Free?

[Chante]

Daniel Gibson wrote:
> Am 26.10.2011 23:52, schrieb Steven Schveighoffer:
>> On Wed, 26 Oct 2011 17:51:11 -0400, Daniel Gibson
>> <metalcaedes at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> Am 26.10.2011 23:38, schrieb Steven Schveighoffer:
>>>>
>>>> But it's much harder to reverse engineer how someone built a
>>>> machine than it is to reverse engineer how software is built.
>>>
>>> Really?
>>> I guess it depends on the machine but I imagine it isn't so hard to
>>> dismantle a machine to find out how it works? (But I have no
>>> experience with that, it's just a guess)
>>> Reverse Engineering software can be pretty hard if the author made
>>> it deliberately hard, like Skype.
>>
>> If you have no idea how a material is built, such as a new kind of
>> glass, you have to guess.
>
> Ok, for materials it's probably hard, but there is a possibility of
> chemical analysis and stuff like that.
> But I guess for things like e.g. car engines it may be easier (besides
> maybe special/new materials used).

It's not worth it. If a company is relying on a competitor's engines to 
develop it's own, it's effectively out of the business of engineering 
(it's just then a manufacturer of other company's products perhaps). 
Competitive analyis is fine, but a company cannot be in the engine 
business without the required engineering prowess required for that.

> Anyway, I'm strongly opposed to software patents.
> My main concerns are that
> 1. Often trivial ideas are patented
> 2. Even for non-trivial stuff it isn't unlikely that some expert
> reinvents the same algorithm/whatever for the same problem.

YES, YES, YES!!!

> One Example is http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shadow_volume#Depth_fail

> 3. Because of this you can never be sure you're not violating patents
> when developing software without knowingly copying ideas of other
> people. Checking this is impossible even for big companies with
> specialized lawyers, let alone smaller companies or hobby developers.

Sounds like a concept for a new book: "Modern Crimes Against Humanity", 
or "Crimes Against Humanity in the Age of Technology".