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CONTRIBUTING.md: defer to the blanket antitrust policy #661

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Expand Up @@ -159,134 +159,9 @@ GitHub discussions, or public steering meetings.

### Antitrust considerations

It is important that the SDK avoids bias toward specific integration paths or
providers. The antitrust policy below details precise terms that should be
adhered to in order to ensure that the evolution and governance of the SDK remain
procompetitive.

### Antitrust policy

Note: all changes to the policy in this section must be approved by legal
counsel.

The Go+Anthropic MCP SDK Working Group (the “Working Group”) is established to
guide and review technical contributions to an open-source Go software
development kit (“SDK”) for the Model Context Protocol (“MCP”). The Working Group
and its members are committed to operating for procompetitive purposes that
accelerate AI development and benefit businesses and consumers. This
collaboration is focused on technical and infrastructure objectives – namely,
developing and maintaining a neutral, open-source, and MIT-licensed library.
Google and Anthropic, as well as other stakeholders, participate with the
understanding that the Working Group’s sole purpose is to improve interoperability
and innovation in the MCP ecosystem.

Antitrust law recognizes that when competitors collaborate for valid reasons
(e.g., joint R&D or standard-setting), such collaborations can be
procompetitive. This Antitrust Compliance Policy (the “Policy”) therefore
outlines guidelines and safeguards to ensure the collaboration remains focused
on its technical mission.

The Policy applies to all Working Group activities and communications,
including official meetings, subcommittee discussions, emails, shared
documents, and any other interactions under the Working Group’s auspices (e.g.,
group chats, version control systems). It applies to all participants from
Google, Anthropic, and any other member organizations or independent
contributors involved in the Working Group. Each participating entity should
ensure its representatives understand and uphold these rules. By participating,
members agree to follow the Policy in both letter and spirit.

#### Governance Procedures and Principles

- **Participant Guidelines.** Participants should generally be limited to
individuals in technical roles who are directly involved in the MCP SDK
project. These participants should not be key decision-makers in their
company’s AI commercial strategy, sales, marketing, pricing, or other
competitively or strategically sensitive business planning.
- **Agenda Preparation.** A written agenda should be circulated before each
Working Group meeting. Agenda items should focus on the SDK’s technical
development, maintenance, or documentation. Where appropriate, counsel should
review the agenda prior to circulation to ensure compliance with the Policy.
- **Policy Reminder at Start.** Meetings should begin with a brief antitrust
compliance reminder with reference to the Policy.
- **Minutes.** Meetings will be minuted by a designated participant, and
neutrally record attendees, roles, topics discussed, action items, and
outcomes. Draft minutes will be circulated to all participants.
- **Documentation and Transparency.** Working Group outputs are intended
for public release. Significant design decisions and discussion outcomes
should be documented publicly. If a topic cannot be safely disclosed
publicly, it likely does not belong in this forum.
- **Independence of Decision-Making.** All participants and their companies
retain complete independence in their own business decisions and competitive
strategies outside of the MCP SDK project. Nothing in this collaboration
restricts or influences how each company operates its commercial business.

### Information Exchange Guidelines

**Appropriate Topics.** Working Group members are anticipated to remain within the
project’s technical scope. In general, discussions should focus on improving
the Go SDK for MCP in a transparent, collaborative, and non-exclusive manner.
The following topics are appropriate and expected:

- **Software Design and Architecture:** Implementation of MCP features in Go,
API design, code structure, testing frameworks, performance considerations,
compatibility issues, and security concerns.
- **Technical Contributions and Bug Fixes:** Review of code contributions,
debugging problems, and handling feature requests.
- **Documentation and Open-Source Logistics:** Discussions of project
documentation, changelogs, versioning strategy, and managing contributions.
- **Standards and Interoperability:** Ensuring SDK compliance with MCP or other
open technical standards. Any standardization effort should be open,
voluntary, and tailored to promote interoperability.
- **Public Information:** Any public information relevant to the Working
Group’s technical work (e.g., published research, open-source code from
outside projects, publicly documented API specs).

**Inappropriate Topics.** To ensure compliance with antitrust law and maintain
the open character of the collaboration, the following subjects should not be
discussed in Working Group meetings, side conversations, or related communications:

- **Pricing and Commercial Terms:** Do not discuss prices, pricing strategy,
discounting, or future pricing plans for Claude, Gemini, or any other AI
product or service provided by Working Group members.
- **Sales or Output:** Avoid sharing sales volumes, revenue, customer counts,
market shares, production plans, or any business performance metrics.
- **Product Roadmaps (beyond SDK):** Do not disclose internal plans for AI
model development, feature rollouts, or future commercialization strategies.
- **Customers or Markets:** No discussions of which customers, industries, or
geographies the parties will pursue or avoid.
- **Customer or Supplier Details:** Do not share specifics of contracts,
negotiations, or relationships with commercial partners.
- **Non-SDK Proprietary Tech:** Keep discussions focused on the open SDK.
Sharing of information should be limited to what is needed to achieve the
Working Group’s goals. Each party’s internal model architectures, fine-tuning
approaches, or training methods unrelated to the project should not be
disclosed.
- **HR or Labor Matters:** No discussions about wages, hiring plans, or
policies toward employees.

#### Enforcement and Support

- **Shared Responsibility.** All Working Group participants share responsibility
for upholding the Policy. While legal counsel can provide support, day-to-day
compliance is a function of culture and practice.
- **Designated Legal Contacts.** Each participating entity should designate a
legal point of contact responsible for reviewing meeting materials (e.g.,
agendas, minutes) and fielding questions about compliance. These contacts
should be included in the Working Group distribution list for all official
materials and should be consulted in advance of any meetings where sensitive
topics may arise.
- **Final Note.** The Policy is not meant to chill legitimate technical
collaboration. It is meant to ensure that the Working Group can focus on its
mission without creating unnecessary legal risk or attracting regulator
scrutiny. Participants who follow the Policy and avoid Inappropriate Topics
will remain squarely within the procompetitive zone.

### Ongoing evaluation

On an ongoing basis, the administrators of the SDK will evaluate whether it is
keeping pace with changes to the MCP spec and meeting its goals of openness and
transparency. If it is not meeting these goals, either because it exceeds the
bandwidth of its current Working Group, or because the processes here are
inadequate, these processes will be re-evaluated by the Working Group. At this
time, the Working Group set may be expanded to include additional community
members, based on their history of strong contribution.
The goal of this repository is to provide a robust and complete Go
implementation of the model context protocol, in an open and transparent
manner, without bias toward specific integration paths or providers. To that
end, the model context protocol organization's [antitrust
policy](https://github.com/modelcontextprotocol/modelcontextprotocol/blob/main/ANTITRUST.md)
applies to all participation in this project.