<<That would be an unusual interpretation of "perpetual" and may be specific to the facts of those cases. Indiana law is going to uphold Ryan's interpretation, unless the terms of the contract clearly indicate that the parties did not intend for the word to be used with its normal meaning. There is nothing in the OGL to indicate that "perpetual", as used in the OGL, should be read differently from Ryan's interpretation.
>>
The interpretation I'm listing for "perpetual" was straight out of TWO different cases in TWO different jurisdictions. I haven't done the Westlaw research to find out why, but it seemed that in some jurisdictions a perpetual contract, regardless of the parties' intentions, was automatically treated as a contract that had expired and was being continued at will. The cases I cited noted this. They WERE NOT copyright cases; just contract law cases, and I'm trying to see if anyone knows how contracts (generally) vs. copyright contracts in those jurisdictions varied from one another.
I was unfamiliar with similar laws in most of the country, just in a few jurisdictions (I think I found 2-3 states so far).
A peer of mine checked with his Intellectual Properties attorney who said that he was familiar with such "at will" terminations of perpetual length contracts, precisely because they defined no fixed duration in a few U.S. jurisdictions.
Lee
