rms@AI.MIT.EDU (08/13/90)
It is good news that Solbourne has decided to drop their user interface copyright claim. Those of you who responded to my alert by complaining to Solbourne have helped bring about this result. In fact, in phone conversations with Solbourne I found a willingness to consider the arguments against user interface copyright. Thus, the overall result seems to have been positive. Solbourne and Imperial College recently posted a statement that there was never a user interface claim. I was surprised by this, because last week an executive of Solbourne said to me (an exact quote), "This is a user interface claim." I don't think it was a false alarm; rather, the announcement is a polite way of ending a dispute. I am not saying this with the aim of prolonging the dispute. Since Solbourne thought better and dropped the claim before any real harm was done, we ought to forgive them, forget their tentative actions, and treat them according to their actions now. But what we shouldn't forget is that we have won a victory. The fact that no one was defeated or crushed makes it all the better. If we can convince a Solbourne, then it is at least possible that we can convince a Lotus--or convince Congress.