Standards and Public PolicyShane Greenstein, Victor Stango Cambridge University Press, 2006 M12 21 Technological standards are a cornerstone of the modern information economy, affecting firm strategy, market performance and, by extension, economic growth. While there is general agreement that swift movement to superior technological standards is a worthwhile goal, there is much less agreement on the central policy questions: do markets choose efficient standards? How do standards organizations affect the development of standards? And finally, what constitutes appropriate public policy toward standards? In this volume, leading researchers in public policy on standards, including both academics and industry experts, focus on these key questions. Given the dearth of applied work on standards and public policy, this volume significantly advances the frontier of knowledge in this critical but understudied area. It will be essential reading for academic and industrial researchers as well as policymakers. |
Contents
| 18 | |
the case | 60 |
black | 87 |
lessons | 123 |
Intellectual property and standardization committee | 208 |
5a Patent and citation data summary by meeting | 221 |
Manipulating interface standards as an anticompetitive | 231 |
exploring | 260 |
a failing paradigm | 296 |
Standards battles and public policy | 329 |
business and public | 345 |
Should competition policy favor compatibility? | 372 |
Index | 389 |
Common terms and phrases
56K modems adoption analog signal analysis ANSI anticompetitive antitrust Applied Materials benefits broadcasting browser chipset citations committee Communications companies complements component competition consensus consortia consortium consumers coordination create dards decision delays distributional conflict example Farrell firms formal Gandal Greenstein high-type viewers host controller IESG IETF IETF standard setting IETF's implementations incentives increase innovation Intel intellectual property interface specification Internet Draft interoperability ISPs JEDEC licensing low-type viewers manufacturers meetings microprocessor Microsoft modularity mortgage industry Netscape network effects network externalities one-way interface standard Open Source open standards optimal organizations outcome participants patents period platform operator policymaker potential problem Proposed Standard proprietary Rambus SDOs slowdown standard setting process standardization process standards development strategy subsidy switch to digital technical telecommunications television tion users variables vendors vertical IS standards Windows 98
Popular passages
Page 318 - States private sector voluntary standardization system for more than 80 years. Founded in 1918 by five engineering societies and three government agencies, the Institute remains a private, nonprofit membership organization supported by a diverse constituency of private and public sector organizations.
Page 300 - States member of the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) and the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC).
Page 313 - ... that the standards they develop will meet both public and private sector needs. A voluntary consensus standards body is defined by the following attributes: (i) Openness. (ii) Balance of interest. (iii) Due process. (vi) An appeals process. (v) Consensus, which is defined as general agreement, but not necessarily unanimity, and includes a process for attempting to resolve objections by interested parties, as long as all comments have been fairly considered, each objector is advised of the disposition...
Page 305 - Additionally, the XML Digital Signature specification, under development by the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) and the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), is also available.
Page 320 - The European Committee for Standardization (CEN), the European Committee for Electrotechnical Standardization (CENELEC), and the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) are the major standards-setting organizations in Europe.
Page 313 - Voluntary consensus standards bodies are domestic or international organizations which plan, develop, establish, or coordinate voluntary consensus standards using agreed-upon procedures. For purposes of this Circular, "voluntary, private sector, consensus standards bodies," as cited in Act, is an equivalent term. The Act and the Circular encourage the participation of federal representatives in these bodies to increase the likelihood that the standards they develop will meet both public and private...
Page 243 - These key pairs are used both to encrypt data (data encrypted with the public key can only be decrypted with the private key) and sign data (data signed with the private key can only be verified with the public key).
Page 326 - This is where much of the concern about standardization comes in - and the old tired rubric of "the nice thing about standards is that there are so many of them" is brought up.34 It is duplicative standards - not duplicative standardization efforts - that are the bane of the industry.