On Thu, Feb 12, 2004 at 11:47:15PM -0500, James Drabb wrote: > On Thu, 2004-02-12 at 22:32, fred smith wrote: > > Whatever would you want that for? > > > > not to mention, if you've ever seen it, you're tainted and anything you > > write could be claimed by MS as derivative. > > While I am not a lawyer, I do not think that is how copyright laws > work. You could not use the source code verbatim, nor could you use > ideas from the code that was patented. However, you could use ideas > from the code that is not covered by a patent. Think about how > copyright really works and not how the RIAA/MPAA/MS/etc want you to > think it works. You can go over a buddies house and watch a movie he > purchased by you did not. You can listen to a song on a friends CD > player that you did not pay for. But not make a new song based on that one. > You can read a book and write a > similar story. Not *that* similar. And I hope you don't use the same characters. > You can create you own version of a popular piece of > artwork. People have been convicted with copyright violation just by creating a similar product to existing ones, without ever getting access to the original. > I can write a book with a theme very similar to the LOTR with > trolls, hobbits, elves, etc and it would be legal. I think copyright > laws prevent the distribution of works that you do not own or have a > right to distribute. That is why the RIAA has not sued anyone for > downloading music, but for uploading music. > > As long as you did not sign an NDA with MS, I don't think they would > have any legal recourse against someone who viewed their code and then > used ideas from that code that are not covered by a patent. No legal recourse? Where did that someone get *their* copy? By violation of copyrights, right? Anyway, I thought people here respected copyrights. How can the same people that cry against ilegal use of GPL code by some corporations take so light views on copyright when talking about Microsoft's (supposed) code? I'm not saying you have just a view, but this is a public list, and from these posts I had that view. I just hope to correct that view for any public out there. > As I said, I am not a lawyer and can be way off base here : ) Neither am I. Regards, Luciano Rocha
