On Tue, Oct 26, 1999 at 07:45:44AM -0400, Greg Maxwell wrote:
[...]
> Worse off, since we aren't patent lawyers, and can't afford one (and prob
> it's in our best intrest not to talk to one): We legally can't even
> decided that "an apratus for automatic dog feeding" doesn't apply to lame.
Funny example but it does not help much.
> The patent laws are stupid, combin that with uneducated examiners...
How do other developers cope with that?
I could think of at leat a dozen other development areas where many patents
could be assumed to exist; for example graphics manipulation. Or are all
those areas too long in business so that the used methods cannot be patented
anymore?
> They have always been more powerful then single people, but that doesn't
> stop people from standing up against them. (though sometimes it stops them
> from winning. :) )
Agreed but this does not help the current situation either.
As I mentioned before I have contact to a company that has a licensing
agreement with FhG. They could sell licenses to Lame users. It would then be
nearly impossible for FhG to trace who is having a license and who is not.
The patent problem would be solved.
But what to do wih the GPL that prohibits patented code if I understood
Mark's posting correctly?
> I don't see that there is anything we can do with lame. Even if someone
> wanted to make a 'licenced' copy, this would not comply with the GPL.
There are other licenses out there which are nearly equally free. The BSD
license for example.
The question is what we want to achieve with the license. IMHO that is
- keep Lame free
- force anyone using Lame to offer the original sources too
- encourage further free development
> > That would be the same kind of trick used to distribute Lame legally: Just
> > distribute the patch not the whole encoder. So for the us we all claim not
> > to have ANY understanding of patents and patent laws ;)
> It wouldn't actually make it legal.
Not yet, no. But it also does not turn any user into a criminal ;)
> > But what if a patent lawyer tells you?
> You don't ask.
Even if you do not ask for it?
Some time ago FhG sent out letters to all developers and told them...
CU
nils
--
Nils Faerber (Linux Nils) eMail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Student of computer science http://www.si.unix-ag.org/~nils/
Unix user group, University of Siegen, Germany
Siegen ... the arctic rain forest!
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