nch & Russian), whereas if it were to be an acronym it would not work for French and Russian. INTERNET ENGINEERING TASK FORCE (IETF) In addition to the ITU-T and the ISO there is another important standards Video Communications: The Whole Picture development "community" involved in crafting recommendations for internetworked multimedia handling systems: the Internet Activities Board (IAB) and, through that body, the IETF. Standards for communications across the Internet evolve through the IETF's rather informal (in comparison to the ITU-T and ISO) standards-setting process that relies on circulars called Request for Comments (RFCs). RFC contributors are mostly scientists and academicians having an interest in some aspects of internetworking including, but not restricted to, multimedia communications. Often these individuals are involved in research funded by various grants or contracts with private corporations. RFCs are also developed in cooperation with other organizations and consortia, by employees of private organizations and by academicians. THE IMTC The IMTC is a non-profit corporation founded to promote the creation and adoption of international standards for multipoint document exchange and video conferencing. Its members promote a Standards First initiative to guarantee internetworking for all aspects of multimedia teleconferencing. The organization is open to all that support its goals. The IMTC maintains an informative Web site that contains a wealth of information on the H.32X and T.12X Recommendations. See Chapter 8 for the URL. The long-standing president of the IMTC is Neil Starkey of DataBeam, Inc. MPEG FAMILY OF SPECIFICATIONS he Moving Picture Experts Group (MPEG) is a committee of the ISO/IEC, or more specifically, the Joint Technical Committee 1, Sub-committee 29, Work Group 11. It has produced a series of four standards for lossy data compression and storage of full-motion video. These four standards are MPEG-1, MPEG-2, MPEG-3, and MPEG-4. MPEG-3, having been found to offer nothing to video,