59-606: The World Wide Web Consortium ( W3C ) is the main international standards organization for the World Wide Web . Founded in 1994 and led by Tim Berners-Lee , the consortium is made up of member organizations that maintain full-time staff working together in the development of standards for the World Wide Web. As of 5 March 2023, W3C had 462 members. W3C also engages in education and outreach, develops software and serves as an open forum for discussion about
118-519: A memorandum of understanding to collaborate on the United States Standards Strategy. The determinates of whether an NSB for a particular economy is a public or private sector body may include the historical and traditional roles that the private sector fills in public affairs in that economy or the development stage of that economy. A national standards body (NSB) generally refers to one standardization organization that
177-751: A community of major web players and publishers to establish a MediaWiki wiki that seeks to document open web standards called the WebPlatform and WebPlatform Docs. In January 2013, Beihang University became the Chinese host. In 2022 the W3C WebFonts Working Group won an Emmy Award from the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences for standardizing font technology for custom downloadable fonts and typography for web and TV devices. On 1 January 2023, it reformed as
236-407: A company offers a product that is "compliant" with a standard. When an organization develops standards that may be used openly, it is common to have formal rules published regarding the process. This may include: Though it can be a tedious and lengthy process, formal standard setting is essential to developing new technologies. For example, since 1865, the telecommunications industry has depended on
295-509: A hierarchical fashion in terms of national, regional and international scope; international organizations tend to have as members national organizations; and standards emerging at national level (such as BS 5750 ) can be adopted at regional levels (BS 5750 was adopted as EN 29000) and at international levels (BS 5750 was adopted as ISO 9000). Unless adopted by a government, standards carry no force in law. However, most jurisdictions have truth in advertising laws, and ambiguities can be reduced if
354-892: A large variety of independent international standards organizations such as the ASME , ASTM International , the International Commission on Illumination (CIE) , the IEEE , the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), SAE International , TAPPI , the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), and the Universal Postal Union (UPU) develop and publish standards for a variety of international uses. In many such cases, these international standards organizations are not based on
413-608: A new edition or level of the recommendation. Additionally, the W3C publishes various kinds of informative notes which are to be used as references. Unlike the Internet Society and other international standards bodies, the W3C does not have a certification program. The W3C has decided, for now, that it is not suitable to start such a program, owing to the risk of creating more drawbacks for the community than benefits. In January 2023, after 28 years of being jointly administered by
472-481: A particular country, while others have been built from scratch by groups of experts who sit on various technical committees (TCs). These three organizations together comprise the World Standards Cooperation (WSC) alliance. ISO is composed of the national standards bodies (NSBs), one per member economy. The IEC is similarly composed of national committees, one per member economy. In some cases,
531-611: A permanent agency of the United Nations , in which governments are the primary members, although other organizations (such as non-governmental organizations and individual companies) can also hold a form of direct membership status in the ITU as well. Another example of a treaty-based international standards organization with government membership is the Codex Alimentarius Commission . In addition to these,
590-408: A product or process is safe for humans, animals, and the environment. The subject of their work can be narrow or broad. Another area of interest is in defining how the behavior and performance of products is measured and described in data sheets. Overlapping or competing standards bodies tend to cooperate purposefully, by seeking to define boundaries between the scope of their work, and by operating in
649-1177: A proposal to form a new global standards body. In October 1946, ISA and UNSCC delegates from 25 countries met in London and agreed to join forces to create the new International Organization for Standardization ; the new organization officially began operations in February ;1947. Standards organizations can be classified by their role, position, and the extent of their influence on the local, national, regional, and global standardization arena. By geographic designation, there are international, regional, and national standards bodies (the latter often referred to as NSBs). By technology or industry designation, there are standards developing organizations (SDOs) and also standards setting organizations (SSOs) also known as consortia. Standards organizations may be governmental, quasi-governmental or non-governmental entities. Quasi- and non-governmental standards organizations are often non-profit organizations. Broadly, an international standards organization develops international standards (this does not necessarily restrict
