Re: [xml-dev] XML's original goals

[Liam R E Quin <liam@w3.org>]

On Sun, 2012-04-15 at 23:51 +0200, Dan Brickley wrote:

> Talking of origins and goals (and btw c.f.
> http://www.w3.org/TR/2004/REC-xml11-20040204/#sec-origin-goals )

Yup, although the original poster's question was more about the politics
behind those goals I think...

> ...wouldn't it be nice if W3C Member-only archives from the original
> XML days could be opened up?

Yes. Unfortunately, we can't get everyone's permission, as not all
participants are alive today (as you indeed implied in your message).
But we might be able to get permission from all who are alive and from
the families/heirs of others.

> Perhaps the only way to do this 'by the book' in terms of expectations
> of the original WG participants, would be for W3C to all declare
> planet Earth a W3C Member and all it's residents as acting
> representatives of that Member.

I don't think that would qualify as meeting their/our expectations.
Probably the W3C Member Agreement holds, and W3C/ERCIM/MIT/Keio/INRIA
copyright would hold, in which case maybe it's a matter of contacting
people and asking them to agree, out of decency's sake at least. People
write things very differently in a closed group than in a public group.

> I ask as I've been talking with Max (cc:'d) lately about proposing a
> W3C Community Group (see http://www.w3.org/community/ ) on Web
> History, and I've been wondering whether working up such a proposal
> (for eventual public release of certain W3C Member-only archives)
> would be a feasible and useful work item. Would anyone be interested
> in exploring this and working through the details?

Although it's interesting I know I'm also pretty maxed out... (sorry
Max!) but I'm willing to help to the extent I can.

Liam


-- 
Liam Quin - XML Activity Lead, W3C, http://www.w3.org/People/Quin/
Pictures from old books: http://fromoldbooks.org/