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Court Rules For Software Ownership Over Licensing
valderost writes "Out-law.com reports on a finding of the US District Court for the Western District of Washington, in favor of an individual reselling Autodesk's AutoCAD software in 'his claim that he owned the software and had the right to sell it on.' The decision hinges on some technicalities in the Autodesk license and conflicting precedents involving a Vanessa Redgrave film, but it's good news for the idea that a software purchase is just that. 'The Court said that it had to follow [the film] case's precedent because it was older than another conflicting ruling, and that it could not choose a precedent based on the most desirable policy. "The court's decision today is not based on any policy judgment. Congress is both constitutionally and institutionally suited to render judgments on policy; courts generally are not," the Court ruled. "Precedent binds the court regardless of whether it would be good policy to ignore it."'"
No, the court is saying that it isn't expressing any opinion about what the law should be and is making that point very clear, probably so that no one will mistakenly point to this as a precedent of a court deciding that the law should be this way for software.
when you start getting down to the actual rights that are transferred with a purchase of goods, if you leave it to the states, you will cause massive damage to interstate commerce. Those boobs can't even come up with consistent sentencing for crimes, there's no way they'll voluntarily adopt a single consistent set of rules over this unless it's done at the federal level.
If any readers still can't imagine what the problem is with that, think about it for a bit. Here's a few hints, imagine if a company in Maine sold software to people in all the states. In Texas they might be forced to provide updates for free for a period of 3 years, while in Ohio updates have a cost $1.00 but they only have to be available for 6 months. Now in Colorado you can resell your software, but in Florida you don't own it - it's all leased for a period of no more than 4 years. Getting messy already, and we've only covered 4 states. (Maine didn't count because I never said anything about their local laws on ownership/sales.)
By the way, if you are buying land in a state other than your own, check what the state laws are where you are buying it. Some states you get the works. Others, you don't get mineral rights. Some, you get water rights, and you might get mineral rights, but not oil rights, that's a seperate thing altogether. (Can you guess which states I'm talking about?)
In California you can buy beachfront property, and you get the beach. In Oregon (same coast, just farther north) you can still buy beachfront property, but the beach always has, and always will, belong to 'the people'. (Lots of Californian developers have gotten massively pissed over that when they tried to put up walls or fences...) The coast belonging to the people of Oregon is essential native traditions that were adopted into laws for Oregon. This is just a small example the differences that already occur, and you don't ship real estate across state lines, imagine how screwed up that would be.
My understanding is that in this particular case Autodesk was essentially marketing the software exactly like a product instead of something that is licensed, thereby they couldn't claim that the product was in effect being licensed. Does this have any effect on shrink-wrap licenses and/or regular software?
This is already European Law (which must be implemented in local laws in al member states). Once sold whithin the EU, you're free to resell your license.
The problem is in the details: if you buy software (i.e. a license to use it), you normally also get a bunch of other rights, like access to updates, maybe even the right to call someone. The law doesn't say that these rights are also transferrable (or transferred). So in most licenses, there's still plenty of "you cannot do this and that (resell, for example), or you will loose the right to such and so".
But the resale of the license to plainly use the software cannot be forbidden by contract in the EU.
my other sig is a 500 page novel
No, you get to use the software at the price you paid. That's your consideration.
Paid. Past tense. I had a sale contract to buy the product, and they sold it to me. From the wording on the box and the "reasonable man" standard, that includes using the contents of the box I bought. They can't then give me something I already own. It's not consideration for them to say "you already own this, we are going to give you nothing, but we are going to take away lots of things you can do now if you click disagree, like resell it, reverse engineer it, or whatever."
For the standard car analogy, it would be like buying a car, then, after you paid for it and took it home, someone from Ford knocks on your door and says you need to sign a contract saying that you will not drive the car over 55 (to keep their safety record good) and that you'll always get your oil changed at Ford dealerships at your own expense and never resell it, and if you don't agree, they will sabotage your car so you can't drive it. Feel free to keep it and Ford will keep your money, you just can't drive it. Would you say "yes, that's a reasonable EULA and I think it's a great consideration to let me use what I've already bought"? Or would you tell them to go to hell and use the product you've paid for in the manner advertised? Why can they, after the sale of the product, then apporach you and tell you that they are going to then reduce the value of the previous sale with no consideration?
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