Intellectual Property and Open Source

Intellectual Property and Open Source
Author: Van Lindberg
Publisher: "O'Reilly Media, Inc."
Total Pages: 394
Release: 2008-07-15
Genre: Computers
ISBN: 1449391109

"Clear, correct, and deep, this is a welcome addition to discussions of law and computing for anyone -- even lawyers!"-- Lawrence Lessig, Professor of Law at Stanford Law School and founder of the Stanford Center for Internet and Society If you work in information technology, intellectual property is central to your job -- but dealing with the complexities of the legal system can be mind-boggling. This book is for anyone who wants to understand how the legal system deals with intellectual property rights for code and other content. You'll get a clear look at intellectual property issues from a developer's point of view, including practical advice about situations you're likely to encounter. Written by an intellectual property attorney who is also a programmer, Intellectual Property and Open Source helps you understand patents, copyrights, trademarks, trade secrets, and licenses, with special focus on the issues surrounding open source development and the GPL. This book answers questions such as: How do open source and intellectual property work together? What are the most important intellectual property-related issues when starting a business or open source project? How should you handle copyright, licensing and other issues when accepting a patch from another developer? How can you pursue your own ideas while working for someone else? What parts of a patent should be reviewed to see if it applies to your work? When is your idea a trade secret? How can you reverse engineer a product without getting into trouble? What should you think about when choosing an open source license for your project? Most legal sources are too scattered, too arcane, and too hard to read. Intellectual Property and Open Source is a friendly, easy-to-follow overview of the law that programmers, system administrators, graphic designers, and many others will find essential.

Open Source Licensing

Open Source Licensing
Author: Lawrence E. Rosen
Publisher: Prentice Hall
Total Pages: 436
Release: 2005
Genre: Computers
ISBN:

"I have studied Rosen's book in detail and am impressed with its scope and content. I strongly recommend it to anybody interested in the current controversies surrounding open source licensing." --John Terpstra, Samba.org; cofounder, Samba-Team "Linux and open source software have forever altered the computing landscape. The important conversations no longer revolve around the technology but rather the business and legal issues. Rosen's book is must reading for anyone using or providing open source solutions." --Stuart Open Source Development Labs A Complete Guide to the Law of Open Source for Developers, Managers, and Lawyers Now that open source software is blossoming around the world, it is crucial to understand how open source licenses work--and their solid legal foundations. Open Source Initiative general counsel Lawrence Rosen presents a plain-English guide to open source law for developers, managers, users, and lawyers. Rosen clearly explains the intellectual property laws that support open source licensing, carefully reviews today's leading licenses, and helps you make the best choices for your project or organization. Coverage includes: Explanation of why the SCO litigation and other attacks won't derail open source Dispelling the myths of open source licensing Intellectual property law for nonlawyers: ownership and licensing of copyrights, patents, and trademarks "Academic licenses" BSD, MIT, Apache, and beyond The "reciprocal bargain" at the heart of the GPL Alternative licenses: Mozilla, CPL, OSL and AFL Benefits of open source, and the obligations and risks facing businesses that deploy open source software Choosing the right license: considering business models, product architecture, IP ownership, license compatibility issues, relicensing, and more Enforcing the terms and conditions of open source licenses Shared source, eventual source, and other alternative models to open source Protecting yourself against lawsuits

The Software Interface Between Copyright and Competition Law

The Software Interface Between Copyright and Competition Law
Author: Ashwin van Rooijen
Publisher: Kluwer Law International B.V.
Total Pages: 314
Release: 2010-01-01
Genre: Law
ISBN: 9041131930

The success of computer programs often depends on their ability to interoperate ' or communicate ' with other systems. In proprietary software development, however, the need to protect access to source code, including the interface information

Interfaces On Trial

Interfaces On Trial
Author: Jonathan Band
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 312
Release: 2019-03-07
Genre: Law
ISBN: 042972361X

This book presents the history of one of the key debates in the continuing effort to develop a legal framework for intellectual property rights in the burgeoning computer software industry. It is the first full account of the interoperability debate-the controversy over the protectability of interface specifications and the permissibility of

Law for Computer Scientists and Other Folk

Law for Computer Scientists and Other Folk
Author: Mireille Hildebrandt
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 341
Release: 2020
Genre: Law
ISBN: 0198860870