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#1732790758330708-459: A public-interest 501(c)(3) non-profit organization . W3C develops technical specifications for HTML5 , CSS , SVG , WOFF , the Semantic Web stack , XML , and other technologies. Sometimes, when a specification becomes too large, it is split into independent modules that can mature at their own pace. Subsequent editions of a module or specification are known as levels and are denoted by
767-597: A set of core principles and components that are chosen by the consortium. It was originally intended that CERN host the European branch of W3C; however, CERN wished to focus on particle physics , not information technology . In April 1995, the French Institute for Research in Computer Science and Automation became the European host of W3C, with Keio University Research Institute at SFC becoming
826-410: A technological baseline for future research and product development. Formal standard setting through standards organizations has numerous benefits for consumers including increased innovation, multiple market participants, reduced production costs, and the efficiency effects of product interchangeability. To support the standard development process, ISO published Good Standardization Practices (GSP) and
885-496: A university may have copies of technical standards on hand. Major libraries in large cities may also have access to many technical standards. Some users of standards mistakenly assume that all standards are in the public domain . This assumption is correct only for standards produced by the central governments whose publications are not amenable to copyright or to organizations that issue their standard under an open license. Any standards produced by non-governmental entities remain
944-461: A working draft (WD) for review by the community. A WD document is the first form of a standard that is publicly available. Commentary by virtually anyone is accepted, though no promises are made with regard to action on any particular element commented upon. At this stage, the standard document may have significant differences from its final form. As such, anyone who implements WD standards should be ready to significantly modify their implementations as
1003-599: Is an organization whose primary function is developing, coordinating, promulgating, revising, amending, reissuing, interpreting, or otherwise contributing to the usefulness of technical standards to those who employ them. Such an organization works to create uniformity across producers, consumers, government agencies, and other relevant parties regarding terminology, product specifications (e.g. size, including units of measure), protocols, and more. Its goals could include ensuring that Company A's external hard drive works on Company B's computer, an individual's blood pressure measures
1062-400: Is done by external experts in the W3C's various working groups. The Consortium is governed by its membership. The list of members is available to the public. Members include businesses, nonprofit organizations, universities, governmental entities, and individuals. Membership requirements are transparent except for one requirement: An application for membership must be reviewed and approved by
1121-553: Is now endorsed by the W3C, indicating its readiness for deployment to the public, and encouraging more widespread support among implementors and authors. Recommendations can sometimes be implemented incorrectly, partially, or not at all, but many standards define two or more levels of conformance that developers must follow if they wish to label their product as W3C-compliant. A recommendation may be updated or extended by separately-published, non-technical errata or editor drafts until sufficient substantial edits accumulate for producing
1180-608: Is that country's member of the ISO . A standards developing organization (SDO) is one of the thousands of industry- or sector-based standards organizations that develop and publish industry specific standards. Some economies feature only an NSB with no other SDOs. Large economies like the United States and Japan have several hundred SDOs, many of which are coordinated by the central NSBs of each country (ANSI and JISC in this case). In some cases, international industry-based SDOs such as
1239-569: Is the version of a standard that has passed the prior two levels. The users of the standard provide input. At this stage, the document is submitted to the W3C Advisory Council for final approval. While this step is important, it rarely causes any significant changes to a standard as it passes to the next phase. This is the most mature stage of development. At this point, the standard has undergone extensive review and testing, under both theoretical and practical conditions. The standard
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#17327907583301298-864: The African Organisation for Standardisation (ARSO), the Arabic industrial development and mining organization (AIDMO), and others. In the European Union, only standards created by CEN, CENELEC, and ETSI are recognized as European standards (according to Regulation (EU) No 1025/2012 ), and member states are required to notify the European Commission and each other about all the draft technical regulations concerning ICT products and services before they are adopted in national law. These rules were laid down in Directive 98/34/EC with
1357-719: The CIE , the IEEE and the Audio Engineering Society (AES) may have direct liaisons with international standards organizations, having input to international standards without going through a national standards body. SDOs are differentiated from standards setting organizations (SSOs) in that SDOs may be accredited to develop standards using open and transparent processes. Developers of technical standards are generally concerned with interface standards , which detail how products interconnect with each other, and safety standards , which established characteristics ensure that
