In a meeting held last week, the Patent Policy Working Group ("PPWG") of the Internet standards body, World Wide Web Consortium ("W3C"), voted to recommend to W3C a royalty-free policy. The policy takes the position that W3C will not approve a Recommendation (effectively, a standard) on a web-related technology if it is aware that a patent exists covering the technology, which patent is not available for licensing on royalty-free terms.
Other highlights of the royalty-free policy include the following:
- the rights accorded under a royalty-free licence will apply solely to the implementation of the standard - any other use of the patent would fall outside the licence;
- if a patent issues after the related standard is adopted by W3C, the royalty-free policy allows the standard to be withdrawn and reworked by W3C to avoid infringement on the patent; and
- a member of any Working Group that formulates new W3C standards must file a declaration that royalty-free rights will be granted to anyone for implementing a standard in relation to any patent held by the member.