Free?

Chante udontspamme at never.will.u
Thu Oct 27 13:02:03 PDT 2011


"Steven Schveighoffer" <schveiguy at yahoo.com> wrote in message 
news:op.v3zaqsfzeav7ka at localhost.localdomain...
> On Wed, 26 Oct 2011 16:55:34 -0400, Chante <udontspamme at never.will.u> 
> wrote:
>
>>
>> "Steven Schveighoffer" <schveiguy at yahoo.com> wrote in message
>> news:op.v3ylgbgaeav7ka at localhost.localdomain...
>>> On Tue, 25 Oct 2011 00:04:18 -0400, Chante <udontspamme at never.will.u>
>>> wrote:
>>>
>>>>
>>>> "Steven Schveighoffer" <schveiguy at yahoo.com> wrote in message
>>>> news:op.v3u2chz6eav7ka at localhost.localdomain...
>>>>> On Mon, 24 Oct 2011 10:39:54 -0400, Kagamin <spam at here.lot> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>> Chante Wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>>> While I haven't thought it through (and maybe don't have the
>>>>>>> knowledge  to
>>>>>>> do so), elimination of software patents was something I had in 
>>>>>>> mind
>>>>>>> as a
>>>>>>> potential cure for the current state of affairs (not a cure for
>>>>>>> viral
>>>>>>> source code though). Of course, noting that first-to-file is now
>>>>>>> the
>>>>>>> thing, it appears (to me) that Big Software Corp and Big 
>>>>>>> Government
>>>>>>> are
>>>>>>> on one side, humanity on the other.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Patents are seen to exist for humanity. Elimination of patents is
>>>>>> equivalent to elimination of intellectual property. You're not 
>>>>>> going
>>>>>> to  succeed on that. But GPL3 at least protects you from patent
>>>>>> claims
>>>>>> from  the author, so you'd better use it. You're afraid of others,
>>>>>> but
>>>>>> GPL can  also protect *your* code.
>>>>>
>>>>> Patents are to foster innovation.  Software innovation needs no
>>>>> patent
>>>>> system to foster it.  Nobody writes a piece of software because 
>>>>> they
>>>>> were  able to get a patent for it.
>>>>>
>>>>> I feel software patents are a completely different entity than
>>>>> material
>>>>> patents.  For several reasons:
>>>>>
>>>>> 1. Software is already well-covered by copyright.
>>>>
>>>> Software, though, is not like a book: it's not just text. There is
>>>> inherent design, architecture, engineering represented by source 
>>>> code.
>>>
>>> Books require design, sometimes elaborate design, and engineering of
>>> sorts.  What an author puts into writing a book is not unlike what an
>>> entity puts into writing software.
>>
>> With a book, the text is the end product. With software, the source 
>> code
>> is an intermediate representation, or production machine rather than 
>> the
>> end product. Source code is like a printing press for a specific book. 
>> It
>> is not like the book. (These analogies are presented more for 
>> analysis,
>> rather than in direct or opposing response).
>
> compiled software

(you meant, "source code")

> is copyrighted, it's a derivative translation of the  original source 
> code. When speaking of copyrighted software, the binary  code and the 
> source used to build it are one and the same.

OK, but what if the "source code" is only graphical on the computer 
display, and the internal binary representation (not text) is then 
compiled? Obviously, the design of the software are the graphical 
diagrams on the computer screen for they are what the programmer 
understands.

>
>>>>> 2. With few exceptions, the lifetime of utility of a piece of
>>>>> software
>>>>> is  well below the lifetime of a patent (currently 17 years).
>>>>> 3. It is a very slippery slope to go down.  Software is a purely
>>>>> *abstract* thing, it's not a machine.
>>>>
>>>> Maybe literally "abstract", but those flow charts, layers,
>>>> boxes-and-arrows actually become realized (rendered, if you will) by
>>>> the
>>>> source code. The text really isn't important. The "abstraction" is.
>>>
>>> Software is not unlike math.
>>
>> I disagree. While one can use software to perform math, that does not
>> make software "like math".
>
> Then the rest of this argument is moot, and I respectfully will end 
> debate  so as to not waste any more of our time.
>

Yes, a debate cannot be had that starts out "God created all things, 
therefore God exists". That is a classic/cliche tactic. 




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