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It's not new that black box reverse engineering is allowed, I was taught this in my IT classes (I'm in the UK).
by ZoFreX 13y ago
It's not new that black box reverse engineering is allowed, I was taught this in my IT classes (I'm in the UK).
- noir_lord 13y agoIndeed however in the UK we operate a common law legal system which means that precedent and case law account for much of our legal system (in effect the law says X is legal but then the case law defines exactly when and when X is legal). A case like this is highly useful at staving off spurious law suits and spoiling tactics (particularly from bigger players against smaller players). I think it's a good decision.
- gsnedders 13y agoNote that this only sets precedent for cases under English law (and not Scots or Northern Irish law).
- SEMW 13y agoTrue, but it's worth remembering that the EWCA appeal was at least partly applying a ruling by the CJEU about the same dispute (C-406/10 SAS v WPL), which applies EU-wide.
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- dspillett 13y agoThe usual references for that are from the US though (the main one being Compaq's emulation of IBM's BIOS to make the first truly "IBM Compatible" PCs) or cases that were settled out of court so therefore have little impact on future cases. This gives the practise a fixed definition in UK case law rather than people just assuming it is OK. Of course this is only covering copyright: patents will complicate the issue.