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Do you oppose copyright on all software, i. e. source code, as well? Because I could somewhat understand that sort of IP anarchism, although I wouldn't agree.

Do you oppose copyright on all software, i. e. source code, as well? Because I could somewhat understand that sort of IP anarchism, although I wouldn't agree. But I'm having a hard time thinking about a coherent reasoning to see source code as copyrightable, yet deny the same to APIs. Copyright applies to any creative endeavours that reach a certain level of breath and/or depth. Having been involved in a few library projects, I have witnessed quite a few where I would say the API was far more important, and sometimes took more work, than the underlying implementation. Look, for example, at all the work done in standard-setting bodies: RFCs, WHATWG, etc. They are all licensed freely, yes. But the attachment of licenses to those documents implies an acknowledgement by the authors (and the community) that their work falls under copyright.

cromwellian 9y ago
Yes, I (personally) oppose patent protection and copyright on software, and barring that, severe time limits, like say, 5 years. You really think an API should be protected from forking or reimplementation for A CENTURY? It's absurd, Oracle agrees with me (see link at bottom) The entire PC industry was launched because clean room re-implementation of the API of the BIOS broke IBM's stranglehold. Is the world better without WINE? Without game or CPU emulators? I am philosophically opposed to the idea of API copyrights especially. This is a corporate battle whose collateral damage is going to harm the entire industry. It's funny how everyone loves forking, until tribalism kicks in, and then people start granting mulligans on philosophy just because of tribal positions on whichever company they don't like. Remember this? http://www.gordoni.com/software-patents/statements/oracle.statement.html http://www.gordoni.com/software-patents/statements/oracle.st... "Oracle Corporation opposes the patentability of software" "A balance of fifty years protection for direct copying of code would continue to be provided by copyright law." Funny how perspective changes if you perform a buyout of a struggling company's assets to use it to shakedown the market.
- pjmlp 9y ago
  We would be using Atari, Amiga and Macs instead, and maybe some UNIX variants as well.
  - cromwellian 9y ago
    I was a huge C64/Amiga fan, but I honestly don't think it would have been Atari or Amiga, both companies were horribly managed. And the Mac was just horrifically overpriced for what you got. At the same time Apple was shipping a $2k non-multitasking, B&W, 128k computer with shitty graphics and sound, Commodore was shipping the Amiga 1000, with twice the memory, and a custom chipset that was not equaled until years later by VGA, or to be honest, SVGA, and at half the price of the Mac 128k. IMHO, the Amiga 1000 was the 'iPhone' of personal computers, ridiculously better than the Mac and PC at its launch date, it was a step-function better than the Mac. But Commodore was a bungling, mismanaged company that flushed a great opportunity down the drain. It's like if you invented the iPhone, but didn't know how to sell it, market it, and get product market fit.
    - pjmlp 9y ago
      Who knows, with the PC out of the way, even with their management mistakes, they might have survived. And even if not, surely there would be another brand to gladly take their place.
      - cromwellian 9y ago
        Nostalgia: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q7rKj0DU8Xs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q7rKj0DU8Xs sad this could be done in 1985. Commodore was vertically integrated like Apple of today, they had a stellar custom chip development team, and had revolutionary chips in the worlds (AAA and Hombre) that would have been like 3dfx, but in 1992, delivering a quantum leap in gfx and single-texturing 3d pipeline well before others. I'm really bummed the company flushed it down the toilet and "Xerox PARC"'ed itself, by having a winning team of researchers and engineers, but not being able to make a business.
macspoofing 9y ago
>Do you oppose copyright on all software, i. e. source code, as well? That has nothing to do with anything. Copyright is a human construct. Somethings are decided to be copyrightable and somethings are not. Not every creative endeavor should be copyrighted, other should, and other should with major limitations. APIs were never copyrightable. Ever. The computing and programming industry developed with this assumption - in fact, it may not have ever developed if that wasn't the case. Why does this need to change now? And not even through a new law but rather court re-interpretation.
- IAmEveryone 9y ago
  My point is that there should be some criteria that determine if something should fall under copyright. And I'm having a hard time finding such a set that contains source code but does not include a (sufficiently extensive) API. You're just asserting tradition. Yet you are not addressing my examples that directly show precedent within the industry for recognising copyright for APIs.
  - caf 9y ago
    As I undestand it, there is a principle that legal contracts themselves cannot be copyrighted, despite the fact that they might well be the result of a considerable amount of creative work. The underlying principle here is that the legal effect itself cannot be subject to exclusive ownership, and the only way to get the same legal effect is to have the same contract. I believe APIs can be considered under an analogous principle - that is, the ability to interoperate with a set of existing code shouldn't be subject to exclusive ownership, and you can't interoperate with the same existing code without implementing the same API, so APIs should not be copyrightable. (This draws a distinction between the API itself and the underlying implementation of that API).
- pjmlp 9y ago
  Here is an example of an API subject to patents in MTC user equipment. http://patents.2012.apievangelist.com/2017/12/07/2012-08-23-paging-method-and-device-for-machine-type-communication-user-equipment/ http://patents.2012.apievangelist.com/2017/12/07/2012-08-23-...

