[10401] in Commercialization & Privatization of the Internet
On disclosing proprietary details...
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Peter Deutsch)
Mon Feb 21 13:27:33 1994
From: Peter Deutsch <peterd@bunyip.com>
Date: Mon, 21 Feb 1994 13:10:48 -0500
In-Reply-To: Alan Sugarman's message as of Feb 21, 10:32
To: Alan Sugarman <sugarman@panix.com>,
Cc: cook@path.net, com-priv@psi.com
[ Alan Sugarman wrote: ]
> Your analogy of IRS returns is misplaced. One is forced to file IRS
> returns, but not forced to enter into $50 million dollar deals with the
> government. Somehow, it would seem the press's business to know how 50
> mill of tax dollars is being spent.
But the issue here seems to be what happens when the money
is _not_ spent.
Here's a case study - Bunyip Information Systems has a
number of project proposals out right now in which we
propose using our technology and expertise in areas of
online information publishing. To demonstrate our ability
to perform the proposed task we include a fair amount of
proprietary details about the architecture and
implementation of our system, our support strategies, our
future plans for extensions and so on.
This information surely helps the customer make
better-informed decisions but if known would certainly
enable our competitors to offer better proposals against
us either in the specific competition or in future
competitions for similar projects. Because of this I
consider it both normal and appropriate that our proposal,
if unsuccessful, not be made public. In fact, I would
consider it inappropriate to reveal certain information
even if we _are_ successful. I'm not sure of everything
the U.S. government requires in the way of disclosure of
successful bids, but I doubt that we'd be require to give
away every trade secret we own just to be considered for a
sale.
FYI, it is usual to specifically identify in a proposal
those portions of a bid which are considered proprietary
and thus should not be made public. I expect potential
customers to respect this as to do otherwise could harm our
company and thus make me cranky.
Now, when spending public money I agree that the relevant
details of how it is spent should be made public, but
there is such a thing as proprietary information and I
believe it wrong to require a potential supplier to
publish such information for all to see as part of the
competitive bidding process. If it were, you can be sure
that it would adversely affect the quality of the bids
received and thus make it _harder_ to ensure high quality
goods and services for the government.
- peterd
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