A standards organization, standards body, standards development organization or SDO is any entity whose primary activities are developing, coordinating, promulgating, revising, amending, reissuing, interpreting, or otherwise maintaining standards A technical standard is an established norm or requirement. It is usually a formal document that establishes uniform engineering or technical criteria, methods, processes and practices. In contrast, a custom, convention, company product, corporate standard, etc. which becomes generally accepted and dominant is often called a de facto standard that address the interests of a wide base of users outside the standards development organization.

Most voluntary standards are offered for use by people, regulators, or industry. When a published standard achieves widespread acceptance and dominance it can become a broader de facto standard A de facto standard is a custom, convention, product, or system that has achieved a dominant position by public acceptance or market forces . De facto is a Latin phrase meaning "concerning the fact" or "in practice". Other standards may be voluntary or may be de jure ("ordained by law") standards enforced by for an industry. This has happened with the modem protocol The Hayes command set is a specific command-language originally developed for the Hayes Smartmodem 300 baud modem in 1977[citation needed]. The command set consists of a series of short text strings which combine together to produce complete commands for operations such as dialing, hanging up, and changing the parameters of the connection. Most developed by Hayes Hayes Microcomputer Products was a U.S.-based manufacturer of modems. They are particularly well known for their Smartmodem, which introduced the ability to control the modem through commands sent in the data stream itself. The "smart modem" approach dramatically simplified operation, making modems a practical device for a much wider, Apple Apple Inc. is an American multinational corporation that designs and markets consumer electronics, computer software, and personal computers. The company's best-known hardware products include the Macintosh computers, the iPod, the iPhone and the iPad. Apple software includes the Mac OS X operating system; the iTunes media browser; the iLife suite's TrueType TrueType is an outline font standard originally developed by Apple Computer in the late 1980s as a competitor to Adobe's Type 1 fonts used in PostScript font standard and the PCL Printer Command Language, more commonly referred to as PCL, is a Page description language developed by HP as a printer protocol and has become a de facto industry standard. Originally developed for early inkjet printers in 1984, PCL has been released in varying levels for thermal, matrix printer, and page printers. HP-GL and PJL are supported by protocol used by Hewlett-Packard Hewlett-Packard Company , commonly referred to as HP, is an American multinational information technology corporation headquartered in Palo Alto, California, USA. HP is one of the world's largest information technology companies and operates in nearly every country. HP specializes in developing and manufacturing computing, data storage, and in the computer printers In computing, a printer is a peripheral which produces a hard copy of documents stored in electronic form, usually on physical print media such as paper or transparencies. Many printers are primarily used as local peripherals, and are attached by a printer cable or, in most newer printers, a USB cable to a computer which serves as a document they produced.

Normally, the term standards organization does not include the parties participating in the standards development organization in the capacity of founders, benefactors A benefactor is a person who gives some form of help to benefit a person, group or organization , often gifting a monetary contribution in the form of an endowment to help a cause. Benefactors are humanitarian leaders and charitable patrons providing assistance in many forms, such as an alumnus from a university giving back to a college or an, stakeholders, members or contributors, who themselves may function as the standards organizations.

Overview

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.

International Standards Organizations

Broadly, an international standards organization develops international standards International standards are standards developed by international standards organizations. International standards are available for consideration and use, worldwide. The most prominent organisation is the International Organization for Standardization. (This does not necessarily restrict the use of other published standards A technical standard is an established norm or requirement. It is usually a formal document that establishes uniform engineering or technical criteria, methods, processes and practices. In contrast, a custom, convention, company product, corporate standard, etc. which becomes generally accepted and dominant is often called a de facto standard internationally.)

There are many international standards organizations. For example, the International Organization for Standardization The International Organization for Standardization , widely known as ISO (pronounced /ˈaɪsoʊ/ EYE-soe), is an international-standard-setting body composed of representatives from various national standards organizations. Founded on 23 February 1947, the organization promulgates worldwide proprietary industrial and commercial standards. It has (ISO), the International Electrotechnical Commission The International Electrotechnical Commission is a non-profit, non-governmental international standards organization that prepares and publishes International Standards for all electrical, electronic and related technologies – collectively known as "electrotechnology". IEC standards cover a vast range of technologies from power (IEC), and the International Telecommunication Union The International Telecommunication Union is the eldest organization in the UN family still in existence. It was founded as the International Telegraph Union in Paris on 17 May 1865 and is today the leading United Nations agency for information and communication technology issues, and the global focal point for governments and the private sector (ITU) have existed for more than 50 years (founded in 1947, 1906, and 1865, respectively) and they are all based in Geneva Geneva (Arpitan: Genèva, IPA: [ˈd͡zənɛva]; French: Genève, IPA: [ʒənɛv]; German: Genf, IPA: [ˈɡɛnf] ; Italian: Ginevra; Romansh: Genevra) is the second-most-populous city in Switzerland (after Zürich) and is the most populous city of Romandie (the French-speaking part of Switzerland). Situated where the Rhône River exits Lake Geneva (, Switzerland Switzerland , officially the Swiss Confederation (Confœderatio Helvetica in Latin, hence its ISO country codes CH and CHE), is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe[note 4] where it is bordered by Germany to the north, France to the west, Italy to. 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 a particular country, whilst others have been built from scratch by groups of experts who sit on various technical committees (TCs).

