W3C Value Proposition

W3C value proposition, gathered from various discussions and comments as part of task force about Making W3C the place for new standards. Comments or suggestions? public-vision-newstd@w3.org

• International community with strong values
  • Respect for participants
  • People are there to work on specs; staff helps navigate process
  • Vendor neutrality
  • Principles for the Web (open, available to all, implementable at no cost, etc.)
• Open Process
  • Consensus-driven
  • Royalty-Free patent policy
  • Public Accountability, transparency in decision-making
• Exposure
  • Strong relationship with IT members focused on standards
  • Liaisons with governments and other standards bodies (including de jure, e.g., PAS Submitter status effort)
  • Relationships with research bodies
  • Quality control, horizontal reviews (e.g., accessibility, internationalization), consensus-building apparatus
• Experience and Reputation
  • Track record (including of helping people build consensus)
  • Relevance of current W3C work
  • Tim Berners-Lee visibility
  • Staff expertise (mentoring, helping to coordinate work, discussion, share institutional experience, building community, diplomacy role)
  • Given broad scope of work, W3C can help sew pieces of technology together so that the whole works more ffectively (architecture).
• Infrastructure and tools (list archives, IRC, teleconf services, wikis, blog, etc.)
  • Communications and marketing staff

Value Proposition for Incubator

• Gentle introduction to standardization; mentoring through the process