🚀 go-pugleaf

jbuck@best.com (Joe Buck) writes:

> Copyright doesn't let you protect encoding methods, or (in the US)
> bitmaps for fonts, or protocols, etc.  Microsoft can duplicate any
> GPL functionality by hiring two teams: the first studies the GPLed
> software and writes up a report of what it does.  The second
> implements a new program from the report, without ever looking at
> the GPLed source.  The original copyright owner has no right to object
> if this is done right (paranoid companies have all communication
> between the two teams go through a lawyer).

How eerie, I just thought this a few hours ago (yes, I actually ponder
these threads in my offline hours...). I think you could also say it
works the other way, which is a very good thing. Besides, most free
software wouldn't have to be reverse engineered in this way; it would
probably follow some spec in the public domain.

I wonder what the ramifications for just messing around with a binary
are. The FSF of course has that policy of only installing proprietary
software long enough to see what they have to make their free
replacement do; It's plausible under the GPL for Microsoft to have a
binary of some free porgram but not the source. (The words "plausible
deniability" keep ringing in my ears...)

-- 
please read: http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/
"cry me a bayou/and i'm leaving..." -tricky