ISO is composed of the National Standards Bodies (NSBs), one per member economy. The IEC is composed of "National Committees", one per member economy. In some cases, the National Committee to the IEC of an economy may be the ISO member from that country or economy. The World Standards Cooperation (WSC) is a cooperative effort between ISO, the IEC, and the ITU.

ISO and IEC are non-treaty international organizations. Their members may be non-governmental organizations or governmental agencies. The ITU and Codex Alimentarius The Codex Alimentarius is a collection of internationally recognized standards, codes of practice, guidelines and other recommendations relating to foods, food production and food safety. Its name derives from the Codex Alimentarius Austriacus. Its texts are developed and maintained by the Codex Alimentarius Commission, a body that was established are two examples of treaty-based organizations (where only governments are the primary members)^{[citation needed]}. The members of these organizations are the government foreign ministry, and/or appropriate regulatory body (telecoms regulator, agricultural, food safety or pharmaceuticals regulator, etc)^{[citation needed]}.

In addition to these, independent standards organizations such as ASTM International ASTM International , originally known as the American Society for Testing and Materials, is an international standards organization that develops and publishes voluntary consensus technical standards for a wide range of materials, products, systems, and services. The organization's headquarters is in West Conshohocken, Pennsylvania, about 5 miles develop and publish technical standards for international use. Others set standards within some more specialized context, such as SAE International, the Internet Engineering Task Force The Internet Engineering Task Force develops and promotes Internet standards, cooperating closely with the W3C and ISO/IEC standards bodies and dealing in particular with standards of the TCP/IP and Internet protocol suite. It is an open standards organization, with no formal membership or membership requirements. All participants and managers are (IETF), TAPPI, World Wide Web Consortium The World Wide Web Consortium is the main international standards organization for the World Wide Web (abbreviated WWW or W3) (W3C), IEEE The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers or IEEE is an international non-profit, professional organization for the advancement of technology related to electricity. It has the most members of any technical professional organization in the world, with more than 395,000 members in around 150 countries, the Universal Postal Union The Universal Postal Union is an international organization that coordinates postal policies among member nations, and hence the worldwide postal system. Each member country agrees to the same set of terms for conducting international postal duties. The Universal Postal Union's headquarters are located in Berne, Switzerland (UPU) or the American Petroleum Institute The American Petroleum Institute, commonly referred to as API, is the main U.S trade association for the oil and natural gas industry, representing about 400 corporations involved in production, refinement, distribution, and many other aspects of the petroleum industry. The association’s chief functions on behalf of the industry include advocacy (API). Often, these international standards organizations are not based on the principle of one member per country. Rather, membership in such international organizations is open, having either organizational/corporate or individual technical expert members from around the globe.

The Universal Postal Union The Universal Postal Union is an international organization that coordinates postal policies among member nations, and hence the worldwide postal system. Each member country agrees to the same set of terms for conducting international postal duties. The Universal Postal Union's headquarters are located in Berne, Switzerland (UPU), by means of its Standards Board, defines, approves, and maintains postal standards. The SB’s objectives are to provide strategic direction and to plan, develop and maintain technical and communications standards aimed at improving postal operational efficiency and quality of service, besides promoting interoperability and compatibility of all UPU and international postal telematics initiatives.

Regional Standards Organizations

Regional standards bodies also exist such as the European Committee for Standardization The European Committee for Standardization or Comité Européen de Normalisation , is a non-profit organisation whose mission is to foster the European economy in global trading, the welfare of European citizens and the environment by providing an efficient infrastructure to interested parties for the development, maintenance and distribution of (CEN), the European Committee for Electrotechnical Standardization CENELEC is the European Committee for Electrotechnical Standardization (CENELEC), the European Telecommunications Standards Institute The European Telecommunications Standards Institute is an independent, non-profit, standardization organization in the telecommunications industry (equipment makers and network operators) in Europe, with worldwide projection. ETSI has been successful in standardizing the GSM cell phone system and the TETRA professional mobile radio system (ETSI), and the Institute for Reference Materials and Measurements The Institute for Reference Materials and Measurements or IRMM, located in Geel, Belgium, is one of the seven institutes of the Joint Research Centre , a Directorate-General of the European Commission (EC) (IRMM) in Europe, the Pacific Area Standards Congress (PASC), the Pan American Standards Commission (COPANT), the African Organization for Standardization (ARSO), the Arab 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", 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.^[1] These rules were laid down in Directive 98/34/EC with the goal of providing transparency and control with regard to technical regulations.^[1]

