What stops people from distributing copies of the source code? The GPL is about free and open *source* code. You are quite free to obtain and distribute the source code.
Again, the spirit of the GPL is specifically access to and freedom to use *source* *code*. Period.
The BSD-style license doesn't guarantee that people can use the source code how they please because it doesn't guarantee access to the source code. The GPL license guarantees that nobody can be given just the binary. It is specifically about ensuring that anyone who uses the binary has access to the source.
You totally miss the spirit of the GPL. The spirit of the GPL is very specifically that the source code be available for use however anybody pleases. So:
1) Why are you complaining when people use the source code how they please? Making that possible was the whole point of the GPL.
2) He has made his source code available for other to use. So he is not only complying with the spirit but furthering it.
The original developers started with other people's GPL code. They are betraying the spirit of the GPL by trying to pressure him into not feeling free to use that work.
No, PineGreen, it is not. That is definitely part of the spirit of the GPL.
The point is, if I want to lock my software to kingdom come and sell it, I am free to do so. And if you want to unlock it and give it away, you too are free to do so.
That *IS* the spirit of the GPL. That we can each do whatever we want with the software, and if you don't like what I did, you can do something else. Don't like the iPhone's rules, don't use it. Don't like my code, change it.
The GPL specifically prohibits use or distribution restrictions. It is perverse for you to flip this spirit on its head.
It's like if I say "borrow my car and go wherever you want in the whole world" it's against the spirit to go to New Jersey. Because I said you could go anywhere and New Jersey is just one place.
The source code is free. Take it anywhere. Even New Jersey.
That is was specifically the source code that was free was a critical choice -- key to the GPL spirit.
The GPL doesn't say you can take a piss either. But you can.
By the way, the right to sell a lawfully made copy of a work is *not* a right restricted under copyright. You don't need the author's permission to sell a work. 17 USC 109(a)
No, that would be the completely wrong thing to do for many reasons. A very important one is that the original authors have no right to decide what the GPL means. They started from other people's GPL'd software and got the benefits from the GPL. They have no right to grant you additional permissions to code they derived from other people's work, nor do they have any right to take rights away.
The beauty of the GPL is that everybody knows what the rules are, so I don't have to worry that Joe will take some software I released under the GPL and release code based on it to Jack under terms I don't agree with.
Does the Canon printer include a 'fingerprint' on each page printed so that the printout can be traced back to that specific printer?
Is that 'fingerprint' copyright Canon?
Does your printout therefore constitute a 'derivative work'?
No, since the fingerprint is not creatively combined with the photo. Canon holds the copyright to the fingerprint, perhaps. You hold copyright to the page printed (assuming it contains your creative expression).
Do not confuse a 'combined work' with a 'derivative work'. If you glue two DVDs together, you create a combined work, not a derivative work. Programs cannot create derivative works because they are incapable of creative combination.
The authors of the program that made the map do, if and only if the map contains sufficient protectable expression. There actually have been quite a few cases involving copyright and maps. It often hinges on bizarre issues that seem to make no intuitive sense.
For example, sometimes names get crowded on the map. So you shift a name a little bit over from the most natural place to fit that name, to make room for other place names in that direction. One case hinged on whether there was sufficient creative content in the placement of a few street names, as that was the only creative content they could find in the map.
So it comes down to how much "translation" is done to make that map and whether the translation is done in a creative way.
Your argument is flawed for two reasons. First, most translations are not perfectly reversible. Second, you analogize a case where no identifiable creative content from the original work survives in the derived work to a case where much does.
If I take a DVD of The Phantom Menace and compress it to an AVI file, the compression is irreversible and done by machine. However, the AVI file is still precisely the same work -- The Phantom Menace. Why? Because nearly all of the creative content survives in the AVI file, and it is only that creative content that is copyrightable.
Compilation eliminates some creative content (such as variable names) but leaves much of it. It's roughly akin to translating a play into another language and changing the character's names.
