On 14/05/14 04:24, Fernando Cassia wrote:
On Mon, May 12, 2014 at 1:44 PM, TJ <[email protected]> wrote:
It seems to impact reverse engineering too, since most black-box reverse
engineering techniques aim to observe the external interactions of an
executing binary and then write an interface specification (API) from which
a compatible implementation is written in a clean-room environment.
But you forget another way to get interoperability: justice and
regulators. Microsoft for instance was forced by regulators to open up
their networking protocols and APIs, as a result of which SAMBA can
implement compatible versions.
I do not forget - competition law forcing the sharing of otherwise
(proprietary) copyright-protected information
is only useful where a single organisation has a dominant market position
(monopoly) in a relevant market.
That is completely orthogonal to my questions about Copyright and doesn't help
in the majority of instances
where someone would wish to publish an alternative implementation of some API.
It also doesn't help in the U.S.A. where there isn't the same regulatory
oversight.
The documentation created as part of the EU settlement with Microsoft
helped us to make the Samba 4 Active Directory Compatible domain
controller code robust and reliable when interoperating with Microsoft
AD domain controllers.
That was a welcome outcome, but it took from 1998 to the end of 2007 to obtain the specifications under NDA, cost €10000, and required the relentless pursuit of Microsoft by the EU commission through
massive fines even after judgment and appeals.
Most other open protocols (ie TCPIP) are open by design (from the
start). Maybe this ruling will have a positive impact: make people
weary of closed protocols and APIs that do not have an open source
implementation.
If this means more use of SIP and less use of Skype, all the better.
Agreed. It also calls to mind Cisco's behaviour over HSRP and VRRP.
The issue I've had in mind in bringing up this subject is how it affects open-source implementations. If it holds that APIs are copyright absent a fair-use judgment, then any existing open-source
implementation of a (proprietary) copyrighted API could find itself threatened by a litigious API copyright owner, and as copyright terms are so much longer than patent it would effectively destroy
any realistic prospect of alternative implementations surviving.
Yes, some surely will be hurt, ie WINE and ReactOS... but it's my
belief that they can challenge MSFT to open their APIs on competition
(antitrust) grounds...
I refer back to my earlier comments on the use of competition law.
I have been working on a GPL v3 implementation of a widely used proprietary
protocol and had worked, until now, on
the assumption that APIs aren't copyrightable but after this appeals decision
my primary concern has switched from
the technical challenges to the legal. I do not want to get to the end of what is a very time-intensive project which will probably total a couple of man-years only to discover that I am unable to
legally publish my work.
