Appeal: Continued Abuse of Process by IPR-WG Chair (Dean Anderson; 2007-12-26) - 2007-12-26
Appeal - 2007-12-26
Date: Wed, 26 Dec 2007 17:19:34 -0500 (EST)
From: Dean Anderson <dean@av8.com>
To: iesg@ietf.org
Cc: rms@gnu.org
Subject: Continued Abuse of Process by IPR-WG Chair
In the Mime attachment are three "ADMIN" messages from Harald Alvestrand
against Todd Glassey and Simon Josephsson declaring one side of a debate
offtopic, and threatening improperly to suspend members who merely
advocate arguments contrary to Harald's and Brian Carpenter's
viewpoints.
Harald previously (improperly) suspended Todd Glassey (for two weeks)
and myself permanently for merely asserting reasonable arguments
contrary to Harald's and Brian Carpenter's point of view. These
suspensions are both contrary to the law governing corporations, which
require, among other things, a vote of the membership to suspend or
expel members of a membership corporation. A knowing disregard for the
law is a key factor for finding criminal intent.
In November, I wrote:
Further, in fact, this document is in no way a "rough consensus of the
IETF" because the IETF community hasn't even seen the document outside
the IPR working group, and also because significant stakeholders on the
policies of patents and copyrights haven't been allowed to contribute
to the document or the working group, and dissenters have been
silenced.
What is going on here is an attempt to mislead people about the level
of community approval and community involvement in the production and
contents of this document. Instead of the IETF community producing
this document, and instead of "rough consensus" supporting the
document, it has actually been produced by a small number of people who
have been either directly involved in, or have promoted disregarding, a
serious fraud on the IETF. These same persons have been directly
involved in silencing dissenters in the IPR working group until mainly
pro-patent persons, or persons with seriously compromised intregrity,
were able to obtain a majority. This is nothing but a charade to alter
RFC 3979 with the purpose to enable more deception of the public and
the membership of the IETF. The charade should be ended.
Things have gotten even worse since November, when the above was
written. On each day, from December 20, 21, and 22 Harald has claimed
that merely contrary arguments are offtopic, while the arguments
supporting Harald's preferred views are "on-topic". Harald has
threatened more people with suspension for merely responding to
reasonable discussion topics, with reasonable contrary arguments. This
is a pattern of harassment and intimidation meant to promote a
particular viewpoint (Harald and Brian Carpenter's), and does not
constitute fair refereeing.
There can be no fair consensus called in the face of such threats and
intimidation by the Working Group Chair.
I ask the IESG to intervene, and replace Harald with a Chair who will be
more fair and will not use the powers of the chair to unfairly advance
his own agenda.
Dean Anderson
President of the LPF
President of AV8 Internet, Inc
--
Av8 Internet Prepared to pay a premium for better service?
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Date: Thu, 20 Dec 2007 12:34:17 +0100
From: Harald Alvestrand <harald@alvestrand.no>
To: Simon Josefsson <simon@josefsson.org>
Cc: Frank Ellermann <hmdmhdfmhdjmzdtjmzdtzktdkztdjz@gmail.com>,
Brian E Carpenter <brian.e.carpenter@gmail.com>, ipr-wg@ietf.org
Subject: ADMIN: Dead horse beating is not on-topic (Re: Sample code)Simon,
you have raised your argument. The WG has declared consensus otherwise.
Please stop wasting the bandwidth on the list; save your breath for
IETF Last Call
(if you REALLY want to have all the arguments repeated once more).HaraldSimon Josefsson wrote:
Brian E Carpenter <brian.e.carpenter@gmail.com> writes:
The
current IETF license is an example of such a license (fixed by
incoming+outgoing though). There has been source code examples in RFCs
with nasty licenses; if I recall correctly, some does not even permit
redistribution.Further, I think the point is that it happens often that the copyright
holder on some code haven't released code under IETF's licenses, and it
is useful to include the code in an RFC. The current situation works
against the IETF's goal of facilitating wide implementations of
standards. This situation is bad, and your suggested solution isn't
realistic.Why not? We've just done it (twice) for a draft I reviewed.
Which drafts was that? In the latest example that Russ asked the IPR WG
about, draft-ietf-rmt-bb-fec-ldpc, after discussions, I was told the
solution will be to remove code from the document.It would only fail in the case of an uncooperative author, and in that
case we're stuck anyway.
No, that's missing the point. In draft-ietf-rmt-bb-fec-ldpc and the
base64 draft, external copyright owners own the copyright on code that
is useful to include in the document. To be over-precise: it is useful
for the IETF, it is not necessarily useful for the copyright owner.In the cases where the copyright owner(s)
1) can't be identified or reached,
2) is unwilling to re-license the work,
3) is never approached to resolve the issueit can still happen that it is useful for the IETF to be able to include
code. The code may be licensed under a widely permissible license.
Still, given how the IETF rules work now (and in the future too), this
is impossible.The requirement to not include external copyright notice has been
violated several times in RFCs, and I haven't seen an argument that the
requirement is more important than allowing the IETF to work better. It
makes it impossible to include freely licensed code that would help
documents. I think the policy should be modified here./Simon
Date: Fri, 21 Dec 2007 09:12:13 +0100
From: Harald Alvestrand <harald@alvestrand.no>
To: TS Glassey <tglassey@earthlink.net>
Cc: Simon Josefsson <simon@josefsson.org>,
Brian E Carpenter <brian.e.carpenter@gmail.com>, ipr-wg@ietf.org
Subject: ADMIN: Offtopic warningThe idea of rights "transfer" for contribution is outside the scope
of this WG.The method that the IETF has used is licensing, and there is WG
consensus that we will continue to use that method.Further atttempts by the same individual to raise the issue of
"transfer" will result in a suspension for offtopic posting.TS Glassey wrote:
Harald - that description is one of an intentionally weak transfer process
and its the WG Chair's responsibity to see that this WG's actions meet all
legal requirements, this is not a technical thing that is being vetted its
the contractual structure for participation in the IETF and that brings
liability into the mix (whether you like it or not).Date: Sat, 22 Dec 2007 12:20:12 +0100
From: Harald Alvestrand <harald@alvestrand.no>
To: TS Glassey <tglassey@earthlink.net>
Cc: ipr-wg@ietf.org
Subject: ADMIN: Offtopic warning (second topic) (Re: #1539 proposed
resolution)Todd,
TS Glassey skrev:
This DOESNT work. It MUST certify that all of the key documents are
read and agreed to. That means the language MUST read something to
closer to5.1. General Policy
By submission of a Contribution, each person actually submitting the
Contribution, and each named co-Contributor, certifies that they
have read and agree to the terms and conditions for submitting IP for
vetting to the IETF.
you have been insisting that the WG should use the term "vetting" at
least since 2003, with zero indication that the WG agrees with you.I'm adding "vetting" to "transfer" as subjects that will get your
privilleges suspended for off-topic posting.Harald