No, copyright doesn't work that way. You can make and sell copies of a DVD that contains yourself reading a poem you wrote followed The Phantom Menace. Legally, that DVD is both works and you need both sets of rights to distribute it. Your copyright in your poem in no way diminishes the copyright in The Phantom Menace, and the copyright in The Phantom Menace in no way interferes with your copyright in your poem and the performance of you reading it. But to distribute the joined work requires both sets of rights.
It's different because nobody holds any copyright to a brush. The difference is that software actually does mix the copyrightable creative content of the software author with the creative content of the person using the software.
Most of class Bravo doesn't go all the way to ground. You still have several hundred feet unless you're both in one of the top 12 cities in the nation and within 10 miles of a major airport.
If you're anywhere near the DC ADIZ though, you are totally screwed. I would definitely not even think of flying a UAV there.
Controlled airspace is really easy to avoid. Just don't go more than 600 feet above the ground or within 3 miles of an airport. That will get you around 95% of the controlled airspace. It's all clearly marked on aeronautical charts. Just go to your local airport and ask any local pilot to pull out a sectional chart and explain how your local airspace works to you.
"The key is that Google is charging money for these names.. that is enough value of "doing business" with the trademarked name but not with it's registered owner."
Right, but this is precisely what we know trademark does not protect. See the litigation over the "Pepsi Challenge", "Playboy Playmate", and lots of other things.
Trademark is not exclusive ownership of a word or phrase. It is only the exclusive right to use a word or phrase as a designator of the origin of a particular class of products.
Because Google's ad sales do in fact put you on the search result page for the Trademarked term, their use of the Trademark is not to designate the origin of anything but to truthfully designate what page the advertising is on.
That's just not what a Trademark gives you. The only way you can infringe on a Trademark is to claim that products not from that manufacturer were made by that manufacturer by the use of their Trademark.
So long as the ads make clear that they are not from the owner of the Trademark, no infringement is possible.
What Google did is no different from someone who walks into a Saturn dealer and says "Tell me about Ford cars" and they responded, "We don't sell Ford cars, but you can buy them from a Ford dealer across the street. Let me tell you about Saturn cars."
There is simply no plausible way to construe this as infringement or misuse of a trademark.
You asked Google about a Trademark, they told you what that Trademark was, how to get more information about it, and they gave you information about the competitors with whom they have a business relationship.
Have you (or has anyone) compared cables made yourself to machine-made cables? Does the $10,000 tester show any difference?
I too have made my own cables for everything from T1 lines to GigE. I've certainly made my share of bad cables, but I've never had a cable seem to work and later somehow subtly fail or lose or corrupt data. And that's all we ask of the cables.
"Apparently libel doesn't have to be false, just intentionally malicious and defamatory."
Right, but a statement that is true that one knows is true cannot be "intentionally malicious and defamatory" because being careful to speak only the truth is the opposite of being malicious.
I think what you're missing is that we all thought that "actual malice", in the context of libel or defamation, meant a reckless disregard for the truth of one's statements, not an intent to harm or embarrass the person you are speaking about.
Your example is an example of an "implied falsehood". An implied falsehood is a type of falsehood. We are talking about statements that are 100% true and contain no implied falsehoods.
I wish you were right. But we thought the first amendment protected truthful speech. The normal logic behind libel laws is that there is very little value to false speech.
Also, we thought that "actual malice" meant a disregard for the truth or falsity of the statements made. If you are careful to say only things that are true and not to deliberately create any false impressions, there is no "actual malice".
This court held that "actual malice" simply meant you wanted to hurt the person.
To see why this is a problem, consider all the cases where one would want to speak the truth with actual malice. A convicted pedophile is talking to a child -- you tell the child the person is a convicted pedophile.
Actually, it would be more like if they saw a bag of what looked like pot, but he destroyed it. So they compel him to produce an identical bag with identical contents.
How can the officer testify under oath that they were child porn? He didn't see any child porn. He saw filenames that suggested child porn and he saw some *animated* porn that is not legally considered pornography.
Slashdot Mirror
What stops people from distributing copies of the source code? The GPL is about free and open *source* code. You are quite free to obtain and distribute the source code.
Again, the spirit of the GPL is specifically access to and freedom to use *source* *code*. Period.
