Subject: RE: New patent claim

From: Philip Hallam-Baker <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 23 Jun 2000 12:16:03 -0700

The working group does not have any budget for any purpose (as far as
I am aware).

Obtaining a non-infringement opinion on even the most ridiculous claim
costs may tens of thousands of dollars in legal time and at least as 
much in engineer time - if you can find one prepared to spend that much
time talking to lawyers.

Under UK law there is actually a tort of demanding monies based on
a bogus intellectual property claim.

I'd rather apply to the US patent office for a patent on some critical
biological function which according to the USPTO motto 'ask and ye 
shall receive' would inevitably be granted. Then if anyone ever sued
we could file a cross claim and demand an injunction demanding that
they cease the bodily functions concerned pending the outcome of the
case.

		Phill

-----Original Message-----
From: [email-masked] [mailto:[email-masked]]
Sent: Friday, June 23, 2000 9:41 AM
To: Philip Hallam-Baker
Cc: [email-masked]; [email-masked];
[email-masked]; [email-masked]
Subject: RE: New patent claim

Et all,
While I agree with Phil that the claims do not seem connected. I wonder
if
the S/MIME group has access
to a legal staff and could ask the question?
Mike McClennan
Director of Marketing - Secure Messaging
Tel: (416) 418-1144
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                    Philip Hallam-Baker

                    <[email-masked]        To:     "'Bruce
Greenblatt'"                       
                    m>
<[email-masked]>, Paul     
                    Sent by:                   Hoffman / IMC
<[email-masked]>,                  
                    owner-ietf-smime@ma        [email-masked]

                    il.imc.org                 cc:

                                               Subject:     RE: New
patent claim                  

                    06/22/00 10:48 AM

I also read the claims. I cannot see the connection.

What did come to mind as a possibility was that some lawyer persuaded
his client that he had to file the notice (and charged him a couple of
hundred bucks for doing so).

          Phill

---

From: Paul Hoffman / IMC <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 23 Jun 2000 12:35:29 -0700

>The working group does not have any budget for any purpose (as far as

For those of you not familiar with Phill's dry Brit humor (surely he 
writes for NTK?), the IETF does not spend money researching laws. It 
never has. In fact, they did not research whether or not they should 
have posted the IPR statement that started this thread: they just did 
it blindly, as they do with all the rest of them. It is up to you to 
decide whether or not the patent is valid, applies to anything you 
are doing, and so on.

(And, before someone posts a "why not" type response, might I remind 
you that you all paid no money to be members of the IETF? That might 
give you a clue....)

--Paul Hoffman, Director
--Internet Mail Consortium