1416-577: The Electronic Frontier Foundation 's resignation from W3C. As feared by the opponents of EME, as of 2020, none of the widely used Content Decryption Modules used with EME are available for licensing without a per-browser licensing fee. W3C/ Internet Engineering Task Force standards (over Internet protocol suite ): Standards organization A standards organization , standards body , standards developing organization ( SDO ), or standards setting organization ( SSO )
1475-707: The GCC Standardization Organization (GSO) for Arab States of the Persian Gulf . In general, each country or economy has a single recognized national standards body (NSB). A national standards body is likely the sole member from that economy in ISO; ISO currently has 161 members. National standards bodies usually do not prepare the technical content of standards, which instead is developed by national technical societies. NSBs may be either public or private sector organizations, or combinations of
1534-544: The Hayes command set developed by Hayes , Apple 's TrueType font design and the PCL protocol used by Hewlett-Packard in the computer printers they produced. Normally, the term standards organization is not used to refer to the individual parties participating within the standards developing organization in the capacity of founders, benefactors , stakeholders , members or contributors, who themselves may function as or lead
1593-516: The ITU to establish the telecommunications standards that have been adopted worldwide. The ITU has created numerous telecommunications standards including telegraph specifications, allocation of telephone numbers, interference protection, and protocols for a variety of communications technologies. The standards that are created through standards organizations lead to improved product quality, ensured interoperability of competitors' products, and they provide
1652-969: The MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (located in Stata Center ) in the United States, the (in Sophia Antipolis , France), Keio University (in Japan) and Beihang University (in China), the W3C incorporated as a legal entity, becoming a public-interest not-for-profit organization . The W3C has a staff team of 70–80 worldwide as of 2015. W3C is run by a management team which allocates resources and designs strategy, led by CEO Jeffrey Jaffe (as of March 2010), former CTO of Novell . It also includes an advisory board that supports strategy and legal matters and helps resolve conflicts. The majority of standardization work
1711-823: The OpenOffice.org , an Apache Software Foundation -sponsored international community of volunteers working on an open-standard software that aims to compete with Microsoft Office , and two commercial groups competing fiercely with each other to develop an industry-wide standard for high-density optical storage . Another example is the Global Food Safety Initiative where members of the Consumer Goods Forum define benchmarking requirements for harmonization and recognize scheme owners using private standards for food safety . Erratum Too Many Requests If you report this error to
1770-645: The WTO Technical Barriers to Trade (TBT) Committee published the "Six Principles" guiding members in the development of international standards. Some standards – such as the SIF Specification in K12 education – are managed by a non-profit organizations composed of public entities and private entities working in cooperation that then publish the standards under an open license at no charge and requiring no registration. A technical library at
1829-726: The World Health Organization Guidelines in health, or ITU Recommendations in ICT and being publicly funded, are freely available for consideration and use worldwide. In 1904, Crompton represented Britain at the Louisiana Purchase Exposition in St. Louis , Missouri , as part of a delegation by the Institute of Electrical Engineers . He presented a paper on standardization, which
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1888-462: The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), whose standards for HTML , CSS , and XML are used universally. There are also community-driven associations such as the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), a worldwide network of volunteers who collaborate to set standards for internet protocols. Some industry-driven standards development efforts don't even have a formal organizational structure. They are projects funded by large corporations. Among them are
1947-406: The intellectual property of their developers (unless specifically designed otherwise) and are protected, just like any other publications , by copyright laws and international treaties . However, the intellectual property extends only to the standard itself and not to its use. For instance if a company sells a device that is compliant with a given standard, it is not liable for further payment to
2006-897: The ARINC Standards. Regional standards bodies also exist, such as the European Committee for Standardization (CEN), the European Committee for Electrotechnical Standardization (CENELEC), the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI), and the Institute for Reference Materials and Measurements (IRMM) in Europe, the Pacific Area Standards Congress (PASC), the Pan American Standards Commission (COPANT),
2065-684: The Asian host in September 1996. Starting in 1997, W3C created regional offices around the world. As of September 2009, it had eighteen World Offices covering Australia, the Benelux countries (Belgium, Netherlands and Luxembourg), Brazil, China, Finland, Germany, Austria, Greece, Hong Kong, Hungary, India, Israel, Italy, South Korea, Morocco, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, and, as of 2016, the United Kingdom and Ireland. In October 2012, W3C convened
