OpenID IP and Patent concerns
Over the past few days there have been several posts about the state of OpenID’s intellectual property. I thought I would make a quick post to point folks at some of the progress the OpenID Foundation has been making on this front and to hopefully dispel some of the FUD going around.
First of all, I should point out that corralling a projects intellectual property (IP) is a non-trivial thing to do. You have to think about all of the current and past contributors as well as have everyone come to an agreement on how that IP should be handled. This can take many different forms. In the case of OpenID, discussions have been on-going on the legal mailing list with all of the interested parties.
Today, one of the main contributors to OpenID, JanRain (full disclosure: former employer), announced their non-assertion convenant for OpenID (covering OpenID 1.1, SREG and Yadis). This is on the heels of Sun and Verisign (and here) doing the same in the past few months.
This is great news and a clear indication that we’re moving in the right direction and going to get this sorted out. Dave Kearns at NetworkWorld mentions the patents that the folks at Sxip hold. Discussions with Dick (CEO of Sxip) have always been positive and the patents that Dick and Co. have filed are, according to him, defensive in nature. Dick has been a pioneer in this space and is firmly committed to OpenID and I believe he’s going to the right thing when it comes to his IP, patents and what the community needs.
We’ll be keeping a running tally on who has committed what to the IPR discussion on the OpenID Specifications page. Progress is being made, we’re moving forward and its never as fast as we’d all like. I encourage you, if you are so inclined, to join the discussions on the legal mailing list or blog about your thoughts on this. Its entirely up to the community how we shape this policy but its absolutely critical that we do it soon.
Update: David Recordon mentions the actual progress being forged during the face-to-face meetings. Thanks David.
Well written Scott,thanks for hte update[...]For anyone who has been following OpenID this post is a worthwhile read.[...]