Shallow copy is the general concept. Move semantics is a special case where the unique ownership is enforced. Here is simple example of the idea: Widget::Wid

Shallow copy is the general concept. Move semantics is a special case where the unique ownership is enforced. Here is simple example of the idea: Widget::Widget(Widget&& w) { this->ptr = w.ptr; // shallow copy w.ptr = nullptr; // nullify the source }