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Re: [802SEC] Standards Staff Discussions



Jim-

At 03:48 PM 9/12/01 -0500, Jim Carlo wrote:
4) Regarding the policy on Marks/Trademarks/Usage, this needs to be aired at the BOG meeting end of November, with the updated Copyright Statement and Trademark Frontpiece agreed by the BOG, then fanned out to the Standards Board at its December meeting. Notice will go on all standards approved from then on.

This is a rather arrogant plan which assumes that both the BOG and SA-Board just approve this plan without deferral or modification. It is my belief that this change will result in a radical change in the relationship between the IEEE-SA and the corporations who are its de facto customers and our employers. This is not "just another" board motion or staff action. It is my belief that continued pursuit along this path has the very real potential to sufficiently alienate the constituency of the IEEE-SA as to bring about the destruction of IEEE Standards as a force in my industry


5) Regarding Std 802, met with Susan Tatiner and Sue Vogel and agreed we had dug a deep hole. Proposal to get out of the hole is to have the Standards Board make a motion recognizing the error and ballot recirculation process. Susan was going to see if they could immediately publish the standard as per the recirc, without the trademark notice, and then add the Mark notice when approved by the BOG. I should have a draft of the Standards Board motion in a day that I will send to you for any comments, as I will make the motion. My suggestion is to simply abstain on the recirc (an abstain vote on a recirc means that you support the change), and then we can go forward with the Standard.

Here again, I feel that your proposal is flawed.
We obviously (by now) are not going to have a motion at the September meeting. I will not support an affirming vote on this issue at the board without interactive discussion, which is effectively what an electronic vote would be.

You are incorrect on the abstain. If more than 30% of the voters actually return a ballot of ABSTAIN then the result is NOT support of the change but rather an invalidation of the ballot. This would throw the whole mess further into limbo. The question would then be what would that mean. There could be multiple interpretations. If you believe, as I do, that this recirculation is improper then declaring it invalid is the right thing to do. If you feel, as does staff, that this is just another round of the same 802 ballot, then it would invalidate the entire approval of 802. That would be difficult to do as the SA-Standards Board has already approved the Standard unconditionally at its June meeting.

I believe that the correct thing to do is:
        1) Vote DISAPPROVE on the change
        2) Demand that the change to clause 5 be rescinded since there was no valid comment during the balloting for this change.
        3) Assert that the standard should be immediately published as approved by the Standards Board and without any new and innovative trademark notices that have not yet been approved by SA governing bodies.
        4) Make sure that you vote has plenty of time to get there by US mail. It is a paper ballot and the vote closes September 20 (faxes are not allowed).

There is no special reason why this particular standard should be held hostage to the proposed change in policy. IEEE 802 should be de coupled from the trademark imposition.

All we are asking for is that the IEEE do what they are supposed to do (and have been doing for years) with an approved Standard(per their own rules). Nothing more, nothing less.

Geoff