Sub-regional standards organizations also exist such as the MERCOSUR Mercosur or Mercosul is a Regional Trade Agreement (RTA) between Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay founded in 1991 by the Treaty of Asunción, which was later amended and updated by the 1994 Treaty of Ouro Preto. Its purpose is to promote free trade and the fluid movement of goods, people, and currency. The official languages are Portuguese Standardization Association (AMN), the CARICOM Regional Organisation for Standards and Quality (CROSQ), and the ASEAN Consultative Committee for Standards and Quality (ACCSQ), and the Gulf Standardasation Organasation for GCC Arab Countries.

National Standards Bodies (NSBs)

In general, each country or economy has a single recognized Standards Body (NSB). Examples include the Brazilian National Standards Organization (ABNT), the American National Standards Institute The American National Standards Institute or ANSI [citation needed] is a private non-profit organization that oversees the development of voluntary consensus standards for products, services, processes, systems, and personnel in the United States. The organization also coordinates U.S. standards with international standards so that American (ANSI), the British Standards Institution BSI Group, also known in its home market as the British Standards Institution , is a multinational business services provider whose principal activity is the production of standards and the supply of standards-related services (BSI), the Mexican Dirección General de Normas (DGN), the Deutsches Institut für Normung Deutsches Institut für Normung e.V. is the German national organization for standardization and is that country's ISO member body (DIN), the Instituto Argentino de Normalización y Certificación The Argentine Normalization and Certification Institute is the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) member body for Argentina (IRAM), the Japanese Industrial Standards Committee (JISC), the Korean Agency for Technology and Standards (KATS), the Nederlandse Norm (NEN), the South African Bureau of Standards The South African Bureau of Standards is the national standards body of South Africa, publishing South African National Standards (SANS). It supplies standards through Standards SA (SABS), the Standardization Administration of China The Standardization Administration of China is the Standards organization authorized by the State Council of China to exercise administrative responsibilities by undertaking unified management, supervision and overall coordination of standardization work in China. The SAC represents China within the International Organization for Standardization ( (SAC), the Standards Council of Canada The Standards Council of Canada is a federal Crown corporation with the mandate to promote efficient and effective voluntary standardization. Located in Ottawa, Ontario, the Standards Council has a 15-member governing Council and a staff of approximately 90. The organization reports to Parliament through the Minister of Industry and oversees (SCC), the Swedish Standards Institute SIS and its members develop standards within different domains, including construction, safety, healthcare, consumer products, management systems, engineering, environmental issues and safety. SIS participates in the European and global network which develops international standards. SIS is a member of the European cooperative effort CEN as well (SIS), Standards Norway (SN), the Swiss Association for Standardization (SNV), or Standards New Zealand (SNZ). A national standards body is likely the sole member from that economy in ISO.

NSBs may be either public or private sector organizations, or combinations of the two. For example, the three NSBs of Canada, Mexico and the United States are, respectively, the Standards Council of Canada (SCC), the General Bureau of Standards (Dirección General de Normas, DGN), and the American National Standards Institute (ANSI). SCC is a Canadian Crown Corporation A government-owned corporation, state-owned enterprise, state enterpise, or government business enterprise is a legal entity created by a government to undertake commercial activities on behalf of an owner government, and are usually considered to be an element or part of the state[citation needed]. There is no standard definition of a government-, DGN is a governmental agency within the Mexican Ministry of Economy, and ANSI is a 501(c)(3) Colloquially, a 501 organization or simply "a 501(c)" is an American tax-exempt, nonprofit corporation or association. Section 501(c) of the United States Internal Revenue Code (26 U.S.C. § 501(c)), provides that 28 types of nonprofit organizations are exempt from some federal income taxes. Sections 503 through 505 set out the non-profit organization with members from both the private and public sectors. The National Institute of Standards and Technology The National Institute of Standards and Technology , known between 1901 and 1988 as the National Bureau of Standards (NBS), is a measurement standards laboratory which is a non-regulatory agency of the United States Department of Commerce. The institute's official mission is: (NIST), the U.S. government's standards agency, cooperates with ANSI under a memorandum of understanding A memorandum of understanding is a document describing a bilateral or multilateral agreement between parties. It expresses a convergence of will between the parties, indicating an intended common line of action. It is often used in cases where parties either do not imply a legal commitment or in situations where the parties cannot create a legally 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.

