6 ms·

That is what copyright is for, not patenting. If someone doesn't have a license to distribute your code, you can collect damages for copyright infringement. Bu

by msg 16y ago

That is what copyright is for, not patenting. If someone doesn't have a license to distribute your code, you can collect damages for copyright infringement. But patenting covers independent inventions of the same algorithms. And it's frequently used for ideas that are profoundly obvious, like a straightforward application of machine learning techniques to a particular data set (Bilski). So if you think of an idea by yourself, you can be sued for implementing it. As a developer, it is recommended that I not read patents, as if it is determined that I read a patent that I then violated, it will be triple damages in a lawsuit. So I have no way to avoid implementing somebody else's patent. Now Sony's lawsuit isn't about software, or patents. It is about certain special secret integers. It so happens that used with readily available software they blow a wide hole in Sony's horrible security system for the PS3. But Sony doesn't own those integers. It doesn't own the hardware it sold to people under pretenses that it would always run Linux, and it doesn't have the right to control how people would choose to use their hardware and GPU. Hotz never used PSN software or any of Sony's other products.

jeromec 16y ago
Now Sony's lawsuit isn't about software, or patents. It is about certain special secret integers. It so happens that used with readily available software they blow a wide hole in Sony's horrible security system for the PS3. I'm not familiar with the particulars of that case, so it's hard for me to make an informed opinion. However, I don't entirely buy a "secret integers" defense, because that could apply to any software, or any media for that matter. For example, any Microsoft operating system can be viewed as one long string of binary code. So, yes, Microsoft would have legally protected rights to that specific combination of numbers. To suggest "secret integers" can't be owned would be to say everyone owns anything anyone creates, even before it's created. Now, if this person simply devised some code which could crack another system which did NOT involve that system's original code I would agree there should be no prosecution.
- marshray 16y ago
  These are not secret integers. In particular they are 46 DC EA D3 17 FE 45 D8 09 23 EB 97 E4 95 64 10 D4 CD B2 C2 as tweeted by the spokesperson of Sony himself: http://twitpic.com/3xwe6h http://twitpic.com/3xwe6h
  - jeromec 16y ago
    How was that code derived? Does it get its form from copyrighted code Sony owns the rights to? If so I believe it should enjoy copyright protection. We're seeing a nearly chaotic upheaval in how business is done in modern times, largely because technology is progressing so fast. This can confuse many of the issues at hand. However, I think it can help to view things using older more well understood models. For example, let's look at books. Harry Potter is a copyright protected work which appears to have given much value to both readers and author/rights holders alike. Each page of that book enjoys copyright protection; tearing out a page and adding words, making other adjustments etc., then posting the revised product online would violate copyright. If we can see the logic to that then I think it can help us to gain perspective when reflecting on the Sony incident.
    - marshray 16y ago
      The private key was derived mathematically from the public key material because Sony generated its keys wrong. Copyright has nothing to do with it. There's a good explanation on YouTube (until they're taken down by the gestapo) which is the Fail0verflow team describing their research. They have a section at the beginning describing the history of console hacking and game piracy, or at least their perspective on it. They take pains to point out that most of their research is not even particularly necessary to pirate games but instead to run user-supplied software on the PS3. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HEFMAP0mTvY http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HEFMAP0mTvY Incidentally, Sony had previously been sued by Certicom for allegedly infringing on patents related to its use of elliptic-curve cryptography.
      - jeromec 16y ago
        If copyright doesn't play into it, then I would agree Sony shouldn't be able to prosecute.
    - msg 16y ago
      Sony's private key is, essentially, a random number. As for copyright protection, you should reflect on this page: http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/DeCSS/Gallery/index.html http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/DeCSS/Gallery/index.html And then this one: http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/GeoHot/ http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/GeoHot/ To the point with Harry Potter: you can think of a continuum of infringement. If you tear a page out and copy it, you will violate the copyright. If you reuse characters or scenes and use them to create your own work, you are making derived works (JK put her stamp of approval on non-commercial fan fiction by the way). But the farther you get away from the original characters the less you can call it infringement. As the link between the two works becomes more and more abstract and less concrete, the new work is more protected. At some nebulous point it is no longer infringing. For instance, Harry's story and appearance is superficially similar to an earlier work called The Books of Magic, a comic series by Neil Gaiman. You can read his take on it here: http://journal.neilgaiman.com/2008/04/fair-use-and-other-things.html http://journal.neilgaiman.com/2008/04/fair-use-and-other-thi... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Books_of_Magic http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Books_of_Magic Essentially he throws up his hands and says "borrowing is a fact of life in genre fiction. Deal with it, I did." How does this apply to computer code? Well, the farther away you get from the original copyrighted code, the less infringing it is. There are extremely limited protections for derived works that amount to Person B having a copy of Person A's code in front of them and editing it. What those Touretzky pages from CMU show is that there is no such thing as a continuum from computer code to an uncopyrightable abstraction. It is abstraction, mathematics, numbers all the way down. In fact, it is speech that is protected by the First Amendment and suppressing it is a constitutional issue with narrow exceptions. So no, you can't use a book model for code. It is not the same thing at all. Executable ideas, math, algorithms, just don't exist in the fiction publishing industry.
marshray 16y ago
As a developer, it is recommended that I not read patents, as if it is determined that I read a patent that I then violated, it will be triple damages in a lawsuit. So I have no way to avoid implementing somebody else's patent. You're supposed to pay a lawyer his hourly rate to review everything you create and compare it to every patent issued. Apparently this makes a great deal of sense to the lawyers who are elected to pass laws.

