Andrei's Google Talk

[klickverbot]

On 9/21/10 4:31 PM, Steven Schveighoffer wrote:
> Huh? Look, this isn't an issue of being deceitful, it's an issue of the
> defensible strength of "yes, I read it, but I didn't copy anything" vs.
> "no I didn't read it, so I couldn't have copied anything." If you don't
> believe the person, then it's up to you to prove they're lying.
 > […]
 > It's even possible to read code, understand the ideas, and write your
 > own code to implement the ideas (commonly done via a clean-room
 > implementation).

I guess I don't quite understand US copyright laws here: Here in Europe, 
if somebody accuses you of copying their work, they have to prove that 
you in fact did copy it. Let's assume that person manages to convince a 
judge that your code is in fact a copy of theirs. To defend yourself, it 
should not really make a difference whether you claim that you read that 
code or not.

Even if it mattered whether you looked at the code or not (at least for 
Europe, I'm reasonably sure that it does not), how are you going to 
convince the judge that you didn't look at the source code? After all, 
for Open Source projects, the source code is publicly available at the 
internet, and if you did not write your program in jail or deep down in 
the ocean in a submarine, there is always the possibility that you could 
have looked at the code.

As I said, I don't really know much about the US copyright laws, but if 
you are used to common European jurisdiction, this situation seems 
pretty bizarre…