Subject: RE: Comment on section 2.3 of draft-ietf-ipr-rules-update-01

From: "Contreras, Jorge" <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 8 Nov 2005 19:28:09 -0500

>I believe it would be better to grant the reprint right to third
>parties in 3.3 rather than changing the boiler plate, which is what
>Scott's draft attempt to do now.

Scott's draft does both.  It grants the reprint right in a new
paragraph 3.3(a)(F), and also has clarifying boilerplate.  

Frankly, we could probably eliminate the boilerplate and simply rely on
the license grants, but I guess it doesn't hurt to 
include it for clarity.

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From: John C Klensin <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 08 Nov 2005 21:44:08 -0500

--On Tuesday, November 08, 2005 19:28 -0500 "Contreras, Jorge" 
<[email-masked]> wrote:

>
>> I believe it would be better to grant the reprint right to
>> third parties in 3.3 rather than changing the boiler plate,
>> which is what Scott's draft attempt to do now.
>
> Frankly, we could probably eliminate the boilerplate and
> simply rely on the license grants, but I guess it doesn't hurt
> to
> include it for clarity.

Actually, I continue to believe that our tendency toward ever 
more boilerplate is harmful.  It makes trivial documents longer 
and, because it is boilerplate, changes from one document to 
another are very hard to spot and often go unseen.  We would be 
far better to a pointer to licenses, etc., that have the 
property that, if the external material changes, the pointers 
change in a way that makes that clear.

     john

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From: Frank Ellermann <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 09 Nov 2005 09:26:31 +0100

John C Klensin wrote:

> Actually, I continue to believe that our tendency toward
> ever more boilerplate is harmful.

+1

I hope that I understand CC BY SA, and why it's not the
same as CC BY, CC BY ND, or CC BY NC.  But I've no idea
what other licenses mean.
                         Bye, Frank

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From: Simon Josefsson <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 09 Nov 2005 15:56:55 +0100

John C Klensin <[email-masked]> writes:

> Actually, I continue to believe that our tendency toward ever more
> boilerplate is harmful.  It makes trivial documents longer and,
> because it is boilerplate, changes from one document to another are
> very hard to spot and often go unseen.  We would be far better to a
> pointer to licenses, etc., that have the property that, if the
> external material changes, the pointers change in a way that makes
> that clear.

I agree with John here.  People have been mistaken the boiler plate as
the license for too long.  That misconception appeared here as well, I
recall that it was argued that the boiler plate ("distribution of this
memo is unlimited") gave third parties any rights.  That is not the
case, and has never been the case, as far as I can understand.

Removing the boiler plate and including the actual license text is
better.  Pointing to the license text is problematic, as is currently
done, because the license may then be revised to retract rights
granted earlier.  That is why I believe it is important to add the
word "perpetual" to copying conditions.

Regards,
Simon

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From: John C Klensin <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 09 Nov 2005 10:16:02 -0500

--On Wednesday, November 09, 2005 15:56 +0100 Simon Josefsson 
<[email-masked]> wrote:

> Removing the boiler plate and including the actual license
> text is better.  Pointing to the license text is problematic,
> as is currently done, because the license may then be revised
> to retract rights granted earlier.  That is why I believe it
> is important to add the word "perpetual" to copying conditions.

For a license of any complexity, I think that is worse.  Long 
RFCs and I-Ds with extensive duplicate standard text are bad, 
regardless of whether the text is categorized as "boilerplate" 
or "license text" -- to me, the latter is just another form of 
boilerplate.  And we clearly understand how to point to dated, 
or version-numbered, license text, to agree that old versions 
will be kept around, etc.  That part isn't hard, really.

     john

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From: Simon Josefsson <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 09 Nov 2005 16:19:52 +0100

John C Klensin <[email-masked]> writes:

> For a license of any complexity, I think that is worse.  Long RFCs and
> I-Ds with extensive duplicate standard text are bad, regardless of
> whether the text is categorized as "boilerplate" or "license text" --
> to me, the latter is just another form of boilerplate.  And we clearly
> understand how to point to dated, or version-numbered, license text,
> to agree that old versions will be kept around, etc.  That part isn't
> hard, really.

Sure.  If that is done properly, I agree.  However, I do have a
problem with the current situation.  RFCs today reference "BCP 78" for
the license, but "BCP 78" is a moving target.  There should be some
qualification in the reference, say a revision of BCP 78, to make it
possible to identify the exact legal text that apply to a specific
work.

Thanks,
Simon

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From: John C Klensin <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 09 Nov 2005 10:25:36 -0500

--On Wednesday, November 09, 2005 16:19 +0100 Simon Josefsson 
<[email-masked]> wrote:

> problem with the current situation.  RFCs today reference "BCP
> 78" for the license, but "BCP 78" is a moving target.  There
> should be some qualification in the reference, say a revision
> of BCP 78, to make it possible to identify the exact legal
> text that apply to a specific work.

We do not disagree about that.

    john