las@apr.UUCP (Larry Shurr) (06/22/88)
This argument is getting rather rank. I'd be very interested in the
actual text of SEA's complaint. I'm also interested in the outcome
of the suit.
There has been a considerable number of assertions to the affect that
1) Phil Katz is a thief (for "stealing" SEA's ideas).
2) SEA is a thief (for stealing ideas embodies in ar,
compress SQ/USQ, LBR, etc...).
and even that
3) The authors of the current crop of Lotus 1-2-3 clones
are thieves (for stealing the "Lotus 1-2-3 idea").
4) Lotus Development is a thief (for stealing the
"Visicalc idea").
I have not yet heard anyone assert that
5) Compaq is a thief (for stealing the "IBM PC idea").
Quite a long time ago, 1952 I believe (that's a long time ago in the
world of computing), IBM tried to obtain exclusive rights through
patent and/or copyright protection for the "FORTRAN idea." However,
a patent may be obtained only for a physical widget and ideas may not
be copyrighted, only expressions are copyrightable. Naturally, UNIVAC
came out with a FORTRAN compiler. Would you say then that
6) UNIVAC (or its corporate successor) is a thief?
(I know! I know! You hate FORTRAN. I don't care for it either.)
This whole series of blasts at various personages and/or coporate
entities echos the recent blasts over MacIntosh vs. New Wave/Windows
"Look and Feel." That argument became even more vituperative than
this one, though perhaps we only need give this one a little more time.
Now it may be that Phil Katz has behaved unethically, or at least
illegally, or maybe just "actionably." However, the debate seems to
have strayed from the originaly dispute and found its home in the
mythology of the origin new ideas.
The unspoken assertion is that, somehow, ideas must be totally unique
and appear spontaneously out of thin air (or thin vacuum should you
happen to be moonwalking at the time). If this is where ideas come
from, then perhaps we should ask Stephen Hawking to investigate them.
Perhaps there are "ideaphons," elementary particles which turn into
totally new information when they strike a suitable detector (i.e., a
brain - though some are apparently better detectors than others).
Until Professor Hawking gets around to considering the question, I
refer you instead to _Becoming a Technical Leader_ by Gerald M.
Weinberg. In the chapter "Developing Idea Power," where he asserts
that most ideas come from four (really three) souces: Creative errors
(mistakes), Stolen ideas, Corrupted Stolen Ideas (sort of a combination
of the first two), and Copulation (some find that good ideas occur to
them before, during or after, but Weinberg refers to the combination of
formally separate and seemingly unrelated pre-existing ideas into a new
creation).
The point is that many ideas are not really new. Instead, they are
recycled and reapplied all of the time (perhaps Professor Hawking will
find that all ideaphons were created at the moment of the big bang).
Not even Visicalc is really a new idea: it combines recording infor-
mation in rows and columns on paper (clay tablets (the sand at the
beach)) and manual calculation using an electronic calculator (mechan-
ical calculator - anybody remember Curta calculators? (abacusi))).
regards, Larry
--
Who: Larry A. Shurr (cbosgd!osu-cis!apr!las or try {cbosgd,ihnp4}!cbcp1!las)
What: "The only thing worse than being talked about is not being talked about."
Where: _The Portrait of Dorian Grey_ - Oscar Wilde
Disclaimer: The above is not necessarily the opinion of APR or any APR client.las@apr.UUCP (Larry Shurr) (06/22/88)
In article <447@apr.UUCP> las@apr.UUCP (Larry Shurr) writes: >This whole series of blasts at various personages and/or coporate ^corporate >formally separate and seemingly unrelated pre-existing ideas into a new ^formerly *sigh* -- Who: Larry A. Shurr (cbosgd!osu-cis!apr!las or try {cbosgd,ihnp4}!cbcp1!las) What: "The only thing worse than being talked about is not being talked about." Where: _The Portrait of Dorian Grey_ - Oscar Wilde Disclaimer: The above is not necessarily the opinion of APR or any APR client.
cjl@ecsvax.uncecs.edu (Charles Lord) (06/22/88)
Since Larry brought up the Apple 'look and feel' suit that has
everyone so up in arms, don't forget that Apple *stole* that idea
from Xerox PARC in the tiny kingdom of Smalltalk...
Thus, NONE of the "original" ideas in computerdom was indeed
original. After all, according to AT&T's ads, they invented
EVERYTHING first.
--
Charles Lord
Cary, NC cjl@ecsvax.UUCP Usenet
cjl@ecsvax.BITNET Bitnetcga66@ihlpa.ATT.COM (Kauffold) (06/24/88)
If I steal ideas on a small scale, it is plagarism. If I steal ideas on a large scale, it is research. Pat Kauffold at Bell Labs
hlison@bbn.com (Herb Lison) (06/24/88)
In article <8293@ihlpa.ATT.COM> cga66@ihlpa.ATT.COM (Kauffold) writes: > >If I steal ideas on a small scale, it is plagarism. > >If I steal ideas on a large scale, it is research. > >Pat Kauffold at Bell Labs If you steal it is stealing.
jamesd@percival.UUCP (James Deibele) (06/26/88)
> >If I steal ideas on a large scale, it is research. > Since there's no disclaimer, I take it that this is AT&T's official policy? Hmmmm. Would make an interesting slogan for one of those awful corporate- self-love ads (you know, Dow Chemical, etc.). "Bell Labs, where over a million ideas in two hundred different languages were stolen last year alone." :-) -- James S. Deibele jamesd@qiclab or jamesd@percival TECHbooks: The Computer Book Specialists (800) TECH-BKS 3646 SE Division Portland, OR 97202 (503) 238-1005 TECHbooks One BBS (#1:105/4.0); 3/12/24 (503) 760-1473