The Case for New Economic Models to Support Standardization Efforts

Clifford Lynch, Executive Director, Coalition for Networked Information

1/01/2005
(Original Publish Date: 2000)

In this paper I discuss - often critically - the "traditional" standards development organizations and their behavior. I recognize that there is tremendous variety among these organizations, both within the US and internationally. Many are making an honest attempt, through diverse approaches, to grapple with the issues raised in this paper. I fear that many of these responses are too modest and too late. I hope the characterization here will help illuminate the growing fault lines between these SDOs and their user communities, both traditional and emerging, and the contrasts between these SDOs and the other organizations that have developed both to complement and compete with them. My goal is to provide insight into the broad challenges facing the existing SDOs and to highlight strategies that may help to address these challenges, rather then to critique the policies and strategies of any specific SDO.