The BSD-style license doesn't guarantee that people can use the source code how they please because it doesn't guarantee access to the source code. The GPL license guarantees that nobody can be given just the binary. It is specifically about ensuring that anyone who uses the binary has access to the source.
You totally miss the spirit of the GPL. The spirit of the GPL is very specifically that the source code be available for use however anybody pleases. So:
1) Why are you complaining when people use the source code how they please? Making that possible was the whole point of the GPL.
2) He has made his source code available for other to use. So he is not only complying with the spirit but furthering it.
The original developers started with other people's GPL code. They are betraying the spirit of the GPL by trying to pressure him into not feeling free to use that work.
No, PineGreen, it is not. That is definitely part of the spirit of the GPL.
The point is, if I want to lock my software to kingdom come and sell it, I am free to do so. And if you want to unlock it and give it away, you too are free to do so.
That *IS* the spirit of the GPL. That we can each do whatever we want with the software, and if you don't like what I did, you can do something else.
Don't like the iPhone's rules, don't use it. Don't like my code, change it.
The GPL specifically prohibits use or distribution restrictions. It is perverse for you to flip this spirit on its head.
It's like if I say "borrow my car and go wherever you want in the whole world" it's against the spirit to go to New Jersey. Because I said you could go anywhere and New Jersey is just one place.
The source code is free. Take it anywhere. Even New Jersey.
That is was specifically the source code that was free was a critical choice -- key to the GPL spirit.
The GPL doesn't say you can take a piss either. But you can.
By the way, the right to sell a lawfully made copy of a work is *not* a right restricted under copyright. You don't need the author's permission to sell a work. 17 USC 109(a)
No, that would be the completely wrong thing to do for many reasons. A very important one is that the original authors have no right to decide what the GPL means. They started from other people's GPL'd software and got the benefits from the GPL. They have no right to grant you additional permissions to code they derived from other people's work, nor do they have any right to take rights away.
The beauty of the GPL is that everybody knows what the rules are, so I don't have to worry that Joe will take some software I released under the GPL and release code based on it to Jack under terms I don't agree with.
Does the Canon printer include a 'fingerprint' on each page printed so that the printout can be traced back to that specific printer?
Is that 'fingerprint' copyright Canon?
Does your printout therefore constitute a 'derivative work'?
No, since the fingerprint is not creatively combined with the photo. Canon holds the copyright to the fingerprint, perhaps. You hold copyright to the page printed (assuming it contains your creative expression).
Do not confuse a 'combined work' with a 'derivative work'. If you glue two DVDs together, you create a combined work, not a derivative work. Programs cannot create derivative works because they are incapable of creative combination.
The authors of the program that made the map do, if and only if the map contains sufficient protectable expression. There actually have been quite a few cases involving copyright and maps. It often hinges on bizarre issues that seem to make no intuitive sense.
For example, sometimes names get crowded on the map. So you shift a name a little bit over from the most natural place to fit that name, to make room for other place names in that direction. One case hinged on whether there was sufficient creative content in the placement of a few street names, as that was the only creative content they could find in the map.
So it comes down to how much "translation" is done to make that map and whether the translation is done in a creative way.
Your argument is flawed for two reasons. First, most translations are not perfectly reversible. Second, you analogize a case where no identifiable creative content from the original work survives in the derived work to a case where much does.
If I take a DVD of The Phantom Menace and compress it to an AVI file, the compression is irreversible and done by machine. However, the AVI file is still precisely the same work -- The Phantom Menace. Why? Because nearly all of the creative content survives in the AVI file, and it is only that creative content that is copyrightable.
Compilation eliminates some creative content (such as variable names) but leaves much of it. It's roughly akin to translating a play into another language and changing the character's names.
No, copyright doesn't work that way. You can make and sell copies of a DVD that contains yourself reading a poem you wrote followed The Phantom Menace. Legally, that DVD is both works and you need both sets of rights to distribute it. Your copyright in your poem in no way diminishes the copyright in The Phantom Menace, and the copyright in The Phantom Menace in no way interferes with your copyright in your poem and the performance of you reading it. But to distribute the joined work requires both sets of rights.