2124-448: The W3C started considering adding DRM -specific Encrypted Media Extensions (EME) to HTML5 , which was criticised as being against the openness, interoperability, and vendor neutrality that distinguished websites built using only W3C standards from those requiring proprietary plug-ins like Flash . On 18 September 2017, the W3C published the EME specification as a recommendation, leading to
2183-519: The W3C. Many guidelines and requirements are stated in detail, but there is no final guideline about the process or standards by which membership might be finally approved or denied. The cost of membership is given on a sliding scale, depending on the character of the organization applying and the country in which it is located. Countries are categorized by the World Bank 's most recent grouping by gross national income per capita. In 2012 and 2013,
2242-884: The Web. The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) was founded in 1994 by Tim Berners-Lee after he left the European Organization for Nuclear Research ( CERN ) in October 1994. It was founded at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Laboratory for Computer Science with support from the European Commission , and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency , which had pioneered the ARPANET ,
2301-507: The body's first President. The International Federation of the National Standardizing Associations (ISA) was founded in 1926 with a broader remit to enhance international cooperation for all technical standards and specifications. The body was suspended in 1942 during World War II . After the war, ISA was approached by the recently formed United Nations Standards Coordinating Committee (UNSCC) with
2360-515: The contributions of other engineers, accomplished a modest amount of industry standardization; some companies' in-house standards also began to spread more widely within their industries. Joseph Whitworth 's screw thread measurements were adopted as the first (unofficial) national standard by companies around Britain in 1841. It came to be known as the British Standard Whitworth , and was widely adopted in other countries. By
2419-835: The country, and enabled the markets to act more rationally and efficiently, with an increased level of cooperation. After the First World War , similar national bodies were established in other countries. The Deutsches Institut für Normung was set up in Germany in 1917, followed by its counterparts, the American National Standard Institute and the French Commission Permanente de Standardisation , both in 1918. Several international organizations create international standards , such as Codex Alimentarius in food,
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2478-515: The end of the 19th century differences in standards between companies was making trade increasingly difficult and strained. For instance, in 1895 an iron and steel dealer recorded his displeasure in The Times : "Architects and engineers generally specify such unnecessarily diverse types of sectional material or given work that anything like economical and continuous manufacture becomes impossible. In this country no two professional men are agreed upon
2537-454: The first integer in the title (e.g. CSS3 = Level 3). Subsequent revisions on each level are denoted by an integer following a decimal point (for example, CSS2.1 = Revision 1). The W3C standard formation process is defined within the W3C process document, outlining four maturity levels through which each new standard or recommendation must progress. After enough content has been gathered from 'editor drafts' and discussion, it may be published as
2596-480: The foreword with a statement like the following: "Attention is drawn to the possibility that some of the elements of this document may be the subject of patent rights. ISO and IEC shall not be held responsible for identifying any or all such patent rights". If the standards organization is aware that parts of a given standard fall under patent protection, it will often require the patent holder to agree to Reasonable and non-discriminatory licensing before including it in
2655-657: The goal of providing transparency and control with regard to technical regulations. Sub-regional standards organizations also exist such as the MERCOSUR Standardization Association (AMN), the CARICOM Regional Organisation for Standards and Quality (CROSQ), and the ASEAN Consultative Committee for Standards and Quality (ACCSQ), EAC East Africa Standards Committee www.eac-quality.net , and
2714-401: The inability of their developers to keep abreast with the technological innovation. As a result, a new class of standards setters appeared on the standardization arena: the industry consortia or standards setting organizations (SSOs), which are also referred to as private standards . Despite having limited financial resources, some of them enjoy truly international acceptance. One example is
2773-727: The most direct predecessor to the modern Internet . It was located in Technology Square until 2004, when it moved, with the MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, to the Stata Center. The organization tries to foster compatibility and agreement among industry members in the adoption of new standards defined by the W3C. Incompatible versions of HTML are offered by different vendors, causing inconsistency in how web pages are displayed. The consortium tries to get all those vendors to implement
2832-469: The national committee to the IEC of an economy may also be the ISO member from that country or economy. ISO and IEC are private international organizations that are not established by any international treaty. Their members may be non-governmental organizations or governmental agencies, as selected by ISO and IEC (which are privately established organizations). The ITU is a treaty-based organization established as
