[olug] I'm one of the nails in SCO coffin...

[Daniel Pfile]

Companies can and do win lawsuits to have copyrighted software removed
from public access after having it be available to the public for a long
time. Ask anybody who plays games on emulators or reads guitar tab and
lyrics on the internet. It's not like trademarks, there's no 'defend it
or lose it' clause.

That said, it's this little gem that's the big deal:

"If information relating to a SOFTWARE PRODUCT subject to this Agreement
at any time becomes available without restriction to the general public
by acts not attributable to LICENSEE or its employees, LICENSEE'S
obligations under this section shall not apply to such information after
such time."

When bell labs began getting rid of their old computers with copies of
the source code on them they made the code available. When that
happened, the license that the code was under allowed the recipients of
the code to disclose it. So, disclosure would not be copyright infringement.

IANAL :)

-- Daniel

PS: I have a 9-track Bell Labs SysV R2 root tape for a VAX 11/780 here
in my office, complete with an ATT proprietary label on it. I got it
around 97 I think. No source code though. :( If somebody had a spare
11/780 or 750 we could try to boot it up.

Bill Brush wrote:
> They're very similar, but if it was just trademarks Disney wouldn't be
> spending millions lobbying to extend copyrights.   Trademarks don't
> expire (or at least they can be renewed), copyrights do (and can't be
> renewed).
> 
> Don't confuse copyright and licensing.  GPL is licensing, not copyrights.
> 
> The way a it was explained to me, is that a copyright is for a given
> work, and derivative works.  If someone takes your work and makes
> derivative of it without your permission you can sue them to cease and
> desist.  Under GPL works that are copyrighted to the originator are
> licensed to anyone who wants to use or modify them provided they
> include the source code.
> 
> That is my understanding anyway, no doubt there are subtleties I am
> missing, but without an NDA, you can post source code belonging to a
> third party, and providing you don't try to pass it off as your own,
> or make money off of it, there is precious little they can do except
> ask you to stop.  If they don't ask you to stop, then they have given
> their tacit approval for their source code to be made public.  Under
> the law everyone has to be treated at least nominally fairly, so they
> can't ask one person to stop and not another without opening
> themselves up to challenge in court.
> 
> If you would like for more clarification I have several lawyers I can consult.
> 
> Bill
> 
> On 8/23/07, Luke -Jr <luke at dashjr.org> wrote:
>> On Thursday 23 August 2007, Bill Brush wrote:
>>> In order for copyrights to be held they must be protected and
>>> enforced, which is why Disney is so rigorous about protection their
>>> cash cows.
>> I thought that was just trademarks? Is Linux now public domain then, since the
>> GPL is never enforced?
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