Subject: RE: draft-zigmond-tv-url-02

From: "Michael A. Dolan" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 19 Aug 1999 12:31:51 -0700

In review of the ietf thread, there seem to be several main issues.  
Rather than try to reply to every message individually, I'll take a 
shot at summarizing them and replying to no individual in particular. 
 If I missed an issue that you feel is still open, then please do 
call it to my attention and I will reply with my opinion.

1. Various comments were on section 3.5, which discusses the future 
and provides an example syntax with double slashes in it.  For 
several reasons that were pointed out and I agree with, it would be 
my opinion that this section should be removed.  Please note that the 
BNF for the proposed scheme does *not* have double slashes in the 
syntax.

2. Various comments were made on the IP statement (sections 9 and 
10).  As I mentioned in a previous email, the authors tried to be 
generous.  They can either try and fix up the wording of the free 
license, or they can revert to the standard IP statement which has 
nothing to do with free (but everyone seems comfortable with having 
to obtain licenses and pay royalties I guess).  I have suggested to 
the authors that they revert to the less favorable standard wording 
for the simple reason to avoid these arrows.  This is really too bad 
in my opinion but will definitely streamline the process.  If there 
is anyone that *wants* it to be free and supports the spirit of the 
statement, they better speak up.

3. There was discussion about how hard is hard to change, and how 
many devices is enough to define widespread current practice, and 
what exponential growth in deployment affects the definition.  I 
maintain that there is "enough" widespread use to justify this 
scheme's public documentation and the authors and others wish for 
this to be published.  If someone wishes to debate this, then please 
provide the parameters by which IETF measures this, and then we can 
discuss it in a sane manner.  But there is little point in further 
discussion on this topic without some parameters around which to 
measure it.

4. Several folks have suggested that IETF is not the right forum for 
this URI scheme and that W3C or somewhere else is.  Since IETF is 
currently considering a draft that explains in great detail how to go 
about publishing URI scheme's at IETF, I fail to follow this 
argument, and thus maintain that IETF is indeed the right forum.  The 
fact that a W3C interest group on TV exists is not evidence that they 
are supportive of publishing URI schemes related to TV.  And, it has 
been implied that there are other groups that may be more 
appropriate, but noone has provided any specific names.

5. It has been suggested that the procedures of the new URI 
registration draft be followed in the processing of this tv: scheme.  
This does not seem appropriate at this time since the draft has not 
been approved, there is no procedure setup in IETF to follow, and the 
real implications of a document published under the "IETF" tree 
versus the "alternative" tree is not clear.  We are seeking better 
understanding of this from the draft author.

6. There was general discussion about URI syntax, such as scheme: and 
scheme:// syntaxes.  Some of these comments were in error.  Hopefully 
this is clear now.

7. The missing copyright section I'm assuming can easily be added, 
and was probably just an oversight.

8. The issue of "security" was raised.  Unauthorized tuning in TV 
systems is the responsibility of the underlying CA and UI systems.  
This URI itself, in my opinion, has no security considerations and 
thus any discussion of tuning authorization is outside the scope of 
this document.  It may be worthwhile capturing the above statement 
clearly deferring the responsibility (where it belongs), though.

9. There was lots of discussion on namspaces for which I have spent 
lots of time personally on how it probably should be done in the next 
URI scheme.  But, I have no further comments on the current draft and 
defer to the authors.

Anything I missed?

	Mike

------------------------------------------------------
Michael A. Dolan, Representing DIRECTV,  (619)445-9070   
PO Box 1673 Alpine, CA 91903        FAX: (619)445-6122

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From: Dan Wing <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 19 Aug 1999 15:49:47 -0700 (PDT)

> discussion on this topic without some parameters around which to 

If there are 1,000 users now and that doubles every week to 2,000, 4,000,
8,000, etc., pick any point in time and begin providing the superior URI
scheme, wait the same amount of time (one week), and half of your current
installed base will now have the superior URI scheme installed.

This ability to grow without ruining the installed base is helpful, even
necessary, on any product that has a growing set of users.

-Dan Wing

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From: Dan Wing <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 19 Aug 1999 15:49:47 -0700 (PDT)

-Dan Wing

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From: Keith Moore <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 19 Aug 1999 19:01:20 -0400

> statement, they better speak up.

People often get confused about IPR issues, so you have to keep
this in mind when evaluating comments.  But there are at least
two separate issues here: copyright of the document and licensing
of any IPR issues (say, patent or trade secret) associated with 
using the technology.

As for copyright of the document and the license for copying, 
making derivative works based on the document, etc:  IETF's 
rules on this are fairly clear, and I suspect they're not a 
problem in this case.

As for patents or trade secrets: IETF maintains web pages which
serve to communicate such IPR claims, and optionally license 
terms, to potential implementors.  There is a boilerplate
paragraph which points thos pages which can be put in RFCs.
 
> discussion on this topic without some parameters around which to 

The urlreg group has just finished defining policy for registering
new URLs.  We haven't fully developed a policy about how to document 
pre-existing URL types, but this discussion will help us understand
how to think about that.

> argument, and thus maintain that IETF is indeed the right forum.  

