🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <7324@gollum.twg.com>, david@twg.com (David S. Herron) writes:
> In article <JIM.90Jun14120824@baroque.Stanford.EDU> jim@baroque.Stanford.EDU (James Helman) writes:
> [EEC talking about getting tightening up copyright to disallow
>  disassembling code ..]
> ...
>>DEC, IBM and Apple are lobbying for it.
> ...
>>Sounds like a serious battle.  I was somewhat surprised to see DEC's
>>name next to IBM's and Apple's.  Does anyone know any details?
> 
> 
> Why is it surprising to have DEC in this list.  Ever since DEC
> started chasing (er.. making inroads into) IBM's markets DEC started
> mouthing the same proprietary stuff that IBM had been doing all
> along.  It has been this way for 7-8 years now.

Actually, DEC disallows it in their Standard Terms and Conditions already.
Before you get any software from them, you agree to abide by the ST&C,
which prohibits reverse-engineering and dissassembly. Recently a program
appeared on comp.os.vms that was written by reverse-engineering the
BOOKREADER data format, and it was later yanked from circulation under
pressure from DEC (causing QUITE a commotion on comp.os.vms). 

Even reverse engineering protocols, as someone mentioned, would violate the
ST&C, since you would have to buy a box from DEC to reverse engineer, and
you have to sign on to the ST&C to do it. I believe this is actually one of
the stronger points in most of DEC's recent lawsuits. Anyone who has
reverse-engineered BI or LAT or SDI, or whatever, using a DEC machine as a
testbed, probably signed and then violated the ST&C.
-- 
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