Andrei's Google Talk

[Russel Winder]

On Tue, 2010-09-21 at 19:08 +0200, klickverbot wrote:
[ . . . ]
> I should also add that I am no lawyer, and I am generally only very 
> modestly experienced in legal issues, so please bear with me if my 
> questions don't make much sense – I just want to understand the reason 
> why Walter is so exceptionally afraid of looking at other projects.

I am sure Walter reads other code, and especially learns about languages
other than C, C++ and D -- not to do so would be to abdicate one's
professional responsibility to stay up to date in one's field.  The
problem is to set up a clear barrier to the accusation of copying.  So
to take a well known example:  FOSS project contributors should never
read Microsoft copyright code, and Microsoft employees should never read
GPL and LGPL code -- substitute any profit-making company that relies on
licence revenues for Microsoft, it is just that using Microsoft here is
almost certainly not libellous.   Rigidly following behaviour such as
this is not a total defence in a copyright action, but it sets a pattern
of corporate and individual behaviour that makes a copyright
infringement less likely and more difficult to prove sufficiently to win
an action.

> To me, it seems a bit as if a researcher refused to keep himself 
> informed about scientific progress in the field he is working on, just 
> because he could be accused of stealing from other people (yes, that's a 
> weak analogy, I know).

Actually I think it is a strong point.  It comes to the heart of the
problem.  Programmers must read code in order to work and also in order
to learn and stay up to date.  This is the primary conflict.

> Oh, and I am perfectly aware of the fact that there is no common 
> European jurisdiction in these matters, but to the best of my knowledge, 
> the laws regarding intellectual property are quite similar from a 
> high-level point of view in many European countries – and probably in 
> large contrast with US copyright laws, which is what I intended to hint at.

I believe you are right, I think the there is a great deal of similarity
in all the jurisdictions in the mix here -- at least for copyright, for
IP law generally I think there are much wider variations.  The problem
is though that despite this, the actual laws and indeed legal systems,
are different and it is in such details that we loose any ability to
generalize.

-- 
Russel.
=============================================================================
Dr Russel Winder      t: +44 20 7585 2200   voip: sip:russel.winder at ekiga.net
41 Buckmaster Road    m: +44 7770 465 077   xmpp: russel at russel.org.uk
London SW11 1EN, UK   w: www.russel.org.uk  skype: russel_winder
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