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A lot of comments here keep drawing parallels to writing as for why this is right or wrong, but I think a more apt comparison would be music, where components l
by z3c0 4y ago
A lot of comments here keep drawing parallels to writing as for why this is right or wrong, but I think a more apt comparison would be music, where components like riffs or rhythms can be reused to make something wholly different. Many a musician has claimed IP infringement over another musician using similar melodies, but just like programming, if you look closely enough, you'll see that everyone is copying each other and there's not much that can be done to stop it.
Personally, I'm a bit bothered by this myself, but I'd be lying if I said I never once got any ideas by looking at the source code of a GPL project.
- omnicognate 4y agoIdeas aren't copyrightable.
- z3c0 4y agoonly ideas are copyrightable
- omnicognate 4y agoGoogle "are ideas copyrightable". Copyright protects the specific, tangible expression, not the idea or concept itself. So in your case, having "got ... ideas by looking at the source code of a GPL project" doesn't necessarily mean there is any violation of copyright. Employers will often require that employees haven't seen sensitive code at all (clean room) as it avoids any possibility of copying the code itself and provides powerful evidence if they're ever sued, but that's not a legal requirement, just a cautious practice. To read code, learn a concept from it and then apply that concept in your own code is fine (as far as copyright is concerned) as long as you're not copying the code itself. I am not a lawyer and the above is not legal advice, ofc :-)