Talk:Software law
Add topicLatest comment: 16 years ago by Pnm in topic NPOV
 | This article was nominated for deletion on 20 April 2024. The result of the discussion was keep. |
 | This article is rated Stub-class on Wikipedia's content assessment scale. It is of interest to the following WikiProjects: | |||||||||||||||||||||||
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||
 | This article is based on material taken from the Free On-line Dictionary of Computing prior to 1 November 2008 and incorporated under the "relicensing" terms of the GFDL, version 1.3 or later. |
NPOV
[edit]No references. Completely subjective phrases like "draconian pretrial seizure" and "Copyrights on command languages enforce gratuitous incompatibility, close opportunities for competition, and stifle incremental improvements."
This has been up for a long time and it's bad. PJ Rey (talk) 09:48, 11 December 2008 (UTC)
Not very neutral, is it? Qaz 04:36, 16 Mar 2004 (UTC)
- Sadly not. You should read FOLDOC's article on software patents... Stewart Adcock 05:56, 16 Mar 2004 (UTC)
- I just removed this text:
- A patent normally covers the design of something with a function such as a machine or process. Copyright restricts the right to make and distribute copies of something written or recorded, such as a song or a book of recipes. Software has both these aspects - it embodies functional design in the algorithms and data structures it uses and it could also be considered as a recording which can be copied and "performed" (run).
- "Look and feel" lawsuits attempt to monopolize well-known command languages; some have succeeded. Copyrights on command languages enforce gratuitous incompatibility, close opportunities for competition, and stifle incremental improvements.
- Software patents are even more dangerous; they make every design decision in the development of a program carry a risk of a lawsuit, with draconian pretrial seizure. It is difficult and expensive to find out whether the techniques you consider using are patented; it is impossible to find out whether they will be patented in the future.
- The proper use of copyright is to prevent software piracy - unauthorised duplication of software. This is completely different from copying the idea behind the program in the same way that photocopying a book differs from writing another book on the same subject.