I believe the real fault has been in the abusive extension of "copyright" enforcement beyond any rational meaning of "limited time". If copyright were given the same weight as patent, 7 years, such problems as the Lotus Improv one addressed in your article would be moot. If intellectual efforts after 7 years moved into the public domain just like physical efforts, we would all benefit.
Especially in computer terms, software more than 7 years old (dare I say two years?) is not something anyone is going to make a profiton by keeping closed.
I am told that later products from the same company that re-use code from they themselves released under the GPL has no GPL restrictions. This is a very good thing, since I have no wish to hinder people who want to sell closed source software if they so choose. However, the GPL being something I've only read once, this flexibility was not obvious to me. The Public Domain is far easier to understand.
For centuries "we" have had the public domain for ideas that have run their commercial course. It is time that the extreme efforts of the entertainment
lobby that have corrupted copyright, and destroyed the idea of the benefits of public domain, be rolled back.
Yes, Disney would loose their enforcement of a character invented early in the last century. But I would finally be able to put three black circles together any way I wanted to without asking anyone's permission for the first time in
my life.
Curt-
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One major source of the problem
2002-07-17 21:12:12
john_betelgeuse
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I agree wholeheartedly!
Not only should copyright be rolled back to
something very time limited and much simpler,
but the DMCA should be repealed or heavily
modified.
As it stands now, you can be prosecuted
for reverse engineering something for the
purposes of creating interoperating systems.
Not only should copyright be rolled back to
something very time limited and much simpler,
but the DMCA should be repealed or heavily
modified.
As it stands now, you can be prosecuted
for reverse engineering something for the
purposes of creating interoperating systems.
Talk about a monopoly grant!