by msg 16y ago

jeromec 16y ago

Now Sony's lawsuit isn't about software, or patents. It is about certain special secret integers. It so happens that used with readily available software they blow a wide hole in Sony's horrible security system for the PS3. I'm not familiar with the particulars of that case, so it's hard for me to make an informed opinion. However, I don't entirely buy a "secret integers" defense, because that could apply to any software, or any media for that matter. For example, any Microsoft operating system can be viewed as one long string of binary code. So, yes, Microsoft would have legally protected rights to that specific combination of numbers. To suggest "secret integers" can't be owned would be to say everyone owns anything anyone creates, even before it's created. Now, if this person simply devised some code which could crack another system which did NOT involve that system's original code I would agree there should be no prosecution.

marshray 16y ago
These are not secret integers. In particular they are 46 DC EA D3 17 FE 45 D8 09 23 EB 97 E4 95 64 10 D4 CD B2 C2 as tweeted by the spokesperson of Sony himself: http://twitpic.com/3xwe6h http://twitpic.com/3xwe6h
- jeromec 16y ago
  How was that code derived? Does it get its form from copyrighted code Sony owns the rights to? If so I believe it should enjoy copyright protection. We're seeing a nearly chaotic upheaval in how business is done in modern times, largely because technology is progressing so fast. This can confuse many of the issues at hand. However, I think it can help to view things using older more well understood models. For example, let's look at books. Harry Potter is a copyright protected work which appears to have given much value to both readers and author/rights holders alike. Each page of that book enjoys copyright protection; tearing out a page and adding words, making other adjustments etc., then posting the revised product online would violate copyright. If we can see the logic to that then I think it can help us to gain perspective when reflecting on the Sony incident.
  - marshray 16y ago
    The private key was derived mathematically from the public key material because Sony generated its keys wrong. Copyright has nothing to do with it. There's a good explanation on YouTube (until they're taken down by the gestapo) which is the Fail0verflow team describing their research. They have a section at the beginning describing the history of console hacking and game piracy, or at least their perspective on it. They take pains to point out that most of their research is not even particularly necessary to pirate games but instead to run user-supplied software on the PS3. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HEFMAP0mTvY http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HEFMAP0mTvY Incidentally, Sony had previously been sued by Certicom for allegedly infringing on patents related to its use of elliptic-curve cryptography.
    - jeromec 16y ago
      If copyright doesn't play into it, then I would agree Sony shouldn't be able to prosecute.
  - msg 16y ago
    Sony's private key is, essentially, a random number. As for copyright protection, you should reflect on this page: http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/DeCSS/Gallery/index.html http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/DeCSS/Gallery/index.html And then this one: http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/GeoHot/ http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/GeoHot/ To the point with Harry Potter: you can think of a continuum of infringement. If you tear a page out and copy it, you will violate the copyright. If you reuse characters or scenes and use them to create your own work, you are making derived works (JK put her stamp of approval on non-commercial fan fiction by the way). But the farther you get away from the original characters the less you can call it infringement. As the link between the two works becomes more and more abstract and less concrete, the new work is more protected. At some nebulous point it is no longer infringing. For instance, Harry's story and appearance is superficially similar to an earlier work called The Books of Magic, a comic series by Neil Gaiman. You can read his take on it here: http://journal.neilgaiman.com/2008/04/fair-use-and-other-things.html http://journal.neilgaiman.com/2008/04/fair-use-and-other-thi... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Books_of_Magic http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Books_of_Magic Essentially he throws up his hands and says "borrowing is a fact of life in genre fiction. Deal with it, I did." How does this apply to computer code? Well, the farther away you get from the original copyrighted code, the less infringing it is. There are extremely limited protections for derived works that amount to Person B having a copy of Person A's code in front of them and editing it. What those Touretzky pages from CMU show is that there is no such thing as a continuum from computer code to an uncopyrightable abstraction. It is abstraction, mathematics, numbers all the way down. In fact, it is speech that is protected by the First Amendment and suppressing it is a constitutional issue with narrow exceptions. So no, you can't use a book model for code. It is not the same thing at all. Executable ideas, math, algorithms, just don't exist in the fiction publishing industry.

marshray 16y ago

As a developer, it is recommended that I not read patents, as if it is determined that I read a patent that I then violated, it will be triple damages in a lawsuit. So I have no way to avoid implementing somebody else's patent. You're supposed to pay a lawyer his hourly rate to review everything you create and compare it to every patent issued. Apparently this makes a great deal of sense to the lawyers who are elected to pass laws.