Limiting Derivative Works Restrictions to IETF Documents

Status of This Memo

This Internet-Draft is submitted in full conformance with the provisions of BCP 78 and BCP 79.¶

Internet-Drafts are working documents of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF). Note that other groups may also distribute working documents as Internet-Drafts. The list of current Internet-Drafts is at https://datatracker.ietf.org/drafts/current/.¶

Internet-Drafts are draft documents valid for a maximum of six months and may be updated, replaced, or obsoleted by other documents at any time. It is inappropriate to use Internet-Drafts as reference material or to cite them other than as "work in progress."¶

This Internet-Draft will expire on 24 January 2027.¶

Copyright Notice

Copyright (c) 2026 IETF Trust and the persons identified as the document authors. All rights reserved.¶

This document is subject to BCP 78 and the IETF Trust's Legal Provisions Relating to IETF Documents (https://trustee.ietf.org/license-info) in effect on the date of publication of this document. Please review these documents carefully, as they describe your rights and restrictions with respect to this document. Code Components extracted from this document must include Revised BSD License text as described in Section 4.e of the Trust Legal Provisions and are provided without warranty as described in the Revised BSD License.¶

Table of Contents

1. Introduction

This document updates Rights Contributors Provide to the IETF Trust [RFC5378] in order to clarify and limit which contributions may include a restriction on derivative rights.¶

2. Conventions and Definitions

This document uses the terminology defined in [RFC5378].¶

3. Derivative Works

There is an expansive definition of "Contribution" in [RFC5378]. There is also a mechanism formally defined in Section 5.3 of that RFC that allows a Contributor to limit the right to produce derivative works. As written, this optional mechanism could be construed as applying to all Contributions. Using this mechanism outside of specifications, for example, in electronic mail, makes it difficult for people to respond and inhibits collaboration. This behavior impedes the very idea of collaborating about the Internet over the Internet. The IESG has stated [IESG-DERIV] that derivative works limitations should only be applied to IETF Documents as defined in [RFC5378].¶

This document formally restricts the use of this mechanism to IETF Documents, i.e., RFCs or Internet-Drafts that are used in the IETF Standards Process. Derivative works restrictions may not be applied to other Contributions, such as public online IETF fora as defined in [RFC9945], appeals, minutes, or audio or video recordings of IETF meetings.¶

All other rights Contributors provide to the IETF Trust/ICMP [RFC5378] remain in place.¶

4. Security Considerations

This document has no direct impact on Internet security.¶

5. IANA Considerations

This document has no IANA actions.¶

6. References

Authors' Addresses