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From: eggert@twinsun.com (Paul Eggert)
Newsgroups: comp.software-eng
Subject: Re: Software Copyright
Message-ID: <1991May15.030152.11149@twinsun.com>
Date: 15 May 91 03:01:52 GMT
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mcgregor@hemlock.Atherton.COM (Scott McGregor) writes (in an otherwise
thoughtful article):

	Ben Schneiderman has made several thoughtful defenses of
	copyright protection including the Viewpoint article in the
	April 1991 Communications of the ACM.

Schneiderman's Viewpoint article was vigorous but thoughtless.
He argued that we should protect individual rights by placing restrictions
on copying computer interfaces.  This is exactly backwards.
Normally one can copy whatever ideas or expressions that one pleases,
whether it's the Bible, Shakespeare, or the decisions of Judge Keeton;
copyright and patent restrictions are limited exceptions to this general rule.
Whether or not we decide to increase such restrictions,
let us not be deluded into thinking that they promote individual rights.