[License-discuss] [Non-DoD Source] Re: patent rights and the OSD

Wed Mar 8 14:36:34 UTC 2017

I can pass it through ARL's lawyers, as well as pass it to the code.gov 
people.

Thanks,
Cem Karan

> -----Original Message-----
> From: License-discuss [mailto:license-discuss-bounces at opensource.org] On 
> Behalf Of Stephen Kellat
> Sent: Tuesday, March 07, 2017 10:41 PM
> To: license-discuss at opensource.org
> Subject: Re: [License-discuss] [Non-DoD Source] Re: patent rights and the 
> OSD
>
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> On Mar 7, 2017, at 10:08 PM, Tzeng, Nigel H. <Nigel.Tzeng at jhuapl.edu> wrote:
> >
> > You know the more I think about this, the disclaimer of patent rights in 
> > CC0 is probably best for GOSS because it avoids the attempt for
> a one size fit all patent grant language among different agencies with 
> different policies and the complexity under which patent rights are
> awarded to whom under the Bayh-Dole Act and Executive Order 10096.
> >
> > Employees of federal agencies, especially research oriented ones, have 
> > some financial interest and rights under 10096.
> >
> > Likewise non-profits and small businesses under Bayh-Dole.
> >
> > IMHO patent grant language in FOSS licenses provide a false sense of 
> > security.
> >
> > I would rather the government open source as much as possible regardless 
> > of patent rights as long as any known patents are disclosed.
> As seen in Ximpleware v Versata the patents typically only cover a small 
> portion of the overall system (VTD-XML). While it is relevant from
> the perspective of being able to use the system as built it is less relevant 
> from a code reuse perspective.
> >
> > For large government systems significant software components could often 
> > be reused without the specific portions covered under
> patent.
> >
> > So just having a copyright license to the entire project would provide 
> > significant value to the community. There is code I wrote 30 years
> ago I'd love to get access to again even if I couldn't use the rest of the 
> system.
> >
> >
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>
> After a less than fabulous day at work for IRS dealing with my tiny corner 
> of tax law as well as my accounts work, I am tempted after
> reading this.  Perhaps this could be used as well as the rest of this thread 
> as pre-decisional input to open a tight Inquiry in the Federal
> Register.  That's the first step we can take to move into building a formal 
> record for a body of law.  Alternatively getting something
> chartered under the Federal Advisory Committees Act might help move this 
> forward.
>
> I think the debate has dragged on a bit for more than a few months.  Moving 
> to where desirable federal policy/policies are adopted is
> probably doable.  Could we narrow this down to 3 or fewer courses of action 
> that might be explored by ARL counsel in an inquiry notice?
> Even if list participants are the only people that respond to a notice in 
> the Federal Register we're still building a useful record for later use
> such as Federal Acquisition Rules changes, for example.
>
> Depending upon what shows up in the President's budget set to drop Monday, I 
> either will have a lot of time on my hands coming up or
> an ICTAP certificate plus lots of time on my hands.  I want to see Federal 
> OSS policy evolve.  We have laid the groundwork here but need
> to get it in the official record soon.
>
> Stephen Michael Kellat
> GS-0962-07/1
> These views are solely my own and not those of the US Government.  Rank, 
> position, grade, and bureau are cited for identification
> purposes only.
>
>
>
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