IETF can handle URI syntax checking and registration issues;
the question is whether IETF has the right expertise to define
the technical particulars of a tv: URL that relate to broadcast
formats and practices.   Not many people in IETF, I'll wager,
know enough about the pecularities of television transmission
to do a credible job with this.  It's like proposals for phone: 
and fax: URLs - should they support subaddressing?  Should they 
support any phone numbers that someone might use, or just E.164 
numbers?  The experts who are best qualified to specify the 
details are probably not found within IETF.

> The fact that a W3C interest group on TV exists is not evidence that they 

Naturally IETF doesn't want to step on the tv industry's toes by 
publishing, and apparently legitimizing, a poorly-designed specification 
of a tv: URL.   And it does seem likely that there are other 
organizations that would have something to say about such a specification,
and which might be involved in the W3C activity.  We would like the
benefit of their thinking on this subject.

More generally, IETF and W3C share an interest in encouraging
uniform and correct use of URIs.  Involving W3C in these discussions
is consistent with IETF's long-established tradition of consensus 
building

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From: Keith Moore <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 19 Aug 1999 19:01:20 -0400

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From: [email-masked]
Date: Fri, 20 Aug 1999 21:13:01 -0400

Date: Thu, 19 Aug 1999 12:31:51 -0700
   From: "Michael A. Dolan" <[email-masked]>

The IP statement in the draft is simply silly.  If there's something in
the document which requires a license --- i.e., due to a patent,
etc. then the document should explicitly say that some part of the
technology is patented.  I don't see how the the tv: URI format could
require licensing any other basis --- there's nothing that I can see
that would restrict its usage on the grounds on copyright, and now that
it's published as an I-D, it's certainly not a trade secret.....

So if the intention is that it be free, first explain why you think a
license is needed *at* *all* before someone can use the URI documented
in the I-D.  (The issue of the copyright status of the document itself
is a different issue, and the IETF process requirements for that are
pretty clear.)

							- Ted

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From: [email-masked]
Date: Fri, 20 Aug 1999 21:13:01 -0400

- Ted

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From: John Stracke <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 23 Aug 1999 16:48:47 -0400

[email-masked] wrote:

> technology is patented.

Not necessarily possible.  There could be a patent pending, and the rule
of thumb seems to be not to talk about upcoming patents until they're
public (probably because it's easier to get a patent blocked than to get
it overturned).

--
/=============================================================\
|John Stracke    | My opinions are my own | S/MIME & HTML OK  |
[email-masked]|============================================|
|Chief Scientist | NT's lack of reliability is only surpassed |
|eCal Corp.      |  by its lack of scalability. -- John Kirch |
\=============================================================/

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From: John Stracke <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 23 Aug 1999 16:48:47 -0400

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From: "Donald E. Eastlake 3rd" <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 24 Aug 1999 20:42:11 -0400

From:  "Michael A. Dolan" <[email-masked]>
Message-Id:  <[email-masked]>
Date:  Thu, 19 Aug 1999 12:31:51 -0700
To:  "Larry Masinter" <[email-masked]>, <[email-masked]>,
            "Matt Crawford" <[email-masked]>, <[email-masked]>,
            <[email-masked]>, <[email-masked]>,
            <[email-masked]>, <[email-masked]>, <[email-masked]>,
            "Lloyd Wood" <[email-masked]>
>...

The IP statement is just random.  As regards copyright, it may not be
broad enough since the world is granted limited rights to reproduce
and translate an RFC into other languages and the IP statements only
grant copyrights to the IETF.

Why should anyone get a technolgy license from Microsoft or Liberate
when it is clear the work was done by many people from many companies
and even one of the authors was previously affiliated with another
company?  There is no reason, other than this legal stuff, to think
that they have any technology IP to license and it appears to be a
pure accidnet of authorship that Microsoft and Liberate are the
companies and the only companies that had the opportunity thus far to
stuff in legal sections.

The IETF is an association of individuals.  Organizational affiliation
is given for purposes of identification only.  The fact that Dan
Zigmond is affiliated in some unspecified way with WebTV Networks,
Inc,., which I believe is owned by Microsoft, and that Mark Vicers is
affiliated in some unspecified way with Liberate Technologies, does
not, in the IETF context, imply they are speaking for these
organiations.  This goes without saying but I see no problem adding a
disclaimer to that effect if it would make people more comfortable.

In the IETF process, if any author or contributor is aware of any IP
that would interfere, they are required to dislose it.  If they are
not, the don't need to say anything on the subject.

>...

I am in favor of publishing this draft, with some cleanups and with
the misleading IP sections dropped.

>...

Use of // implies using the DNS for naming autority.  The right place,
as far as I can tell, for ITU callsigns in the DNS would be at
callsign.reg.int.

>and was probably just an oversight.

The copyright notice in not required in Internet Drafts.  It can be
added by the RFC Editor.

>clearly deferring the responsibility (where it belongs), though.

There is usually something you can say about security, like the local
nature of the URIs may misleading cause them to be differently
interpreted in other environments.  (Someone mails a URI for a family
channel to someone in whose environment the URI identified a porm
channel.

>...

Donald

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From: "Donald E. Eastlake 3rd" <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 24 Aug 1999 20:42:11 -0400

Donald