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Intellectual Property and Open Source
stoolpigeon writes "There isn't a person writing code in this country who is not impacted by US intellectual property laws. I think that it is safe to say, that not all coders have a strong understanding of just what those laws are, let alone what they mean. Stepping into this gap is programmer become lawyer Van Lindberg with his new book Intellectual Property and Open Source. Lindberg has really done something special with this volume. I don't think I've ever read a tech oriented work where I've felt so convinced that I was reading something that would become a standard by which others would come to be judged." Read below for the rest of JR's review.
Intellectual Property and Open Source
author
Van Lindberg
pages
371
publisher
O'Reilly Media, Inc.
rating
10/10
reviewer
JR Peck
ISBN
978-0-596-51796-0
summary
A practical guide to protecting code.
Let me quickly state what this book is not. It is not comprehensive. It does not cover all of US law on intellectual property. What it does cover is mostly viewed from a high level that does not address many finer points. It is not a reference for IP laws outside of the United States. While there is some commonality in various parts of the world, I think the differences preclude this book from being too useful for anyone not impacted by US law.
So what is this book? To me it felt very much like sitting down with a lawyer who can speak my language, understands my concerns, uses open source software, cares about freedom and has a gift for building metaphors and illustrations that make sense. It is that ability to bridge the gap between lawyer and developer and do it in an readable way that makes this such an incredible book. If it were just accurate and thorough but I couldn't get past a couple pages it wouldn't be worth much. If things weren't put into terms that I could grasp and apply to real life situations, the same would be true.
The first seven chapters are a primer on the history and current status of U.S. IP law. Lindberg walks the reader through patents, copyright, trademarks, trade secrets, contracts and licenses. He discusses how these impact inventors and developers. I had considered myself to be somewhat familiar with most of these, but was surprised how much I learned. I was also a bit scared by the time I was done with it all. Lindberg cites not only the pitfalls that are out there, but backs it up with case history that illustrates his points. More than once I caught myself thinking, "I guess that is possible but it is unlikely." only to be reading a page or two later about how it had already happened and was in some cases still finding its way through the courts. This was all quite a wake-up call for me.
Chapter eight and on deal with how one can operate in the open source world. Lindberg talks about just what Open Source is and then handles the many things that a developer needs to consider from how to handle a new idea (especially if one is employed) to choosing a license, accepting patches, reverse engineering without being as likely to get sued, and setting up a non-profit to run a project.
I found the discussion on various licenses and just what they mean to be especially helpful. There is a general discussion that covers a wide array of licenses, and then a separate chapter just for working with the GPL. There is an illustration in that chapter that I think stands as an excellent illustration of what this book is like. "The Darth Vader Scale of Derivative Works", found in chapter twelve, serves to illustrate the Free Software Foundation's position on the applicability of the GPL. Lindberg takes time and care to explain the issue, but the figure showing a range from little "Anny" to the fully cloaked and helmeted Darth Vader shows how he also makes it fun at the same time.
It is not absolutely necessary to read through the book from start to finish but I would highly recommend it. The conversational style makes it easy to do, and there are concepts and metaphors that Lindberg reuses throughout the book that will be easier to understand if the reader has familiarity with their use right from the start. That said, the table of contents, index and topical separation of chapters will make this useful as a reference. I would just agree with Lindberg that reading it through first will make such use easier in the future.
The book has appendices that contribute over 80 pages to the total length. These include a sample Proprietary Information Agreement, a list of Open Source licenses ( along with some descriptions of how they are used), a Free Software license list, a list of the licenses used with Fedora on a grid that lists GPL compatibility, the full text for a number of licenses and a very nice GPL Compatibility Matrix. That matrix shows what versions of *GPL licenses can be used with one another from the perspective of adding code to an already licensed project or licensing a project that will include code already licensed under one of the *GPL licenses.
Some of the sections are quite sobering. I don't think becoming more educated about these issues is going to encourage people that things are headed in the right direction. That said, I don't think they will arrive at that conclusion because Lindberg is pushing a particular point of view. He is very even handed in his approach and it is obvious that he took great pains to focus on one single goal, disseminating accurate and valuable information without letting anything else get in the way. He leaves value judgments to the reader. When there are issues of debate he presents information on both sides, and may express his leaning but does not argue for it or attack other view points.
This book may be frustrating for those who just want copyright and all intellectual property laws to go away. I get the sense that while Lindberg believes that there is a lot of room for improvement, he isn't trying to describe what could or should be, he is just giving advice on how to try and best navigate what is. Right now, the penalties for failing to understand the current environment can be quite harsh, and so I think that such a guide is very important. This extremely approachable and useful book is must reading for anyone creating or contributing to FOSS projects.
You can purchase Intellectual Property and Open Source from amazon.com. Slashdot welcomes readers' book reviews -- to see your own review here, read the book review guidelines, then visit the submission page.
So what is this book? To me it felt very much like sitting down with a lawyer who can speak my language, understands my concerns, uses open source software, cares about freedom and has a gift for building metaphors and illustrations that make sense. It is that ability to bridge the gap between lawyer and developer and do it in an readable way that makes this such an incredible book. If it were just accurate and thorough but I couldn't get past a couple pages it wouldn't be worth much. If things weren't put into terms that I could grasp and apply to real life situations, the same would be true.
