CED report on Openness in Digital Economy

The Committee for Economic Development (CED) has released a report on Open Standards, Open Source, and Open Innovation: Harnessing the Benefits of Openness. It concludes:

"Because of the advantages of open standards, the
Council recommends that governments encourage
the development and use of open standards through
processes as open to participation and contribution
as possible. The Council believes that the
participation of civil society would be beneficial in
the formation of standards with important social
consequences. The Council also recommends that
the results of government-supported research be
readily available for inclusion in open standards, as
they have been in areas such as grid computing...

To foster open innovation, the Council recommends
not only that the NIH should continue their efforts
to expand the dissemination of the research they
support, but also that other federally funded,
unclassified research should be made broadly
available. Consistent with the position it has taken
in its earlier reports, the Council recommends that
any legislation or regulation regarding intellectual
property rights be weighed with a presumption
against the granting of new rights. The burden of
proof should be on proponents of new rights to
demonstrate with rigorous analysis the necessity of
such an extension, because of the benefits to society
of further innovation through greater access to
technology. Finally, the Council suggests that the
National Science Foundation (NSF) fund research
into alternative compensation methods, similar to
those created to facilitate the growth of radio, to
reward creators of digital information products and
accommodate the changes brought about by the
digitization and growth of the Internet."

Interesting to hear such conclusions from a US think tank.

Update: Ian is enthusiastic about the conclusions.