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SCO and Software Liability: What To Consider

Posted by timothy on from the fret-productively dept.

mristau writes "I wrote my senior thesis on the problems of software liability in the context of both proprietary and open source software development. I used the SCO v. IBM issues as a basis for further hypothetical analysis. The work provides sufficient technical background for a general audience. I'm not a legal scholar so my analysis isn't perfect, but the issues are relevant to us all."

7 comments

  1. Mirror? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    This site has been listed as Entertainment. I have NO idea why. So I can't RTFA even though I'm very interested in the subject matter.

    1. Re:Mirror? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

      There's some sort of modern poetry in the fact that you can't browse an educational site for information, although you can see it linked from the timehole that is /.

      Perhaps in haiku form. Anyone?

    2. Re:Mirror? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Once there was a site
      Then when Slashdot linked to it
      Joshu replied "Mu!"

    3. Re:Mirror? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

      Maybe it is assumed to be an adult site because a female name is part of the url. Censor-ware has done dumber things.

  2. I'm not exploting the SCO FUD! Honest! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Insightful

    So when will your new company selling Linux insurance start competing with Perens, Jones and McBride?

  3. Her paper suggests certification... by tcopeland · · Score: 3, Informative

    ... as a final goal. I wonder which she feels would be more effective - certification in the sense of process - i.e., CMM levels? Or certification of individual programmers?

    It sounds like she favors the latter - I'd be interested to hear what she thinks (and why).

    --
    The Army reading list
  4. Here's the abstract by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Software liability increasingly affects software developers and computer users. Programmers today typically subscribe to one of two main paradigms of software development: proprietary development or open source development. Each model presents unique problems of legal liability. Proprietary development puts software firms and individual programmers at potentially enormous risk if their work harms others. Open source development muddies the waters of authorship and legal responsibility extensively while putting the end user at a diverse set of risks. The accidental, yet inevitable mixing of development paradigms exacerbates the difficulties of assigning legal liability and introduces ethical dilemmas on many levels. I argue that a legal and technical paradigm shift must occur in order for technology to maximally benefit society in the coming years.

    Right off the bat I disagree. How does Open Source muddy the waters of authorship more than proprietary? A visible CVS checkin system is, if anything, less likely to be used for checking in infringing code than a closed shop system. And no, I did not read the whole 94-page paper.