Subject: [Fecframe] Concerns WRT draft-watson-tsvwg-fec-sf-00.txt licencing conditions

From: Vincent Roca <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 09 Nov 2005 20:10:10 +0100

Dear Mark,

I have serious concerns with respect to the licencing conditions 
described in Digital
Fountains IPR Disclosure (copied in this email for convenience).

 From the FECframe BOF description, it is clear that the existing I-D
(draft-watson-tsvwg-fec-sf-00.txt) is forseen to be the underlying 
transport
mechanism. As explained in the associated IPR disclosure, one or more 
patents
cover parts of the technology. If DF says they "will not assert any such 
Patent
claims against any implementing party for fully complying with the 
Standard", there
is a _big_ if: "(ii) [the party must not] challenge the validity of any 
patent right
owned or controlled by Digital Fountain[...]".

In our case, we did our best to produce a technology (LDPC 
staircase/triangle
FEC codes) that remains as far as possible from DF's Patents on the 
subject.
In spite of that, DF posted an IPR Disclosure, explaining the LDPC FEC 
infringes
three patents they own. The fact that we stayed on our position and 
explained that
we do not agree will undoubtedly be interpreted as "challenging DF patents"
(correct me if I'm wrong), and therefore we do not benefit from the 
royaltee free
licencing terms above. This is not acceptable IMHO.

The fact that the IETF does not take any position on IPR claims does not 
mean
this point should not be considered during the FECframe BOF, since the 
terms of
this IPR disclosure, along with the aggressive IPR attitude of DF, are 
likely to
largely restrict the licencing conditions of the FECframe technology.

Cheers,

   Vincent

Follows an extract of the IPR disclosure related to 
draft-watson-tsvwg-fec-sf-00.txt
----------------------------
https://datatracker.ietf.org/public/ipr_detail_show.cgi?ipr_id=632

Digital Fountain is the owner of one or more pending unpublished patent
applications (the Patents) relating to the subject matter of
Internet-Draft draft-watson-tsvwg-fec-sf-00.txt (Forward Error 
Correction (FEC)
Streaming Framework).

If the technology that is fully specified in this document is included in a
standard adopted by IETF (a Standard) and any claims of the Patents are
necessarily infringed by complying with the standard, then Digital 
Fountain will
not assert any such Patent claims against any implementing party for fully
complying with the Standard; provided, however, that such implementing 
party
does not (i) assert any patent right owned or controlled by such party 
against
Digital Fountain or any of its successors, or (ii) challenge the 
validity of any
patent right owned or controlled by Digital Fountain or any of its 
successors.
For the avoidance of doubt, Digital Fountain reserves the right to 
freely assert
its patent rights in connection with any product, service, or technology 
that
does not fully comply with the Standard.
----------------------------

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---

From: "Mark Watson" <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 9 Nov 2005 16:20:41 -0500

Vincent,

Our intention and hope is that the FEC Frame work will be free from IPR
concerns and this is why we made a 'royalty free' declaration. We think
it benefits everyone - ourselves included - if there are protocols which
support FEC which can be developed free from IPR concerns with IPR only
being considered when it comes to the choice of FEC code. This has been
the basis of our approach in RMT for many years now and is one of the
motivations behind the FEC Building Block approach.

The reciprocity clause you cite is, in my understanding, a normal thing
in such IPR disclosures and just means that in the event of formal legal
disputes between us and another company then all our patents can be
taken into account, as you might expect in that situation. 

To answer your question, whether or not you have publicly stated some
opinions about some other patents, what those opinions are, and who does
and doesn't agree with them, has no bearing on this issue.

Best regards,

Mark

-----Original Message-----
From: Vincent Roca [mailto:[email-masked]] 
Sent: Wednesday, November 09, 2005 11:10 AM
To: [email-masked]; Mark Watson
Cc: Vincent Roca
Subject: Concerns WRT draft-watson-tsvwg-fec-sf-00.txt licencing
conditions

Dear Mark,

Patent

we do not agree will undoubtedly be interpreted as "challenging DF
patents"

mean

Cheers,

   Vincent

If the technology that is fully specified in this document is included
in a
not assert any such Patent claims against any implementing party for
fully

that