Publicly available specification. A new paradigm for developing international standards

Formal standards groups have been criticized in recent years for the time required to develop standards. With notable exceptions, standards groups have earned this criticism. One body, ISO/IEC JTC1 (Joint Technical Committee 1), is aggressively addressing the time required to develop formal international standards (ISs) for the information technology industry. With its latest addition, publicly available specification (PAS), JTC1 now has three standards development paradigms: traditional, fast-track and PAS. All three paradigms share the same final approval procedures but have different development processes. The PAS paradigm resembles both the traditional and fast-track paradigms in its process for moving from a draft IS to an IS. The PAS paradigm even more closely resembles the fast-track paradigm in that it lets a standard be initially developed outside ISO. However, whereas the fast-track paradigm lets a standard be developed by a JTC1 member, the PAS paradigm lets it be developed by any organization