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From: sl@van-bc.UUCP
Newsgroups: comp.os.minix,comp.mail.uucp
Subject: Re: uucp source copyright status - IMPORTANT
Message-ID: <533@van-bc.UUCP>
Date: Sun, 29-Mar-87 03:08:33 EST
Article-I.D.: van-bc.533
Posted: Sun Mar 29 03:08:33 1987
Date-Received: Sun, 29-Mar-87 18:42:19 EST
References: <480@gouldsd.UUCP> <694@brl-sem.ARPA> <73@bnl.UUCP>
Reply-To: sl@van-bc.UUCP (Stuart Lynne)
Organization: Public Access Network, Vancouver, BC.
Lines: 33
Xref: utgpu comp.os.minix:459 comp.mail.uucp:376

In article <73@bnl.UUCP> jpm@bnl.UUCP (John McNamee) writes:
>>> ...THE SOURCE FOR UUCP HAS NO COPYRIGHT NOTICES IN IT...
>> 
>> Up until very recently you never found a copyright notice in UNIX software.
>> UNIX is not protected by copyright, but rather by trade secret.  In your
>> agreement with AT&T (or Western in the old days), you agreed not to
>> divulge the UNIX source code nor information on how it operates.  Despite
>> the lack of copyright notices in UUCP, it is still AT&T proprietary.
>
>What about people who have obtained UNIX sources without ever being bound
>by an AT&T license agreement?  The site they got them from is in trouble,

The sources I've seen contained no copyrights, but also contained no
markings of any sort to indicate which of the thousands of AT&T Licenses
they may have come from. 

Does AT&T have some insidious method of permuting each source file in an 
identifiable manner so that they can track down which sites have been 
careless about source control :-).

What about those licenses that are no longer in business, the receiver comes
in and auctions off all of those tapes at about $.50 each? He doesn't
give a damm about what's on them. 

So I find it hard to beleive that AT&T is going to be able in most cases to
do anything even if they do track down someone who has a copy.

Just how many grad students do you know who have complete version 7, or BSD,
or System III/V source tapes hidden away? Some trade secret huh.


-- 
Stuart Lynne	ihnp4!alberta!ubc-vision!van-bc!sl     Vancouver,BC,604-937-7532