RE: ISO intellectual property (was Standards)

["Bullard, Claude L (Len)" <clbullar@ingr.com>]

Title:

First, balance of powers.  It isn't us vs them, black or white,

good or evil, etc.   It is balance:  ensuring that no

group or consortia be empowered to act such that

the interests of human culture are in peril because they

can act hastily or without sound reason.  It sounds

dramatic, I know, but it is really the tedious details

of how law and technology interact by consent.

 

Second, we can't toss words like "standards" into these

discussions unless they have meaning.  What

do we say to those who think SAX should be a

W3C-owned and maintained product?  What would

that help?  Do those who originally developed it

but are not W3C members have rights?  If so, what

are they?  Lots of open-list works gets carried off

into members-only groups.  Well-meaning people

enlist the support of organizations whose policies

and worse, controls, they don't understand.  In

some cases, controls they cannot or will not see.

 

Don't take my position in a largely theoretical argument

as a like or dislike.  This isn't personal and those 

who want to make it personal are simply thanked 

for their input.    I think it important to explore these

relationships down that twisty road because otherwise

we find ourselves accepting the opinions of the press,

the pundits, and others (me included, so I accept the

risks to debate this from an unpopular position).  

 

Because XML is being used to code and preserve very

large chunks of the world's

information assets, care is warranted in how it is

designed, created and changed.   The Blueberry affair

pushes certain issues to the surface.  When for

example, should an organization be allowed to limit

the character sets if such limitations would make

cultural assets (eg, the famous Buddhist texts)

disappear?   Do the consortia have responsibilities

for such things?  If not, should SGML, an international

standard, be maintained assiduously to ensure in

such cases, the owners of that information have

another way to maintain it and still make it available? 

 

I have lobbied for the update and improvement of

SGML.  I've done it for years.   I consider it the

jewel for which XML is a setting.  It does deserve

a bit or polishing now and then.

Len
http://www.mp3.com/LenBullard

Ekam sat.h, Vipraah bahudhaa vadanti.
Daamyata. Datta. Dayadhvam.h

-----Original Message-----
From: Williams, David [mailto:DAVID.WILLIAMS@ca.com]

Hey Len..

 

 

<question>

Don't take this the wrong way, please...

What exactly, then, are you doing developing XML standards?

</question>

 

<re-phrase>

What is it about XML that holds your interests and keeps you from lobbying the ISO daily to "fix" and update SGML?

</re-phrase>

 

<statement of opinion>

A casual reader might think that you don't like OR enjoy using and/or developing XML....

</statement of opinion>