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From: brnstnd@stealth.acf.nyu.edu
Newsgroups: misc.legal,comp.software-eng,comp.misc
Subject: Europe's attempt to copyright interfaces is insane
Message-ID: <2536:Apr1302:34:2890@stealth.acf.nyu.edu>
Date: 13 Apr 90 02:34:28 GMT
References: <1093@goofy.UUCP> <14867@s.ms.uky.edu> <1990Apr8.003410.9841@ncsuvx.ncsu.edu> <4469@stpstn.UUCP> <1NT2K:Exds13@ficc.uu.net>
Reply-To: brnstnd@stealth.acf.nyu.edu (Dan Bernstein)
Followup-To: comp.misc
Distribution: usa
Organization: IR
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X-Original-Subject: Re: The OTHER half... look-n-...taste?
X-Original-Original-Subject: Re: Should software ideas be protected?

In article <1NT2K:Exds13@ficc.uu.net> peter@ficc.uu.net (Peter da Silva) writes:
  [ in reference to the European Community's proposed Copyright Directive ]
> The ability to copyright program interfaces to packages takes the already
> dubious "look-n-feel" copyrights to a new and absurd height.

That's an understatement.

For thousands of years ideas have been free. Now AT&T will be able to
stifle all UNIX competition by copyrighting the v7 interface; Xerox and
Apple will win their suits against Apple and Microsoft respectively on
copyright grounds and the Presentation Manager will follow the Macintosh
into the grave; RSA Incorporated will wallow in income from their new
RSA encryption copyright; Chomsky will copyright half of theoretical
computer science; and the next car you buy won't have a steering wheel.

This frightens me.

Followups to comp.misc.

---Dan