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Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watnot!watmath!clyde!rutgers!topaz!hedrick
From: hedrick@topaz.UUCP
Newsgroups: comp.sources.d
Subject: Re: "Public Domain" YACC - AT&T Position on Proprietary and Copyrighted Software
Message-ID: <9725@topaz.RUTGERS.EDU>
Date: Sat, 28-Feb-87 22:12:50 EST
Article-I.D.: topaz.9725
Posted: Sat Feb 28 22:12:50 1987
Date-Received: Sun, 1-Mar-87 17:06:36 EST
References: <6662@alice.uUCp> <691@rayssd.RAY.COM>
Organization: Rutgers Univ., New Brunswick, N.J.
Lines: 36
Keywords: yacc, copyright, proprietary, "corrective action"

Companies are required by law to respond whenever they see someone
publish copyrighted code improperly, or when they see someone claim
that they no longer intend to enforce the copyright on something.  If
they see such things and fail to respond, they can lose their
copyright.  The statement

In article <6662@alice.uUCp> fcp@alice.UUCP writes:
> Please be aware we are tracing down a recent exposure of some of our
> source code on this network, and we have, and will continue to take,
> corrective action.

was almost certainly written by one of their lawyers to be the minimum
necessary to preserve their legal rights.  The same sort of doctrine
occurs with access to private areas.  Rutgers closes off all of its
on-campus streets one day a year, just to make sure they don't revert
to being public.  (They do this on Christmas day, by putting up a
small sawhorse in the middle of the road saying "this road is
closed".)  I have seen other universities do this as well.  ATT *has*
to respond when their copyright is challenged, or they risk having
Unix become public domain.  I don't know of any software other than
Unix whose source is as widely distributed.  This may be due to the
peculiar history of Unix or it may really be that ATT wants to be good
guys.  But whatever the reason, Unix source is available to so many
people that ATT is very near the limits of believability when they
claim it to be a trade secret.  Many of the discussions on
unix-wizards and other groups come very near the line, given that our
license agreements require us to consider all knowledge of Unix
internals as confidential information.  I think ATT has been
remarkably friendly in their enforcement of the Unix license
provisions.  It would be possible to push them into a corner where
they would feel compelled to take a stricter interpretation.  I have
seen some comments recently in the discussion of the setuid bit that
look remarkably like challenges to ATT to act.  I think we would all
be better off if we let sleeping dogs lie, and be understanding if now
and then the dog opens an eye and growls when somebody steps on his
tail.