🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <1991Oct31.195608.226@skitzo.dseg.ti.com> dittman@skitzo.dseg.ti.com (Eric Dittman) writes:
>From Byte, April 1991, "Computing in the U.S.S.R.", by Igor Agamirzian,
>writing on the decline of Soviet informatics and computer science:
>
>"In developed countries, copyright laws protect the humanitarian as well
> as scientific and technological spheres.  In the U.S.S.R., the product
> of intellectual work does not belong to its author; it does not even
> belong to the organization within which it is developed.
>   Unfortunately, this is one of the main reasons for our decline in
> these disciplines.  Why should we invest in products if we can obtain
> everything free?"
>
>So, why will getting rid of copyrights and patents in the U.S. improve
>the state of the art instead of leading to the decay of the software
>industry like in the Soviet Union?

   The appropriate question to ask is whether or not the new "feature" of
granting software patents and interface copyrights will *improve* the state
of the software industry.  It the contention of the LPF (among others) that
it will not.

   I do not think the US software industry has *ever* shown the slightest
indications of decay.  In fact, I've always been impressed with how
commercial software has steadily improved over the years.  Even with minor
problems like software piracy, most software manufacturers have done pretty
well (the status quo has been good enough, in fact, that even "copy
protection" has fallen out of fashion and Shareware has thrived).

   I doubt that many people in this newsgroup are really questioning the
validity of copyrights on individual works (i.e. few people question
whether or not it ok to "pirate" source code or binaries.  For that, read
misc.int-property).  The objections are in connection with the introduction
of interface copyrights and software patents. 

---
Noah Friedman
friedman@prep.ai.mit.edu
(Speaking only my own opinions)