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Reply-To: Mailing list for the LaTeX3 project
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In-Reply-To:  Your message of "Mon, 09 Nov 1998 12:24:31 GMT." 
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Date:         Mon, 9 Nov 1998 12:32:53 +0000
From: Robin Fairbairns <Robin.Fairbairns@CL.CAM.AC.UK>
Sender: Mailing list for the LaTeX3 project
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To: Multiple recipients of list LATEX-L
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Subject:      Re: Quotes, HTML, and FrontPage
Status: R

> >  > I think TeX society should not go under indirect supervision
> >  > of ISO, W3C, etc. because there will come some time that one considers
> >  > charging
> > oh come! dont be *too* paranoid. if we have to pay a license fee to use
> > ISO standards, the world will have become *very* odd...

in fact, there do exist iso standards which require you to pay
implementation licence fees.  there are very strict guidelines,
however, about standardising patented techniques: in particular, the
owner of the patent is required to declare that they will never refuse
an application for licence.

> From what I understand with regard to Fortran standards, if you want a
> copy of the standard, you have to pay a substantial sum to ISO.

if you want a copy of the latex book, you have to pay a sustantial sum
to addison wesley longman.  less, i admit, than one pays to one's
national standards body[*] for a transposed copy of something as big as
fortran, but the principle is the same.

personally, i would be quite happy to be using something for which a
formal specification, to which i could test compliance, existed.  but
i think i'm a bit unusual in that.  perhaps it comes from having seen
the standardsation process from the inside...

r

[*] none but a true idiot _buys_ standards from iso.  bsi's charges
for standards are extortionate, but as nothing by comparison with
iso's.