On Tue, 29 Feb 2000 16:47:20 -0500, KU4QD <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> said:
>Some really bright people, including some really bright attorneys
>disagree with you. Let's start with an Open Source advocate, Richard
>Stallman:
>>UCITA has another indirect consequence that would hamstring free
>>software development in the long term -- it gives proprietary
>>software developers the power to prohibit reverse engineering. This
>>would make it easy for them to establish secret file formats and
>>protocols, which there would be no lawful way for us to figure out.
They already have that power, through covenants of sale. UCITA merely
ratifies the existing power to do so as recognized in decisional law
in at least three circuits.
>Therefore, if Microsoft's (or anyone else's) license says that you
>cannot reverse engineer, UCITA will give that the force of law.
It already has the force of (decisional) law.
>IMHO, the FTC lawyers have a better understanding than you, as a law
>student, have. I can go on and on with quotes and studied
>interpretations of those quotes that would argue that reverse
>engineering can and would be banned.
The FTC is analyzing it specifically under a federal preemption
analysis and an anticompetitve analysis. The brunt of their point is,
if anyone is going to do this, Congress should be because copyright is
a federal issue. As it is now, the same sort of anticompetitive
activity is possible but subject to regulation by the federal, not
state, courts. Can you say "turf war"?
Kelly
************
[EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.linuxchix.org