2891-472: The principle of one member per country. Rather, membership in such organizations is open to those interested in joining and willing to agree to the organization's by-laws – having either organizational/corporate or individual technical experts as members. The Airlines Electronic Engineering Committee (AEEC) was formed in 1949 to prepare avionics system engineering standards with other aviation organizations RTCA, EUROCAE, and ICAO. The standards are widely known as
2950-790: The purpose of safety or for consumer protection act from deceitful practices. The term formal standard refers specifically to a specification that has been approved by a standards setting organization. The term de jure standard refers to a standard mandated by legal requirements or refers generally to any formal standard. In contrast, the term de facto standard refers to a specification (or protocol or technology) that has achieved widespread use and acceptance – often without being approved by any standards organization (or receiving such approval only after it already has achieved widespread use). Examples of de facto standards that were not approved by any standards organizations (or at least not approved until after they were in widespread de facto use) include
3009-448: The same with Company C's sphygmomanometer as it does with Company D's, or that all shirts that should not be ironed have the same icon (a clothes iron crossed out with an X) on the label. Most standards are voluntary in the sense that they are offered for adoption by people or industry without being mandated in law. Some standards become mandatory when they are adopted by regulators as legal requirements in particular domains, often for
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#17327907583303068-610: The size and weight of a girder to employ for given work". The Engineering Standards Committee was established in London in 1901 as the world's first national standards body. It subsequently extended its standardization work and became the British Engineering Standards Association in 1918, adopting the name British Standards Institution in 1931 after receiving its Royal Charter in 1929. The national standards were adopted universally throughout
3127-619: The standard matures. A candidate recommendation is a version of a more mature standard than the WD. At this point, the group responsible for the standard is satisfied that the standard meets its goal. The purpose of the CR is to elicit aid from the development community on how implementable the standard is. The standard document may change further, but significant features are mostly decided at this point. The design of those features can still change due to feedback from implementors. A proposed recommendation
3186-454: The standard. Such an agreement is regarded as a legally binding contract, as in the 2012 case Microsoft v. Motorola . The ever-quickening pace of technology evolution is now more than ever affecting the way new standards are proposed, developed and implemented. Since traditional, widely respected standards organizations tend to operate at a slower pace than technology evolves, many standards they develop are becoming less relevant because of
3245-455: The standards organization except in the special case when the organization holds patent rights or some other ownership of the intellectual property described in the standard. It is, however, liable for any patent infringement by its implementation, just as with any other implementation of technology. The standards organizations give no guarantees that patents relevant to a given standard have been identified. ISO standards draw attention to this in
3304-510: The standards organizations. The implementation of standards in industry and commerce became highly important with the onset of the Industrial Revolution and the need for high-precision machine tools and interchangeable parts . Henry Maudslay developed the first industrially practical screw-cutting lathe in 1800, which allowed for the standardization of screw thread sizes for the first time. Maudslay's work, as well as
3363-554: The two. For example, the Standards Council of Canada is a Canadian Crown Corporation , Dirección General de Normas is a governmental agency within the Mexican Ministry of Economy, and ANSI is a 501(c)(3) non-profit U.S. organization with members from both the private and public sectors. The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), the U.S. government's standards agency, cooperates with ANSI under
3422-1102: The use of other published standards internationally). There are many international standards organizations. The three largest and most well-established such organizations are the International Organization for Standardization (ISO), the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC), and the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), which have each existed for more than 50 years (founded in 1947, 1906, and 1865, respectively) and are all based in Geneva , Switzerland . They have established tens of thousands of standards covering almost every conceivable topic. Many of these are then adopted worldwide replacing various incompatible "homegrown" standards. Many of these standards are naturally evolved from those designed in-house within an industry, or by
3481-406: Was so well received that he was asked to look into the formation of a commission to oversee the process. By 1906, his work was complete and he drew up a permanent terms for the International Electrotechnical Commission . The body held its first meeting that year in London, with representatives from 14 countries. In honour of his contribution to electrical standardization, Lord Kelvin was elected as
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