Representatives from ContentGuard, Hewlett Packard, Microsoft, Reuters, and Verisign have proposed the formation of an OASIS Rights Language Technical Committee. Chaired by Hari Reddy of ContentGuard, the TC will "continue work previously done by ContentGuard, Inc. on XrML to define the industry standard for a rights language that supports a wide variety of business models and has an architecture that provides flexibility to address the needs of the diverse communities." The TC will "define a governance and language extension development process for the language that comprehends maintaining an evergreen language while minimizing the impact of change on all market participants." It will also define relationships with complementary standards efforts within OASIS and establish liaisons with standards bodies. ContentGuard, which has copyrights to the XrML 2.0 specification and schema, will submit the Extensible Rights Markup Language (XrML) Version 2.0 to the TC at the initial meeting.

From the announcement proposal:

The Internet has spawned a revolution in how content is distributed and services are accessed. This has fueled the development of technologies to manage, secure, control, and automate the flow of content and the access to services over the Internet, as well as other digital distribution techniques. Digital Rights Management (DRM) is the common term collectively associated with such technologies. If we consider the DRM lifecycle or workflow for digital content and services, we see that the exchange of rights and conditions information is required between the entities in the workflow or at each step of the lifecycle. We also realize that expressing rights can be simple or very complex depending upon the requirements of the entire workflow and business models... Thus, a common standard rights language that can be shared among the participants in this digital workflow is required. This common rights language will facilitate the interoperability of the systems that manage the creation, distribution and consumption of these digital works and services. It will also be an integral tool in declaring and implementing trust and authentication mechanisms.

ContentGuard will submit the eXtensible rights Markup Language™ (XrML™) Version 2.0 at the initial meeting of the TC. ContentGuard has copyrights to the XrML 2.0 specification and schema (including previous releases) along with a trademark on the name "XrML". ContentGuard also owns US Patents 5,638,443, 5,634,012, 5,715,403, and 5,629,980 which have claims that may necessarily be infringed by the use of the contribution. ContentGuard will grant OASIS permission to use the trademark "XrML" for the use of the TC and associated promotion and marketing. ContentGuard's contribution will be submitted with the following intellectual property rights statement: "ContentGuard agrees to offer a license, on reasonable and nondiscriminatory terms, to use any patent claim of US Patents 5,638,443, 5,634,012, 5,715,403, and 5,629,980 and which is necessarily infringed by the use of the contribution."

Proposed deliverables:

1. To release the rights language Schema with supporting implementation information.
2. To develop and execute governance process for managing the continuing improvements to the language.
3. To provide liaisons to other complementary standards bodies.
4. Policies defining the creation of extensions to the language
5. Definition of a subset or mapping of the rights language for mobile consumer electronic devices.
6. Definition of common methods for integration of the rights language with metadata standards, content/service identification standards, and content referencing standards.
7. Definition of common methods for integration of the rights language with authentication, crypto and PKI standards for econtent distribution and for web services.