Standards, ISO, and MPEG

Standards, ISO, And MPEG	This chapter is strictly speaking not part of the flows of events that produced MPEG standards. Reading is highly recommended because it places MPEG in the world of standards: why we need standards, the role of patents, how MPEG used to make standards, an overview of the apparently chaotic but productive MPEG meeting, and the role played by two people working an unknown to most important organisation called Information Technology Task Force.
The Need For Standards	There is a fair amount of misunderstanding about standards. This section gives a a definition and explains the role they play.
Patents And Standards	The ISO/IEC directives start dealing with standards with the sentence “…if in exceptional circumstances…” to describe a common situation. Patents are important but dealing with patents as an exception when they are the norm does not bode well for the solution.
The MPEG Way Of Standards Making	In ISO, Working Groups are established to solve a problem and are expected to be disbanded after completing their mission. This is the first point that made MPEG different, This section explains the other, more important points.
An MPEG Meeting	This section describes the logic behind the organisation of an MPEG meeting by providing a virtual experience of how MPEG meetings unfolded.
Life In ISO	This section gives a sample of the life in the good old times of ISO and how it affected the first phases of MPEG.