Subj : Re: GNU Public Licences Revisited (again) To : comp.programming From : Randy Howard Date : Wed Aug 31 2005 01:35 am Serge Skorokhodov (216716244) wrote (in article ): > Randy Howard wrote: >> It would however, be totally unfair to the original author, >> unless that person /wanted/ to give it up for such acts. You >> might as well demand that chemists give up their formulas for >> snake oil, so that other snake oil companies won't have to >> start from scratch. What rational basis is there for this >> need to make others have it easier off the fruit of others' >> labor? > > The problem of patents is exactly that they prevent others from > starting from scratch for unreasonable period of time. Otherwise > it was just trade secrets. Sort of. Are patent protections too lengthy, especially in an industry that moves this quickly? Probably. Does a patent prevent you from starting from scratch on a different solution? Not at all. See also improvement patents. >> Strange, Office is going XML reportedly, despite still >> retaining copyright protection on their software. How can >> that be? > > I may be wrong, but you cannot use XML MS Office format without > permission. Yeah right. XML exists so that people can interoperate with the data. Good luck to MS convincing people not to use plain text data descriptions. >> It is anyone's right to sell a product, without giving away >> all the implementation details. It is your right as a >> consumer to refuse to buy it if you don't like it. If you >> choose to buy it though, then you have no complaint. > > Do you remember the MDI in MS Exel but not in Windows SDK story? Yes. It was a mountain out of a molehill. MS shouldn't have to give away all their interfaces if they don't want to. It's one of the few times I come down on their side. Besides, reverse engineering is such that it is a short-term advantage at best. > Don't you think that companies must take some responsibility and > obligations if their product is of infrastructural importance? What does that mean? If I come up with some sort algorithm is so efficient that it makes all existing implementations pale by comparison, do I have a responsibility to give it away? This naive view of the world ignores that without protection of invention, there is little incentive to invest in finding them in the first place. Apart from those few that will do it just for the recognition, it would all but dry up. > Farmacutical companies have to after talidomid. I fail to see how a bad drug is related to this. Not having a patent on thalidomide would not have impacted the results as far as I can tell. > Just imagine a car manufacturer that doesn't provide technical > details on breaks or patent ABS. Ok, I'll imagine it, because I own several cars that have ABS brakes and I was not provided with technical details about how they implemented them. Furthermore, I don't need such information, all I need to know is where the brake pedal is located, which thankfully is exactly where I expected it to be. -- Randy Howard (2reply remove FOOBAR) .