Standards Developing Organizations (SDOs)

Whereas the term national standards body (NSB) is generally used to refer to the one-per-country standardization organization which is that country’s member to ISO The International Organization for Standardization , widely known as ISO (pronounced /ˈaɪsoʊ/ EYE-soe), is an international-standard-setting body composed of representatives from various national standards organizations. Founded on 23 February 1947, the organization promulgates worldwide proprietary industrial and commercial standards. It has, the term Standards Developing Organization (SDO) generally refers to the thousands of industry or sector based standards organizations which develop and publish industry specific standards. Some economies feature only an NSB with no other SDOs. Large economies like the United States and Japan feature 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 the IEEE The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers or IEEE is an international non-profit, professional organization for the advancement of technology related to electricity. It has the most members of any technical professional organization in the world, with more than 395,000 members in around 150 countries and the Audio Engineering Society Established in 1948, the Audio Engineering Society draws its membership from amongst engineers, scientists, manufacturers and other organizations and individuals with an interest or involvement in the professional audio industry. They are mainly engineers developing devices or products for audio, and also people working in audio content production (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) (see Trends below) in that SDOs may be accredited to develop standards using open and transparent processes.

Scope of work

The developers of technical standards are generally concerned with interface standards In telecommunications, an interface standard is a standard that describes one or more functional characteristics or physical characteristics (such as electrical, mechanical, or optical characteristics) necessary to allow the exchange of information between two or more (usually different) systems or pieces of equipment, which detail how products interconnect with one another, and safety standards, which establish characteristics required for a product or process to be safe for the humans, animals and 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 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 ISO 9000 is a family of standards for quality management systems. ISO 9000 is maintained by ISO, the International Organization for Standardization and is administered by accreditation and certification bodies. The rules are updated, as the requirements motivate changes over time. Some of the requirements in ISO 9001:2008 include) 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 False advertising or deceptive advertising is the use of false or misleading statements in advertising. As advertising has the potential to persuade people into commercial transactions that they might otherwise avoid, many governments around the world use regulations to control false, deceptive or misleading advertising. Truth in labeling refers laws, and ambiguities can be reduced if a company offers a product that is "compliant" with a standard.

Standards development process

When an organization develops standards which may be used openly, it is common to have formal rules published regarding the process. This may include:

• Who is allowed to vote and have input on new or revised standards
• What is the formal step-by-step process
• How are bias and commercial interests handled
• How are negative votes or ballots handled
• What type of consensus is required
• etc

Although 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 the ITU The International Telecommunication Union is the eldest organization in the UN family still in existence. It was founded as the International Telegraph Union in Paris on 17 May 1865 and is today the leading United Nations agency for information and communication technology issues, and the global focal point for governments and the private sector 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 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.

Standards distribution and Copyright

Since the standards development process costs a great deal of money, time and resources, virtually all but a few standards are distributed on a commercial basis rather than being provided free. A technical library at 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 Works are in the public domain if they are not covered by intellectual property rights at all, if the intellectual property rights have expired, and/or if the intellectual property rights are forfeited. Examples include the English language, the formulae of Newtonian physics, as well as the works of Shakespeare and the patents over powered flight. This assumption is correct only for standards produced by the central governments whose publications are not amenable to copyright. Any standards produced by non-governmental entities remain the intellectual property of their developers 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 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 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."^[2]

Trends

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 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 Organization (SSO). Despite having limited financial resources, some of them enjoy truly international acceptance. One example is the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) whose standards for HTML, CSS, and XML are used universally throughout the world. 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 lower level software solutions.

Some industry-driven standards development efforts don't even have a formal organizational structure. They are projects funded by large corporations. Among them are the OpenOffice.org, a Sun Microsystems-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.

References

1. ^ ^{a b} European Union: Directive 98/34/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 22 June 1998 laying down a procedure for the provision of information in the field of technical standards and regulations Official Journal L é04, 21.7.1998, p. 37–48. (This page also provides references to amendments.) See also European Commission: Enterprise Directorate-General: Vademecum on European Standardisation. (This document contains a consolidated version of Directive 98/34/EC, dated 15 November 2003.) Accessed 2009-05-05.
2. ^ Quoted from ISO/IEC 24751-1:2008: "Information technology - Individualized adaptability and accessibility in e-learning, education and training - Part 1: Framework and reference model", p. v.

See also

• Coordination problem
• List of technical standard organisations
• Open standard
• Standard
• Standardisation
• Transport standards organisations
• Fair, Reasonable and Non Discriminatory terms
• Autocracy

External links

• NIST: Additional Standard Resources.
• CEN: Survey of Fora & Consortia - Edition 14 - October 2008 – Alphabetical List of Standards-related Fora and Consortia.
• CEN: ICT Standards Consortia – background information on the above list.

Categories: Standards organizations

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• International Standard Book Number: Encyclopedia

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