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| Authored by: Kilz on Thursday, April 19 2012 @ 01:02 PM EDT |
Before getting to the questions you have lets make sure we
understand one
thing. "Copyright" protects someone from
making a "Copy" or a "Duplicate" of
what you have written,
drawn, or photographed. It doesnt stop someone from
writing
on the same topic, drawing something on their own, or taking
a photo
of the same thing. It doesnt protect ideas,
concepts, thoughts,
etc.
So, if I copy someone else's unauthorized copy I
have no legal
responsibility (not specifically saying harmony was not
authorized, just
asking about the principal of your statement)?
The
specification document was always under copyright,
right?
The list
(specifications) may have been protected
under copyrights. There is a
problem though with the
assumption of an "unauthorized copy". The problem is
that
the copyright on the specifications only covers that exact
"copy" or the
exact fixed wording of the specifications as
written by Sun/Oracle.
A close
analogy could be a news story on a specific event.
One newspaper writes a story
about what happened at the
court yesterday. They list who was called to
testify, who
the judge was, and why everyone was there. A second
newspaper can
write a story using the same facts but
different words. The second newspaper is
not violating the
firsts copyright. Though the stories are about the exact
same event and using the same facts.
In exactly the same way, a
specification can use the exact
same requirements and as long as company 1 does
not use the
same fixed wording it would not violate copyrights. One
important
thing to remember in all this. Copyrights cover
the fixed expression in words,
drawings, photos, ect. It
does not cover the ideas expressed in the
writing,
drawing, or photo. That would be covered by a
patent.
More seriously, we are talking about thousands
of
classes and methods. These specs are very specific about
the naming,
parameterization, and how the method executes.
First off
Names can not be copyrighted. Possesses can
not be copyrighted. The only
thing that can be copyrighted
is the fixed expression, like a description of
how to use
the specification. But someone else can write a different
description on how to use the same thing and copyright does
not protect
it.
It describes stack behavior, types of floating
point math, and
exceptions to post conditions.
The problem with that is that you
cant copyright a behavior.
You can copyright the code that causes that to
happen. But
only the exact expression in its fixed state. Others can
create a
different piece of code that brings about that
exact behavior. If you want to
protect the behavior a patent
would be needed.
This API spec is
not like saying 3 bedrooms. It
more similar to saying 3 bedrooms called Alvin,
Simon, and
Theodore,, with doorways having exact dimensions, made from
teak
and cedar, whose led lights come on every morning
precisely at 6 am. At what
level of specificity does the
design become unique and
protectable?
Copyright would only cover the design of the
building, not
what was made from it. Copyright doesnt cover names, or
ideas
like when lights come on.
Does that level change if it is shown
that the
defendant studied the design in question?
I am not sure,
because the design or specifications can lead
people to create things that are
very close because there
are few ways to do them. Copyright would be the wrong
protection because it only covers the fixed expression of
the design, not the
end product made from it.
[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, April 19 2012 @ 09:38 PM EDT |
So, if I copy someone else's unauthorized copy I have no
legal
responsibility (not specifically saying harmony was not authorized, just
asking about the principal of your statement)?
The specification
document was always under copyright, right?
The issue at
trial isn't whether Google made a bunch of copies of the
specifications
document. If you took out only the code in the specifications
document, you
wouldn't be able to make it work, anymore than you could
build a birdhouse
given a list of all of the parts needed to make a
birdhouse.
At what level of
specificity does the design
become unique and protectable? Does that
level change if it is shown that the
defendant studied the design in
question?
There is no
level of specificity where the idea itself becomes unique and
protectable under
copyright. It is only the expression of the idea that is
protectable, and there
is nothing about method calls that is a unique
expression (artistic or
otherwise). Many of them are along the lines of
"drawLineOnScreenGiven (point
x, point y)". Good APIs are transparent,
unambiguous and not very
creative.
So, if you're asking whether the API is valuable or not by
itself, then the
answer is "yes it is valuable" but only if you have also have
supporting code
that does the things the API advertises. Otherwise, it is
useless and in any
case, it sould be as difficult to enforce as, and only
slightly more than, the
copyright on a parts list for a 747. [ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
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