[Patents] Greg upset about "peace, love, linux"

[dmarti@zgp.org (Don Marti)]

begin Gregory Aharonian quotation of Mon, Jun 25, 2001 at 01:57:40PM -0400:

> patenting of software.  In the US, we have spent the last forty years
> gradually eliminating the illogic of software copyright (i.e. software
> is all functional and process and method, which is explicitly banned for
> copyright protection under US laws - I am not sure what the laws are
> in Europe).  All because IBM does nothing but help IBM.

So are you proposing that software be patentable, but _not_
copyrightable?

That's an interesting point of view, but isn't it only meaningful if
shrink-wrap licenses are invalid?  In accepting a shrink-wrap
license you sign away your rights to copy (and in some cases even
comment on) the software.  

If shrink-wrap licenses are enforceable, the copyright status of
the software doesn't matter.

(I tend to agree with the Bernstein v. US Dept. of Justice ruling
that source code is speech, and I think it follows from that that
it should be copyrightable.)

-- 
Don Marti              "I've never sent or received a GIF in my life."
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