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That lawsuit is - as far as I can tell - dead in the water anyway because of the number of years that the situation has been going on. If you let a thing like t

by 0x12 15y ago

That lawsuit is - as far as I can tell - dead in the water anyway because of the number of years that the situation has been going on. If you let a thing like that lapse for too long then you can't later on turn around and demand reparation. They'd have a very hard time arguing they weren't aware of it for so long that a very large portion of the IT world became dependent on it without becoming aware of it themselves. And all that is assuming that the claims hold water, which remains to be seen. It's an attempt at extortion from where I'm sitting, after all, the value of the database is only determined by the parties that are using it, recreating it from scratch requires some effort but nothing monumental. The current timezones are not at risk anyway, it is just the historical data we are talking about here.

derleth 15y ago
Still, if you ignore the facts of this specific case, which I agree is extremely weak, what do you think about my questions? Also: This is a copyright case, not trademark. 'Use it or lose it' does not apply to whether copyright violations have occurred; it can, at most, modify the damages involved.
- 0x12 15y ago
  You're right about the 'use it or lose it', but the damages will likely be set to '0', especially in those cases where the value of the original copyrighted data is minimal (which I think in this case is fairly clear). As for the question of appropriation, I don't think that that should ever happen, it would basically mean that anything is up for grabs given the right reasoning. Governments have to jump through some pretty involved hoops in order to seize your property (ok, in some countries the hoops are not that complicated and abuse is rife), for corporations to do the same thing would be a bad development. Say next year we all decide that the windows source code is something we can't live without any more so hand it over? That's not a good development, even in those cases where you could make a strong argument for it. In this particular case, there isn't even a strong argument, all it will take is a little bit of work if they should win their case and then they can keep their database and use it to light the fire after printing it out. It will have lost its value entirely after it gets re-created from original material.

by 0x12 15y ago

derleth 15y ago

Still, if you ignore the facts of this specific case, which I agree is extremely weak, what do you think about my questions? Also: This is a copyright case, not trademark. 'Use it or lose it' does not apply to whether copyright violations have occurred; it can, at most, modify the damages involved.

0x12 15y ago
You're right about the 'use it or lose it', but the damages will likely be set to '0', especially in those cases where the value of the original copyrighted data is minimal (which I think in this case is fairly clear). As for the question of appropriation, I don't think that that should ever happen, it would basically mean that anything is up for grabs given the right reasoning. Governments have to jump through some pretty involved hoops in order to seize your property (ok, in some countries the hoops are not that complicated and abuse is rife), for corporations to do the same thing would be a bad development. Say next year we all decide that the windows source code is something we can't live without any more so hand it over? That's not a good development, even in those cases where you could make a strong argument for it. In this particular case, there isn't even a strong argument, all it will take is a little bit of work if they should win their case and then they can keep their database and use it to light the fire after printing it out. It will have lost its value entirely after it gets re-created from original material.