oz@yetti.UUCP (Ozan Yigit) (02/08/86)
I am interested in finding a bit more about U.S copyrights, especially as they apply to JOVE, a text editor written by Jonathan Payne. A bit of history: Jove was originally written by Payne, during his years in Lincoln-Sudbury highschool. This software was later submitted to a usenix tape, I think 1978 or 1979. This distribution states that it is authored by Jonathan Payne. No copyright notices are included. Up until recently, Jove was hacked by lots of different people. The versions I have seen still did not contain any copyright notices. There is a general agreement that there is two sections in Jove which makes it non-distributable: temporary file I/O handling (taken from VI) and regular expression pattern matching (taken from ED). Very recently, a new release is made by Jonathan Payne. It contains a copyright notice for 1984, 1985, 1986. (This is mentioned in net.micro and net.emacs, I think..) Also, a version was submitted to 4.3BSD under user-contributed software. Now: my assumption is, that any version of jove that DID NOT CONTAIN COPYRIGHT NOTICE, is in the public domain, minus the restricted code fragments. (Which can be replaced with little work..) Also, the recent copyright simply cannot protect any earlier versions. That is, nothing can stop me from replacing the restricted code fragments with routines of my creation, and release to whomever is interested. Of course, it is not as bad as it sounds, for I have no compelling reason for doing so, not yet anyway. (I am waiting for another text editor to be released before putting any work into Jove) Furthermore: One version of Jove sources were included with DECUS Spring 85 symposium VAX tape, which usually gets picked up by most VAX sites around the world. This version also did not contain any copyright, and also included the restricted fragments. (So much for AT&T's wrath..) How does this effect its status, if any. What do you think ??? Perhaps some legal whizzards out there would clerify the situation. This is especially important, since a company picked up JOVE to sell for PC type machines. Oz -- Usenet: [decvax|allegra|linus|ihnp4]!utzoo!yetti!oz Bitnet: oz@[yusol|yuyetti] FREE SOFTWARE FOUNDATION vs. EMPIRE. Watch for things to come..
tenney@well.UUCP (Glenn S. Tenney) (02/10/86)
In article <321@yetti.UUCP> oz@yetti.UUCP (Ozan Yigit) writes: > ... >A bit of history: Jove was originally written by Payne, during his > years in Lincoln-Sudbury highschool. This software > was later submitted to a usenix tape, I think 1978 > or 1979. > > This distribution states that it is authored by > Jonathan Payne. No copyright notices are included. > ... I believe the dates are VERY critical since the new copyright law regarding computer software went into effect at about that same time. As I recall if it was before 1978 it is likely in Public Domain. After 1978, the mere lack of a copyright notice DOES NOT put it into the Public Domain! You are supposed to put a notice on, but the law specifically says that (with the newer law) your omission won't forfeit your rights. I think it is more important to note that copies were widely distributed with the author's knowledge and consent at that time and without (as I understand) restrictions. Net result to me, not an attorney, is those versions distributed back then ARE Public Domain. Besides, until it is registered in Washington they can't take you to Federal Court. Sorry Jonathan, but your highschool work was probably given to everyone, but the current stuff can be protected. -- Glenn Tenney UUCP: {hplabs,glacier,lll-crg,ihnp4!ptsfa}!well!tenney ARPA: well!tenney@LLL-CRG.ARPA Delphi: TENNEY As Alphonso Bodoya would say... (tnx boulton) Disclaimers? DISCLAIMERS!? I don' gotta show you no stinking DISCLAIMERS!