This interview with Peter Brown, Chairman of the OASIS Board, was conducted by email for the Talkstandards.com open forum on SSO Governance.

Peter Brown gives a valuable insight into the governance of OASIS and some of the rationale behind it. Also, Peter Brown offers his general view of governance issues such openness, governmental interference and much more.

Interview for Talkstandards.com with Peter Brown, Chairman of the OASIS Board

Talkstandards [TS]: OASIS is well known for its transparency; what is the underlying rationale for this type of governance?

Peter Brown [PB]: Its origin is in the open source movement – the belief that by opening up a process to a community, you can “crowd source” and achieve better results. But it is also a powerful business model – by providing a transparent platform in which standards can be developed and an up-front choice of IP models with which our members are comfortable.

TS: Is transparency considered more important in some stages of the process than others?

PB: No, we believe that openness is important throughout the whole process

TS: In your view, how can SSOs’ governance contribute to the competition between organizations?

PB: Organizations, whether public sector agencies, government departments, NGOs or private companies, are increasingly looking at governance models and processes as an important consideration for their participation. I think that we are moving from a “defensive”, “insurance policy” approach to participation in standards organizations, based on the idea that you need to be there in order to ensure that your ideas are not locked out; to a more positive, value-driven approach based on recognizing the inherent value of standards in driving – not inhibiting – market competition and innovation.

TS: Further, how has OASIS’s governance of the standardization process affected the market success of developed standards?

PB: Increased confidence in the market, and the output that comes through, are the result of this openness and the implicit offer to any standard “consumer” to take a look at how it was put together. This is in stark contrast to the more closed processes in which the consumer is presented with output from an opaque sausage machine with dubious ingredients and processes.

TS: Many OASIS standards are used in areas where privacy and trust are of utmost importance (e.g. eHealth and eID); to what extent has the level of legitimacy of the standardization process contributed to the commercial success of OASIS standards?

PB: The identity management domain is, by its nature, very cautious and suspicious of opaque systems in which it is difficult to identify the motives, interests and offers of the various players. High levels of confidence are a pre-requisite to positive cooperation between partners and it is clear to me that the offer of a stable, transparent and sustainable process and environment has been a key factor in the choice of OASIS as the place to do this work.

TS: You have expressed that your view of OASIS is more of a service provider, supplying a platform where standards can be efficiently developed, than strictly as an organization. Does this affect the level of maintenance of published standards? How does OASIS react and evolve to meet changes in market demand or take heed to user feedback?

PB: It is an essential part of our process to recognize that the publication of a standard is not the end of the story. The service we provide to our members allows the story to evolve – whether it be the maintenance or updates of a standard, spin-offs, detailed implementation guidelines, or other work products, the community of members around any standard provides further value to those affected by or using any given standard.

TS: Many EU governments, supported by EC directives, are pushing for the implementation of eGovernment solutions which implies that governmental interest in OASIS standards is rising. Has this manifested in any attempts to affect the standardization process in terms of transparency and maintenance?

PB: No. We are proud of our process and hold it up as an example for others to follow. On the other hand, there are vested interests that are not always keen on such transparency and prefer to work through more opaque channels to defend particular interests. It has generally been a driving principle of eGovernment to favor openness and OASIS has certainly benefited from that.

TS: In case of such developments in the future, how would OASIS respond to such interference and what do you consider to be legitimate requirements for government intervention in the standardization process?

PB: We remain vigilant. In the current debate on the future of the European standardization system, we have seen that some bodies feel threatened by such openness, sometimes because a core part of their business models rely on monetizing their standards – make them open, and they lose money. Historically, this has been the elephant in the room and it is encouraging to see that it is being addressed.

OASIS Short info: OASIS (Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards) is a not-for-profit consortium that drives development, convergence and adoption of open standards on a global scale. Since its founding in 1993, OASIS has gained more than 5,000 participants from over 600 organizations and become the largest producer of Web services standards. Transparency characterizes the governance and procedures of OASIS, with members setting the technical agenda and striving for openness throughout the process. Technical categories in which OASIS is active include: Web services, eCommerce, Security and XML processing.

Peter Brown Biography: Peter is founder and Managing Director of Pensive, a software solutions company for subject-centred computing, based in Belgium. He is also President and Chairman of the Board of OASIS, the global consortium that is advancing open standards for the Information Society.

Peter has more than 25-years experience working in European public institutions. He is currently on unpaid leave from the European Parliament where he previously headed the service responsible for information architecture and data standards. He has been heavily involved in standards work within the European Union institutions; at a European level through the European standards agency, CEN; and globally in OASIS and ISO. He was a co-editor of the “Reference Model for Service Oriented Architecture (SOA)”, now an OASIS Standard. He has been active in promoting the ISO 13250 standard (“Topic Maps”) as a standard for facilitating information federation and delivering practical semantic technology solutions today.

Peter is a regular keynote speaker and contributor to conferences throughout Europe and North America. His main professional interests are interaction design, subject-centric computing, semantics and “making the Information Society a safe place to be in”, through greater attention to data protection, privacy and users’ control over their digital assets.