cromwellian 9y ago

Yes, I (personally) oppose patent protection and copyright on software, and barring that, severe time limits, like say, 5 years. You really think an API should be protected from forking or reimplementation for A CENTURY? It's absurd, Oracle agrees with me (see link at bottom) The entire PC industry was launched because clean room re-implementation of the API of the BIOS broke IBM's stranglehold. Is the world better without WINE? Without game or CPU emulators? I am philosophically opposed to the idea of API copyrights especially. This is a corporate battle whose collateral damage is going to harm the entire industry. It's funny how everyone loves forking, until tribalism kicks in, and then people start granting mulligans on philosophy just because of tribal positions on whichever company they don't like. Remember this? http://www.gordoni.com/software-patents/statements/oracle.statement.html http://www.gordoni.com/software-patents/statements/oracle.st... "Oracle Corporation opposes the patentability of software" "A balance of fifty years protection for direct copying of code would continue to be provided by copyright law." Funny how perspective changes if you perform a buyout of a struggling company's assets to use it to shakedown the market.

pjmlp 9y ago
We would be using Atari, Amiga and Macs instead, and maybe some UNIX variants as well.
- cromwellian 9y ago
  I was a huge C64/Amiga fan, but I honestly don't think it would have been Atari or Amiga, both companies were horribly managed. And the Mac was just horrifically overpriced for what you got. At the same time Apple was shipping a $2k non-multitasking, B&W, 128k computer with shitty graphics and sound, Commodore was shipping the Amiga 1000, with twice the memory, and a custom chipset that was not equaled until years later by VGA, or to be honest, SVGA, and at half the price of the Mac 128k. IMHO, the Amiga 1000 was the 'iPhone' of personal computers, ridiculously better than the Mac and PC at its launch date, it was a step-function better than the Mac. But Commodore was a bungling, mismanaged company that flushed a great opportunity down the drain. It's like if you invented the iPhone, but didn't know how to sell it, market it, and get product market fit.
  - pjmlp 9y ago
    Who knows, with the PC out of the way, even with their management mistakes, they might have survived. And even if not, surely there would be another brand to gladly take their place.
    - cromwellian 9y ago
      Nostalgia: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q7rKj0DU8Xs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q7rKj0DU8Xs sad this could be done in 1985. Commodore was vertically integrated like Apple of today, they had a stellar custom chip development team, and had revolutionary chips in the worlds (AAA and Hombre) that would have been like 3dfx, but in 1992, delivering a quantum leap in gfx and single-texturing 3d pipeline well before others. I'm really bummed the company flushed it down the toilet and "Xerox PARC"'ed itself, by having a winning team of researchers and engineers, but not being able to make a business.

macspoofing 9y ago

>Do you oppose copyright on all software, i. e. source code, as well? That has nothing to do with anything. Copyright is a human construct. Somethings are decided to be copyrightable and somethings are not. Not every creative endeavor should be copyrighted, other should, and other should with major limitations. APIs were never copyrightable. Ever. The computing and programming industry developed with this assumption - in fact, it may not have ever developed if that wasn't the case. Why does this need to change now? And not even through a new law but rather court re-interpretation.

IAmEveryone 9y ago
My point is that there should be some criteria that determine if something should fall under copyright. And I'm having a hard time finding such a set that contains source code but does not include a (sufficiently extensive) API. You're just asserting tradition. Yet you are not addressing my examples that directly show precedent within the industry for recognising copyright for APIs.
- caf 9y ago
  As I undestand it, there is a principle that legal contracts themselves cannot be copyrighted, despite the fact that they might well be the result of a considerable amount of creative work. The underlying principle here is that the legal effect itself cannot be subject to exclusive ownership, and the only way to get the same legal effect is to have the same contract. I believe APIs can be considered under an analogous principle - that is, the ability to interoperate with a set of existing code shouldn't be subject to exclusive ownership, and you can't interoperate with the same existing code without implementing the same API, so APIs should not be copyrightable. (This draws a distinction between the API itself and the underlying implementation of that API).
pjmlp 9y ago
Here is an example of an API subject to patents in MTC user equipment. http://patents.2012.apievangelist.com/2017/12/07/2012-08-23-paging-method-and-device-for-machine-type-communication-user-equipment/ http://patents.2012.apievangelist.com/2017/12/07/2012-08-23-...