RE: [stdsreg] some thoughts on the future direction of StdsReg

[Ketchell John <john.ketchell@cenorm.be>]

Thanks, Karl.

Of course such an animal would have to be voluntary, encouraging behaviour
rather than prescribing it, but it would at least be better than the current
haphazard situation in which SDOs almost seem to start to collaborate
because some participant in two separate bodies happened to notice synergies
between them... I certainly would not underestimate the challenge - our ICT
Standards Board here regularly has great (but sometimes even amusing)
debates over control issues when its ToRs are very clearly and consciously
stating its conclusions are non-binding on the member organizations...:-)

In any case we shall continue to float the idea as and when possible, but
maybe we can do more with the collective list.   In other words, "you have
the meta-data, but why not a wider collaboration and would anybody out there
be interested?"  If so, we can then have a shot at some kind of informal
(but maybe not a virtual) meeting of interested parties, with some
appropriate presentations on different issues.  I would guess the overall
cost would not be at all substantial and certainly not in comparison with
the membership fees consortia glean.

------------------------------------------------------------------------
Best regards
John Ketchell
Director, CEN/ISSS - Information Society Standardization System

URL:http://www.cenorm.be/isss

Rue de Stassart, 36	email (direct) john.ketchell@cenorm.be
B-1050 Brussels	email (secretariat) isss@cenorm.be
Belgium	                        Tel (direct) + 32 2 550 08 46
Fax + 32 2 550 09 66	Tel (secretariat) + 32 2 550 08 13
Tel (GSM) +32 475 594 828



-----Original Message-----
From: Karl F. Best [mailto:karl.best@oasis-open.org]
Sent: Tuesday, July 02, 2002 15:50
To: Ketchell John; 'Standards Registry Mail List'
Cc: Bob Feghali
Subject: RE: [stdsreg] some thoughts on the future direction of StdsReg


John:

> What would actually be far preferable to us is a much wider
> agenda:  that we seek to create an  "Association of Standards
> Consortia" (with formal SDOs as associates).  This could promote
> information exchange, help desk function, and best practice for this
> and a number of other issues (eg a best practice for consortia IPR
> policies!), provide a portal and (ultimately) encourage efforts at
> collaboration to ensure inter-operability. This is an idea we
> have floated from time to time with different people;  of course it
> would need a resource commitment to create it, but, if we can
> develop a worthwhile contact base, it might be a good idea to test
> the waters and see whether enough people out there are interested.
> Then I think we would need a not-for-profit Association to be
formed:
> this can be done relatively easily even for very small activities in
> many countries, though obviously the scope and size of the operation
> would depend on what people are prepared to buy into.

Oh, the uber-organization idea :-) Actually, I like this idea a lot,
and have been thinking about it quite a bit the last several months.
My original thinking last fall when we started the StdsReg effort was
that this could become (or belongs in) some sort of uber-organization.

But I see a couple of problems: First, the funding, as you have
pointed out. Second, and more important, is the authority. If this was
merely a coordinative body then how useful would it be? At some point
its mission would be hampered by lack of authority over other SDOs.
And I can say for certain that there are very few SDOs in the world
right now who would voluntarily give up any of their soverignty to
join an uber-organization.

But despite these objections I still think that this is an interesting
idea that could be pursued. I would be (personally) interested in
being involved somehow.


</karl>
=================================================================
Karl F. Best
OASIS - Director, Technical Operations
+1 978.667.5115 x206
karl.best@oasis-open.org  http://www.oasis-open.org


