Subject: Re: Why does Valdis trust UL?

From: "Tony Dal Santo" <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 30 Jan 2002 06:34:15 -0800

Does UL "go after" companies that produce unsafe devices.  My guess would
be no.  As far as UL is concerned, companies voluntarily bring their
products to them for certification.  It is the consumers and legal
authorities that give UL such a "big stick".  And with this model, UL
seems to be fairly free of legal hassles since (from their perspective)
seeking certification is voluntary.

It seems to me a similar model could be followed by IETF or anyone with
the business sense to start a company (e.g. the InterOperability Lab
at UNH for Ethernet).  Actually, the task should be very simple.  The
IETF is supposed to require two independent interoperable implementation
before something can become a standard (and ideally even before becoming
a draft standard).  The "Internet Interoperability Lab" could just test
voluntary submissions against the two versions used when approving the
standard.

Is the practice of requiring two independent implementations still being
followed?  Or is the problem that a generic RFC is being treated as an
"approved standard" before it has actually become so (see RFC 2600).

Tony