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Legal Issues of Opening Up Proprietary Standards?
mrjb asks: "The Alesis HD24 is a 24-track, hard disk audio recorder with a built-in 10 megabit FTP server. To improve on file transfer speed, Alesis offers an external Firewire drive with a program called FST/Connect which reads the disks under Windows. I've contacted Alesis about a Linux solution, but none is planned. Also, they are (understandably) not very eager to reveal the file system specs. After a few days of staring at hex codes, I now know enough about the FS to read HD24 IDE disks under Linux (no Firewire required). As I know I benefit from the efforts of the Samba and OpenOffice teams, I'd love to share this info. I'm not, however, the least bit interested in Alesis suing me (in fact, I might want to send them my CV at some point). What would your advice be in such a delicate situation of conflicting interests?"
Reverse Engineering is generally not illegal.
But, to CYA, your best bet is to just write up the specs as you understand them, then have someone else write the driver for the community.
You don't even have to share those specs. Give the author the specs, have him write the driver, then publish it, without your specs. Now, anyone who wants to reverse engineer the driver you wrote, is investigating a full layer of indirection from you. They're not even looking at the specs you wrote, but rather the code that was written upon those specs.
I am unamerican, and proud of it!
Before he does that, what he really ought to be doing is talking to an attorney. An attorney can give you advice on what measures you can take to minimize your legal exposure here. That advice may include what you need to do to assure that you've done this in a clean manner. Having specs you hand off to somebody else may not provide the kind of validation that is needed.
In the end though you can do this 100% on the up and up and still get sued. A good lawyer will tell you that. Will they win the lawsuit? Not if you do this right, but then how many thousands of dollars will you blow defending the lawsuit, whether you win or not.
Whatever you decide to do an attorney can give you a clear perspective on what the ramifications are.
This sig has been temporarily disconnected or is no longer in service
Why not get your working driver, and email the company asking if they would release a driver written by you in any form. Then negotiate either payment, or open-ness.
The music industry is notoriously "closed mouthed" about letting anyone know how their electronic products work at a technical level. Ever since the mid 80's or so though, companies have been reverse-engineering these instruments and devices, and *selling* commercial products that work with them, not to mention work on freeware projects along the same lines.
For example, I used to own a Roland S-50 sampling synthesizer. It saved its sample data on 720K 3.5" floppy disks. But people with PCs quickly realized it would be much more useful if you could take standard WAV sound files and dump them into the synth via MIDI. Many other makes and models of sampling synths and rack-mounted samplers were in the same boat. The manufacturers (like Roland) had poor documentation for the MIDI "system exclusive" commands that would be required to upload or download the sample data, so a few people worked at reverse engineering all of this on their own. Eventually, prodcuts were sold like "SampleVision" which knew how to do this for many dozens of samplers on the market.
Rather than being sued, it seemed like the synth makers actually ended up endorsing the products, providing links to them from their own web sites - because they learned it made their products more desirable to purchase.
Even if the onus of proof is on the prosecution, that won't stop them from creating a long, drawn-out trial that will bankrupt the defendant before the case even gets close to providing justice. So yes, in an idealistic world where lawyers don't require money and time is not an issue, the onus is on the prosecution. However, we don't live in that world, and unless he can prove very quickly that the case has no merit, he's going to get the legal crap beat out of him, regardless of whether or not he's done anything wrong.
It's better to vote for what you want and not get it than to vote for what you don't want and get it.
- E. Debs
Chapter 12's permission vis-a-vis reverse engineering for compatibility purposes refers to copy protection and issues pertaining to copyright, not generic protocols:
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http://www.copyright.gov/title17/92chap12.html#12
Scroll down to "(f) Reverse Engineering." This section has to do with permitting one vendor to reverse engineer protected/encrypted content.
The notion of reverse engineering a driver for a pipeline which does not encrypt or otherwise disguise its content is theoretically outside the aegis of the DMCA.
Apple used (or misused, depending on your perspective) the DMCA against the OSx86 website because it infringed on protection measures Apple specifically set in place to prevent OSX from installing on whiteboxes. Real told its board members that they might be DMCAed over Fairplay because it unlocks copy protection on iTMS purchases.
If the submitter did not discover any authentication methods or trust related protocols in his reverse engineering, and his driver does not have code which specifically spoofs a platform or other form of identification, it sounds to this non-lawyer like a non-issue.
There may be other legal issues at hand, but AFAIK the DMCA is chiefly concerned with those who circumvent deliberate measures to protect copyright, and simply refusing to publicly document a protocol isn't the same thing.
Now, if the driver somehow replicates code that the vendor had to *license* from Microsoft, Microsoft may have an issue with you. Again, check with a competent IP attorney.
"Made up/misattributed quote that makes me look smart. I am on
So first off, anyone who "asks slashdot" about legal issues is asking for public opinion, not legal fact. I did not need to preface this with "IANAL", but I did so to call attention to the fact that slashdot is the wrong forum. You can't get legal advice from anyone but a lawyer you have arragements with. It's stupid even to go to somewhere like groklaw and ask for advice. Pay a lawyer or take your chances.
Second, reverse engineering IS legal. Your cynicism is masking that fact. Yes, it is dangerous, but the question sounded like some frustrated guy who figured out a file format all by himself. There are dozens of things he could have done to make his particular reverse illegal, but I suspect he did so honestly or he wouldn't be asking. Lawyers could clarify the subject, all us geeks are going to say is "if you didn't cheat, it's OK".
Third, the DMCA makes reverse engineering copy protection methods illegal. This particular part of the DMCA has not been tested, ever, on purpose. It probably would get thrown out. It is unlikely that someone would crack copy protection on purpose, without intent to enable piracy. But it has been done, and no charges filed on that issue. That is why I made the statement about "being willing to get drug through the mud".
Fourth, you don't need to be a lawyer to make statements about what is right. Most of law is what society thinks is right vs. wrong turned in to words that can then be applied equally and fairly. Very often the written law is well behind public opinion, and one way that changes is by forcing it.
Finally, Engineering 101. When in doubt, shout it out.
"With their patent-pending method of writing to the hard drive HD24 and HD24XR are the first hard disk recorders built from the ground up"
So, go look up the patent (not need to do any reverse engineering and send it off to someone who lives in a country that doesn't have software patents. They will then be free to write a driver, but you won't be able to because you live in the US and have silly patent laws.
They may try and sue your arse if you send them a linux driver and ask them distribute it because you've already infringed upon their patent.
Note, it looks like the patent is still pending as none of the patents listed seem to be for a file system.
thank God the internet isn't a human right.