It's different because nobody holds any copyright to a brush. The difference is that software actually does mix the copyrightable creative content of the software author with the creative content of the person using the software.
Most of class Bravo doesn't go all the way to ground. You still have several hundred feet unless you're both in one of the top 12 cities in the nation and within 10 miles of a major airport.
If you're anywhere near the DC ADIZ though, you are totally screwed. I would definitely not even think of flying a UAV there.
Controlled airspace is really easy to avoid. Just don't go more than 600 feet above the ground or within 3 miles of an airport. That will get you around 95% of the controlled airspace. It's all clearly marked on aeronautical charts. Just go to your local airport and ask any local pilot to pull out a sectional chart and explain how your local airspace works to you.
"The key is that Google is charging money for these names.. that is enough value of "doing business" with the trademarked name but not with it's registered owner."
Right, but this is precisely what we know trademark does not protect. See the litigation over the "Pepsi Challenge", "Playboy Playmate", and lots of other things.
Trademark is not exclusive ownership of a word or phrase. It is only the exclusive right to use a word or phrase as a designator of the origin of a particular class of products.
Because Google's ad sales do in fact put you on the search result page for the Trademarked term, their use of the Trademark is not to designate the origin of anything but to truthfully designate what page the advertising is on.
That's just not what a Trademark gives you. The only way you can infringe on a Trademark is to claim that products not from that manufacturer were made by that manufacturer by the use of their Trademark.
So long as the ads make clear that they are not from the owner of the Trademark, no infringement is possible.
What Google did is no different from someone who walks into a Saturn dealer and says "Tell me about Ford cars" and they responded, "We don't sell Ford cars, but you can buy them from a Ford dealer across the street. Let me tell you about Saturn cars."
There is simply no plausible way to construe this as infringement or misuse of a trademark.
You asked Google about a Trademark, they told you what that Trademark was, how to get more information about it, and they gave you information about the competitors with whom they have a business relationship.
There is nothing wrong with that.
Have you (or has anyone) compared cables made yourself to machine-made cables? Does the $10,000 tester show any difference?
I too have made my own cables for everything from T1 lines to GigE. I've certainly made my share of bad cables, but I've never had a cable seem to work and later somehow subtly fail or lose or corrupt data. And that's all we ask of the cables.
Right, and a statement is "malicious" if the speaker recklessly disregards the truth or falsity of the statement.
That is, it has nothing to do with whether you are trying to hurt someone, it is perfectly legal to use the true speech to hurt people.
"Apparently libel doesn't have to be false, just intentionally malicious and defamatory."
Right, but a statement that is true that one knows is true cannot be "intentionally malicious and defamatory" because being careful to speak only the truth is the opposite of being malicious.
http://www.lectlaw.com/def2/m006.htm
I think what you're missing is that we all thought that "actual malice", in the context of libel or defamation, meant a reckless disregard for the truth of one's statements, not an intent to harm or embarrass the person you are speaking about.
href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Actual_malice
http://www.lectlaw.com/def2/m006.htm
Your example is an example of an "implied falsehood". An implied falsehood is a type of falsehood. We are talking about statements that are 100% true and contain no implied falsehoods.
I wish you were right. But we thought the first amendment protected truthful speech. The normal logic behind libel laws is that there is very little value to false speech.
Also, we thought that "actual malice" meant a disregard for the truth or falsity of the statements made. If you are careful to say only things that are true and not to deliberately create any false impressions, there is no "actual malice".
This court held that "actual malice" simply meant you wanted to hurt the person.
To see why this is a problem, consider all the cases where one would want to speak the truth with actual malice. A convicted pedophile is talking to a child -- you tell the child the person is a convicted pedophile.
You're right, I didn't read far enough.
But they don't want the combination nor do they want him to open the vault. They want him to produce an identical baggie with identical contents.
Actually, it would be more like if they saw a bag of what looked like pot, but he destroyed it. So they compel him to produce an identical bag with identical contents.
How can the officer testify under oath that they were child porn? He didn't see any child porn. He saw filenames that suggested child porn and he saw some *animated* porn that is not legally considered pornography.