The first seven chapters are a primer on the history and current status of U.S. IP law. Lindberg walks the reader through patents, copyright, trademarks, trade secrets, contracts and licenses. He discusses how these impact inventors and developers. I had considered myself to be somewhat familiar with most of these, but was surprised how much I learned. I was also a bit scared by the time I was done with it all. Lindberg cites not only the pitfalls that are out there, but backs it up with case history that illustrates his points. More than once I caught myself thinking, "I guess that is possible but it is unlikely." only to be reading a page or two later about how it had already happened and was in some cases still finding its way through the courts. This was all quite a wake-up call for me.
Chapter eight and on deal with how one can operate in the open source world. Lindberg talks about just what Open Source is and then handles the many things that a developer needs to consider from how to handle a new idea (especially if one is employed) to choosing a license, accepting patches, reverse engineering without being as likely to get sued, and setting up a non-profit to run a project.
I found the discussion on various licenses and just what they mean to be especially helpful. There is a general discussion that covers a wide array of licenses, and then a separate chapter just for working with the GPL. There is an illustration in that chapter that I think stands as an excellent illustration of what this book is like. "The Darth Vader Scale of Derivative Works", found in chapter twelve, serves to illustrate the Free Software Foundation's position on the applicability of the GPL. Lindberg takes time and care to explain the issue, but the figure showing a range from little "Anny" to the fully cloaked and helmeted Darth Vader shows how he also makes it fun at the same time.
It is not absolutely necessary to read through the book from start to finish but I would highly recommend it. The conversational style makes it easy to do, and there are concepts and metaphors that Lindberg reuses throughout the book that will be easier to understand if the reader has familiarity with their use right from the start. That said, the table of contents, index and topical separation of chapters will make this useful as a reference. I would just agree with Lindberg that reading it through first will make such use easier in the future.
The book has appendices that contribute over 80 pages to the total length. These include a sample Proprietary Information Agreement, a list of Open Source licenses ( along with some descriptions of how they are used), a Free Software license list, a list of the licenses used with Fedora on a grid that lists GPL compatibility, the full text for a number of licenses and a very nice GPL Compatibility Matrix. That matrix shows what versions of *GPL licenses can be used with one another from the perspective of adding code to an already licensed project or licensing a project that will include code already licensed under one of the *GPL licenses.
Some of the sections are quite sobering. I don't think becoming more educated about these issues is going to encourage people that things are headed in the right direction. That said, I don't think they will arrive at that conclusion because Lindberg is pushing a particular point of view. He is very even handed in his approach and it is obvious that he took great pains to focus on one single goal, disseminating accurate and valuable information without letting anything else get in the way. He leaves value judgments to the reader. When there are issues of debate he presents information on both sides, and may express his leaning but does not argue for it or attack other view points.
This book may be frustrating for those who just want copyright and all intellectual property laws to go away. I get the sense that while Lindberg believes that there is a lot of room for improvement, he isn't trying to describe what could or should be, he is just giving advice on how to try and best navigate what is. Right now, the penalties for failing to understand the current environment can be quite harsh, and so I think that such a guide is very important. This extremely approachable and useful book is must reading for anyone creating or contributing to FOSS projects.
You can purchase Intellectual Property and Open Source from amazon.com. Slashdot welcomes readers' book reviews -- to see your own review here, read the book review guidelines, then visit the submission page.
Sounds great, like getting a book on storage media and having 50 pages about punch cards.
Previous cases affect judicial rulings as much as the law, therefore having a large portion of it devoted to the history makes sense, whereas storage mediums don't rely on anything in the past except what they want to remain interoperable.
If you buy it directly from O'Reilly they also offer a DRM-free pdf version, or book/pdf bundle:
http://oreilly.com/catalog/9780596517960/index.html
I'm glad to see this becoming more common, I'd like to have pdf version of more books I use for reference. Digital search is so much faster than flipping through a book, even if the Index is accurate.
"The ability to delude yourself may be an important survival tool" - Jane Wagner -
Sorry to reply to myself - but when I wrote the above I was going by memory and it's been about a month since I read the book. I grabbed my copy when I got a chance and here are the details - so people know I'm not just making something up. The specific case I'm talking about here is described starting on page 180 of the book and has to do with David Barstow, a company called Schlumberger and Major League Baseball.
Barstow worked for Schlumberger and while employed there had an idea for a baseball simulator. He had signed a proprietary information agreement with Schlumberger ( an oilfield services company) so he cleared his idea with a company lawyer.
Later after he had left Schlumberger and started his own company he sued MLB for violating his patents. At some point after that - Schlumberger decided they owned all his patents including those Barstow filed after he left their employ. According to the book this case is still not finally settled.
It's hard to believe that's how Micronians are made. Why don't we see it right now by having you both kiss one another?
But it confuses a lot of people because the FSF's statements about linking don't match the text of the new license AT ALL. (I expect some of their statements were simply cut'n'pasted from GPLv2 documents without re-analysis.)
Eben Moglen made GPLv3 applicability 100% clear when he explicitly defined (in Section 0. Definitions) the terms "conveying", "modify", "based on" and "covered work" (all applicable), and explicitly denied applicability of the license when "making an exact copy" or "executing GPLv3 code on a computer". GPLv2 had previously confused the issue by using the term "derived", which many people thought meant mere "usage", so the new separation in GPLv3 was extremely well conceived.
Alas, RMS still lives mentally in the GPLv2 era, because he still thinks the GPL applies to unmodified execution through dynamic links, when GPLv3 explictly denies that as a license taint vector.
So yeah, the situation is messy if you listen to the FSF. But read the GPLv3 text yourself and the situation is much improved, as the license is very clear and explicit now.