RFC 2026. However, 
this is often done concurrent with a statement that the IETF does not 
take positions regarding IP.
      4.  Adobe understands official IETF policy to be that the IETF 
declines to take a position regarding the IP content of its standards 
and thus Adobe's license.  Therefore, each participant and user of 
TIFF FX is responsible for an independent legal evaluation and 
decision despite any other action by the IETF or its officers.

Adobe continues to recommend a path forward that allows those parts 
of TIFF FX that are in scope of Adobe's license to progress rapidly. 
Alternatively and at the request of the committee, we have also 
provided a process whereby the scope of the license could potentially 
be expanded by adding scope to the underlying Adobe TIFF 
specification.  The working group has thus far declined to take 
advantage of either.  Additionally, we have offered to assist the 
IEEE if they choose to seek a license to use TIFF.  We have yet to be 
contacted in this regard.

Adobe continues to be interested in working with the IETF and ITU to 
bring their work into scope of our license, and with the IEEE in 
their efforts to seek a license.

Sincerely,

Scott Foshee