🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <cYLscby00WB64AAJAO@andrew.cmu.edu> al1f+@andrew.cmu.edu (Andy A. Lee) writes:
>William Bumgarner,
>
>     You have just brought yourself a lawsuit with your "Meobius patch
>(deprotection) and warning" message.  How?  First, publically you admitted
>that you 'alternated' the Moebius source code without written permission of
>the author.  Such alternation is in DIRECT violation of the copyright law.
>Second, it would be extremely easy for any lawyer to prove that your message
>causes Moebius's author to loose sale on the software.  You are responsible
>for any lost of sale due to your message, i.e. those who are going to buy
>a copy of the game now can 'copy' from their friends.  The money lost in
>sale could add up to serveral times your Carnegie Mellon tuition.
>
>     It is perfectly legal to express your experiences with Moebius (and its
>author company), but to post deprotection procedures is down right ILLEGAL,
>irresponsible, and stupid.  Think twice next time you decide to boast...
>
>Andy A. Lee
>al1f@andrew.cmu.edu

*FLAME ON*
NUMBER 1)  Alteration of the code of a program is NOT illegal according to
the copyright law.  It may be illegal according to the shrink-wrap license
that the software came with, but the validity of such licenses is questionable,
and even if it is valid, violation of it carries civil, not criminal, penalties,
which leads to:

NUMBER 2) Posting of deprotection procedures is NOT illegal. There is this
little thing called the first amendment, you see, which protects speech.
Though it has been ruled that the 1st amendment does not apply to encouraging
criminal activity, posting deprotection procedures at most encourages breaking
a license agreement, which is not a criminal act.

And if posting deprotection procedures was illegal, why does GEnie allow it??
*FLAME OFF*
   First thing to do, lets kill all the lawyers.
		William Shakespeare
 
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