Dear Toby,
The old-line standards groups charge for access. Even if you get the document, the IP may have questionable provenance.
Sometimes some agencies have explicitly made some standards work public. Look to what UN-CEFACT has done with country and currency codes.
http://www.unece.org/cefact/codesfortrade/codes_index.html
They have produced XML Schemas (XSD) that are freely downloadable, freely accessible, and so have increased rather then decreased trade.
MW: This is a good example of an authoritative source publishing data in a way that all can use. This has nothing to do with the example Deborah was talking about however, which is about exchanging confidential design data between probably only a few systems within a few organizations as part of a design process.
One problem is the revenue model. Standards groups who get their revenues from specifications are not going to want to solve IP issues. If the revenue model is tied to per-page charges, you can expect wordy documents with lots of pictures.
MW: Not my experience. ISO is one such organization, but those that develop standards are not paid for their time and are aware that those that buy them pay per page, so standards tend to be shorter than perhaps more cryptic than might be useful as a result.
Sometimes groups produce where the IP is only that “No member will sue you if you are a member”—if only they would state it so succinctly. This means that fewer review the specification, fewer comment, and the specification is often harder to work with.
MW: I’m not aware of any standards organization that works like this.
I like to work in OASIS (www.oasis-open.org) because its products are generally free to use, free to download, free to build derivative products. The IP gate is on the contribution, rather than the use. Every email, posting, and proposal is publicly visible, which cuts through a lot of delays. Building-based semantics in OASIS is hard to come by.
MW: I agree OASIS is one of the better standards organizations in terms of openness and clear business model.
Regards
Matthew West
Information Junction
Tel: +44 1489 880185
Mobile: +44 750 3385279
Skype: dr.matthew.west
matthew.west@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
http://www.informationjunction.co.uk/
http://www.matthew-west.org.uk/
This email originates from Information Junction Ltd. Registered in England and Wales No. 6632177.
Registered office: 2 Brookside, Meadow Way, Letchworth Garden City, Hertfordshire, SG6 3JE.
tc
"Computers are useless. They can only give you answers." -- Pablo Picasso
Somewhere in this discussion is a problem that is the essence of what has been holding up progress in the facilities domain.
There are ways to publish technical requirements or test for conformance online for free, and pay (even substantially) to participate in the working groups or have voting privileges. For example OGC, W3C.
I can even see being able to own a part name or number within a larger communication machine that could be mapped to a generic form for broader exchange purposes. For example “13-57 13 15 Dining and Drinking Spaces” versus “The Sand Bar and Grille”
Depending on the domain, or need for cross disciplinary discussion, many on the IP-protected side have no interest in supporting, or will even actively stops progress, on a common model. There is also the problem of failed common models that do not work, will not accommodate different object definitions - from software to software or industry model to industry model - without loss of data or functionality. Bentley systems has stepped forward in this white paper on the IFC model to say actually – the emperor has no clothes on. See pages 6 and 7 “Round Tripping”
For some reason I think ontologies might be a way these IP-With-Open problems might be fixed but maybe I am wrong or wishing for too much.
DEBORAH MACPHERSON
Specifications and Research
Cannon Design
3030 Clarendon Blvd.
Suite 500
Arlington, VA 22201
Phone: 703.907.2353
Direct Dial: 2353
dmacpherson@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Cannondesign.com
Skype debmacp
From: ontology-summit-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:ontology-summit-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Simon Spero
Sent: Monday, March 11, 2013 5:25 PM
To: Ontology Summit 2013 discussion
Subject: Re: [ontology-summit] Hackathon: BACnet Ontology
On Mon, Mar 11, 2013 at 11:53 AM, Peter R. Benson <Peter.Benson@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Deborah, IP is a real issue. We designed the eOTD to try to resolve some of
these issues. In a dictionary the IP resides in the representation but also
in the identifiers or codes as these are always copyright.
That is not entirely clear; see e.g. SOUTHCO, INC v. KANEBRIDGE CORPORATION (