> Ordinary reverse engineering is not illegal (as in gatos or NTFS.) > It's only breaking content protection that they made illegal with the DMCA. > (The reverse eng is technically not illegal, it's doing something with it, > sigh.) > Just to clarify, the DMCA specifically allows circumventing access controls for the purpose of reverse engineering to create interoperable systems (there are a few more exceptions, see 17 U.S.C. 1201 for the complete list). However, it remains a good question as to what would be allowed. In some of the deCSS cases, this defense was used, but the court was more persuaded by the plaintiff's argument that the circumvention was for piracy and not interoperability. Contrast this with the recent litigation over selling generic toner carteridges to use in Lexmark printers. The court was persuaded that the defendant there reverse engineered Lexmark's access controls precisly to make interoperable products.
-- Email me if you want a gmail account, I have invites.
_______________________________________________ mythtv-users mailing list [email protected] http://mythtv.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/mythtv-users