> -----Original Message-----
> From: Ketchell John [mailto:john.ketchell@cenorm.be]
> Sent: Tuesday, July 02, 2002 8:48 AM
> To: 'Standards Registry Mail List'
> Cc: Bob Feghali
> Subject: RE: [stdsreg] some thoughts on the future
> direction of StdsReg
>
>
> Dear Colleagues
>
> Thank you for starting this debate.
>
> First, I would agree we should send the draft (though
> essentially on more or
> less a "cold call" basis) for comment to all the SDOs we
> can find, whether
> ICT consortia or other.  As regards the contacts, I agree
> this is difficult,
> though not impossible - our original consortia list five
> years ago was drawn
> up in consultation with the organizations, though I suspect
> the contact
> information thus obtained is pretty badly outdated (I can
> try to check this
> on Thursday when our responsible person re-appears).  As
> Karl says, we MIGHT
> be able to provide updated contact details for many
> organizations if we
> split the task:  if all else fails, usually there is some
> kind of anonymous
> organizational contact on the web sites anyway.
>
> As part of the comment process, we should also elicit
> information on the
> likely extent of buy-in to using the end product.  The
> smaller organizations
> may be more easily able to adapt and use it - eg I have no
> problem to
> implement it for our CEN/ISSS Workshop activities, where we
> have control
> over how the work programme is presented and we can manage
> it, but for CEN
> to implement it for all its thousands of work items would
> be extremely
> difficult to say the least, especially given investments in
> and process for
> managing data-base technologies.  What we need is enough users to
> demonstrate it by example, even on a trial basis.
>
> I am not so keen on the formal adoption of the spec. by a
> particular SDO
> (which?).  Maybe the resulting connotations of "ownership"
> might even put
> some people off? Also, I wonder whether we need any IP
> protection - I would
> see this as a kind of "public good".
>
> What would actually be far preferable to us is a much wider
> agenda:  that we
> seek to create an  "Association of Standards Consortia"
> (with formal SDOs as
> associates).  This could promote information exchange, help
> desk function,
> and best practice for this and a number of other issues (eg
> a best practice
> for consortia IPR policies!), provide a portal and
> (ultimately) encourage
> efforts at collaboration to ensure inter-operability. This
> is an idea we
> have floated from time to time with different people;  of
> course it would
> need a resource commitment to create it, but, if we can
> develop a worthwhile
> contact base, it might be a good idea to test the waters
> and see whether
> enough people out there are interested.  Then I think we
> would need a
> not-for-profit Association to be formed:  this can be done
> relatively easily
> even for very small activities in many countries, though
> obviously the scope
> and size of the operation would depend on what people are
> prepared to buy
> into.
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> ------------
> Best regards
> John Ketchell
> Director, CEN/ISSS - Information Society Standardization System
>
> URL:http://www.cenorm.be/isss
>
> Rue de Stassart, 36	email (direct) john.ketchell@cenorm.be
> B-1050 Brussels	email (secretariat) isss@cenorm.be
> Belgium	                        Tel (direct) + 32 2 550 08 46
> Fax + 32 2 550 09 66	Tel (secretariat) + 32 2 550 08 13
> Tel (GSM) +32 475 594 828
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Bob Hager [mailto:BHager@ansi.org]
> Sent: Monday, July 01, 2002 22:19
> To: 'Standards Registry Mail List'
> Cc: Bob Feghali
> Subject: RE: [stdsreg] some thoughts on the future
> direction of StdsReg
>
>
> Thanks for this, Karl.
>
> With regard to identifying SDOs, we have been working on
> developing a
> comprehensive SDOs database for the NSSN which could be a
> great starting
> point for the comprehensive list of SDOs.  This takes into
> account the
> CEN/ISS list and others.  As Em pointed out at the Interop
> Summit, we need
> to get to the middle level people - the ones who deal with
> the metadata on a
> day-to-day basis.  It's still on my list to give a status
> report to ANSI
> SDOs via our Organization Member Council and other ANSI
> governance bodies.
>
> Regarding ANSI hosting the StndsReg site, I've spoken to
> our IT Director and
> I'll soon get your IT people in touch with ours to work on
> the details.
>
> Regards,
> Bob H.
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Karl F. Best [mailto:karl.best@oasis-open.org]
> Sent: Saturday, June 29, 2002 9:08 AM
> To: stdsreg
> Subject: [stdsreg] some thoughts on the future direction of StdsReg
>
>
> For the past couple of days I've been at the Interoperability Summit
> in Orlando, where I presented, together with Bob Hager, the
> status of
> the StdsReg project. I also had the chance to chat with Makx Dekkers
> and Em delaHostria, a couple of our StdsReg participants who were in
> attendence.
>
> After these chats and further thinking prompted by some of the
> discussions and presentations at the meeting, I've been
> trying to come
> up with some ideas regarding our future direction. We're nearing
> completion of the StdsReg metadata spec (many thanks to
> Bob, Makx, and
> others who have contributed technically), and should start thinking
> about where we're going from here.
>
> (I'm sending these ideas out via this email list to prompt some
> discussion; our meeting attendence has been dropping, and
> I'd like to
> get some input from those of you on the list who haven't
> been able to
> attend lately. Please consider this an invitation to respond to and
> discuss these topics.)
>
> I propose that as soon as we have a final draft we feel comfortable
> with that we send it out for public review. The goal of the
> review is
> to find out if the spec will adequately describe the work of SDOs.
> Therefore, the audience for this review is SDOs, and not vendors. As
> such, we need to compile a list of SDOs and contact information for
> the appropriate person at each SDO. I will need help from all of you
> in compiling this list. I'm aware of a couple lists of SDOs (e.g. at
> CEN/ISSS) but don't know of any that include contact information.
>
> After sending out the spec for review, getting feedback, evaulating
> this feedback and using it to improve the spec, then giving final
> approval to the spec by this committee, we will still have two tasks
> ahead of us: first, promoting the adoption of the spec, and second,
> (optionally) seeking to have the spec approved by some SDO.
>
> For the first, how do we promote the adoption of the spec by
> organizations that currently, or could potentially in the
> future, list
> standards information? We already have interested organizations
> represented within our commmittee (ANSI, CEN, OASIS, Diffuse) that
> have committed to or will probably implement the spec. How do we
> promote its use at other organizations?
>
> And for the second, do we see the need for approval of the
> spec by an
> SDO? I suspect that this would be useful in driving the adoption of
> the spec, but which SDO should we submit to?
>
> Related to that is the standing of our currently ad hoc committee.
> Should this committee seek to become part of an SDO, or are we happy
> remaining independent, with our own process and with no IP
> protection?
> I have resisted suggestions coming from within my own organization
> that StdsReg should become an OASIS technical committee on
> the grounds
> that that would require you all to join OASIS in order to
> participate.
> Is there an organization that we could (or should!) belong to that
> would allow open participation, provide us with IP protection, and
> provide a path for approval of the spec by some (de juere?) SDO?
>
> (Note that because StdsReg is not an OASIS TC and therefore not
> covered by the OASIS IP policy I have been asked by my Board to move
> the StdsReg web page and email list off the OASIS servers. ANSI has
> been kind enough to offer to take their turn at this
> hosting; we will
> make the move very soon. I'll discuss this further on the next
> concall.)
>
> I've suggested these items for discussion in hopes of getting some
> feedback from those of you interested in the future
> direction of this
> effort. I'm got my own feelings on some of these, but would
> prefer to
> get your ideas so that we can all together make some of these
> important decisions.
>
> Please respond!
>
> </karl>
> =================================================================
> Karl F. Best
> OASIS - Director, Technical Operations
> +1 978.667.5115 x206
> karl.best@oasis-open.org  http://www.oasis-open.org
>
>
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