Re: PathSearchAndQualify patch not applied?

Why are we discussing the XFree86 project and Microsoft?

Try to imagine yourselves sitting in front of a judge with your legal 
representative and TG's team is on the other side of the court.  The judge 
looks at your team and politely asks what it is about your patch that you 
feel was unlawfully taken from you?

You could answer that the format of the patch is unique.  However, it was 
automatically produced by the Patch program which you do not own.

You could answer that the algorithm is unique.  However, is it really 
unique and do you have a patent on it?

You could answer that your naming scheme for variables is unique.  
However, TG will probably use a variable naming scheme that is consistant 
with its code.

You could answer that the overall structure and design is unique.  
However, there is seldom any artistic merit in patches. 

You could say that you own the rights to the bug you discovered.  However, 
TG created the bug and has the right to fix it.

In conclusion, if you wish to have copyright over something, you have to 
be legally able to identify what that something is.  If you cannot, your work 
is not copyrightable.

Nadav Frum
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On Mon, 19 Jul 2004, Keef Aragon wrote:

> This is precisely my point.The XFree86 project has to do with
> contributors in general.The fact of the matter is that ANY code one
> writes is copyrightable period, and can be enforced unless it is written
> under a license which prevents that.If TG doesn't have a clause in
> their license which gives them the right to use your code at their will
> (which I believe they do) then they can't and you own it.Granted, the
> final result here is the same if TG wrote their license appropriately
> but there are no loopholes in the law that say "if you patch someone's
> code and they need your patch, you don't own your patch."Just because
> I patch YOUR code doesn't mean you own my patch unless I agreed to give
> rights to you upon writing it, which in theory, can be enforced through
> a clause in the license... This is the situation here.Bryan was right
> though:
> 
> You *can* be forced to use an inferior solution, if you can't come up
> with an independent implementation that's not considered a derivative
> work.
> 
> Though Software license agreements, to date, have not been used as a
> basis for any legal action, the central idea of US copyright law is that
> any material that an individual party produces is under their own
> copyright unless they render that right to another party or to the
> general public... which in this case, a specially crafted license can
> theoretically force one to do.

On Mon, 19 Jul 2004, Bryan Kadzban wrote:
                                                                                
> On Mon, Jul 19, 2004 at 04:06:10PM +0300, Nadav Frum wrote:
> > In particular, copyright does not apply when it is impractical to
> > enforce it.
>
> Yes, copyright does apply.
>
> Just because it's impractical for Microsoft to enforce their licensing
> (they can't visit every home and check to make sure every user has
> bought a license), does NOT mean that they therefore lose all rights to
> control the copying of their software.Just because it's "hard" to
> differentiate one patch from the rest of the code, does not mean that
> the patch somehow gets given over to the people that wrote the main bits
> of the code.
>
> I think it's the same thing as arguing that just because a certain area
> (state, county, country, whatever) doesn't have enough law enforcement
> people, and they therefore can't effectively investigate murders, that
> murder somehow becomes legal.It's impractical to *prosecute*, yes, but
> that still doesn't make the act legal.