This book introduces law to computer scientists and other folk. Computer scientists develop, protect, and maintain computing systems in the broad sense of that term, whether hardware (a smartphone, a driverless car, a smart energy meter, a laptop, or a server), software (a program, an application programming interface or API, a module, code), or data (captured via cookies, sensors, APIs, or manual input). Computer scientists may be focused on security (e.g. cryptography), or on embedded systems (e.g. the Internet of Things), or on data science (e.g. machine learning). They may be closer to mathematicians or to electrical or electronic engineers, or they may work on the cusp of hardware and software, mathematical proofs and empirical testing. This book conveys the internal logic of legal practice, offering a hands-on introduction to the relevant domains of law, while firmly grounded in legal theory. It bridges the gap between two scientific practices, by presenting a coherent picture of the grammar and vocabulary of law and the rule of law, geared to those with no wish to become lawyers but nevertheless required to consider the salience of legal rights and obligations. Simultaneously, this book will help lawyers to review their own trade. It is a volume on law in an onlife world, presenting a grounded argument of what law does (speech act theory), how it emerged in the context of printed text (philosophy of technology), and how it confronts its new, data-driven environment. Book jacket.

Copyright Law and Computer Programs

Copyright Law and Computer Programs
Author: Jisuk Woo
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 260
Release: 2014-06-03
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1135694826

This book analyzes U.S. federal cases on the copyright protection of computer software programs, to examine the role of communication in legal decision making process. It is the first to apply Anthony Giddens' theory of structuration to analyze law in a systematic and empirical way. Previous studies considered law to be independent, objective and neutral, and even those that considered social structures and actors focused on economic and political factors. Employing the framework of the author, the work, and the use, this study attempts to show how relationships and struggles of the parties are actually manifested through communication, and how the strategic communication of the parties influences the structural environment of copyright law. There has been a long-running debate over whether and how the copyright law, evolved from the era of the print technology, should be applied to computer programs, a new work of authorship. Contrary to some cautionary arguments that modern copyright law tends to protect copyright holders while disregarding authors' rights, the struggle between developers and non-developers, rather than between copyright holders and non-copyright holders, was clearly manifested in legal arguments. The construct of authorship has been modified, yet remained central in copyright discourse. On the other hand, the concept of the use, despite the significance of users in copyright regime, has yet to be developed to play an important role in the legal arguments. Moreover, the factor of whether the party was a developing entity, was found to be a single most important factor influencing the courts' decisions. But only when the party could successfully present itself as the one involved with developing activities, the court was more likely to accept its argument than the other party's. Therefore, it was the legitimacy gained by communicating the nature of the party, rather than the nature of the party itself, that made the difference in the ways the courts made decisions. This book presents how, in this process of strategic communication, the structure of copyright law was reproduced and transformed.

Copyright in the Digital Era

Copyright in the Digital Era
Author: National Research Council
Publisher: National Academies Press
Total Pages: 103
Release: 2013-05-30
Genre: Technology & Engineering
ISBN: 0309278953

Over the course of several decades, copyright protection has been expanded and extended through legislative changes occasioned by national and international developments. The content and technology industries affected by copyright and its exceptions, and in some cases balancing the two, have become increasingly important as sources of economic growth, relatively high-paying jobs, and exports. Since the expansion of digital technology in the mid-1990s, they have undergone a technological revolution that has disrupted long-established modes of creating, distributing, and using works ranging from literature and news to film and music to scientific publications and computer software. In the United States and internationally, these disruptive changes have given rise to a strident debate over copyright's proper scope and terms and means of its enforcement-a debate between those who believe the digital revolution is progressively undermining the copyright protection essential to encourage the funding, creation, and distribution of new works and those who believe that enhancements to copyright are inhibiting technological innovation and free expression. Copyright in the Digital Era: Building Evidence for Policy examines a range of questions regarding copyright policy by using a variety of methods, such as case studies, international and sectoral comparisons, and experiments and surveys. This report is especially critical in light of digital age developments that may, for example, change the incentive calculus for various actors in the copyright system, impact the costs of voluntary copyright transactions, pose new enforcement challenges, and change the optimal balance between copyright protection and exceptions.