RE: Promise SATA driver GPL'd

David Schwartz
2003-07-24T18:22:19Z

> On Wednesday 23 July 2003 19:21, David Schwartz wrote:

> > No matter how much code I write for which I don't give you
> > the source, the
> > amount of code for which you do have the source is not reduced. The more
> > free code there is, the freer you are. The only thing that
> > threatens your
> > freedom is if someone makes free code unfree. How do they do that?

> By claiming they wrote it first, supplying enough lawyers and
> court fees to
> put you out of existance.

Of course, that is certainly true. Someone can attempt, through the legal
process, to stop you from using software you yourself wrote. Although I
doubt any company would ever be that evil. ;)

That is, by the way, one advantage of taking a printout of your code and
mailing it to yourself in a sealed envelope or seeking a registered
copyright. It at least provides proof that you had the code on the date you
wrote it.

There is one other benefit to a registered copyright on software that a
lawyer recently mentioned to me. Suppose you're a company and have employees
who write software. You really can't be 100% sure that the software they
provide to you isn't stolen from someplace (and you sure as heck can't be
sure someone can't claim it is).

By seeking a registered copyright, you can argue that the registration
provides constructive notice to anyone else that you are claiming copyright
on that software. This *may* start the 3 year statue of limitations from the
date or registration rather than the date they found out you had software
they think is theirs.

DS