🚀 go-pugleaf

The following submission was posted to VIRUS-L, but I thought that it may be of interest too members of this list.
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Date:    Thu, 22 Oct 92 16:57:11 -0400
From:    Dennis Clouse <ISCDEC@uccvma.ucop.edu>
Subject: Landmark legal ruling on software copyright

published today (10/22/92) in the San Francisco Examiner is the following legal
decision on disassembly of software (subject line is title of article):
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    "In the first binding ruling on the application of copyright law
     to a common process called reverse engineering, a federal appeals
     court said video game maker Accolade Inc. of San Jose could copy a
     video game system's code copyrighted by Redwood City-based Sega
     Enterprises Ltd. in order to design games for the Sega console.
     Reverse engineering is the parctice of taking apart a product to
     see how it works, and using the knowledge to design one's own
     product.  During the process, Accolade made a copy of Sega's
     encoded computer program, designed to exclude unlicensed game
     makers, in order to translate the information and extract the key
     to the code.  The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeal in San Francisco
     said the copying did not violate Sega's federally protected
     copyright on it's software package.  The court said Sega's
     exclusive rights over it's own programs did not entitle it to
     prohibit another company from learning how the Sega system worked
     and designing games that would fit it, as long as those games
     did not copy Sega games."
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DENNIS E. CLOUSE         OFFICE OF THE PRESIDENT       UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA
PHONE:510-987-0467       ISCDEC@UCCVMA.UCOP.EDU            ISCDEC@UCCVMA.BITNET
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James Youngman               mbcugjy@hpa.ph.man.ac.uk
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