On Sun, 21 October 2001, "Michael Beck" wrote: > > From: email@greglondon.com > > Sent: Friday, October 19, 2001 00:06 > I am afraid, you are mixing "class", and "interface" concepts here. Class is a > "design blueprint", similar in its function to "chip design" or "architectural > design", and as such it's protected by copyright. You cannot derive a design and > claim it as legal, regardless of the mechanism you have used. However, you can > take "interface" or API, and create your own "blueprint" out of it. I'm afraid that you're mixing a copyrightable "work" with a nice "idea". The work, Alice's database, and the idea, all databases, does not prevent Bob from using Alices code, and writing code of his own which the compiler will USE to call Bob's method instead of Alice's. > The Author still holds the copyright to the design. So yes, you can use it, but > you are not allowed to modify the design and publish it without a permission. I'm afraid you're confusing your work with someone using your work. Your blueprint of a house. my blueprint of a garage does not infringe on your blueprint of a house. But I might buy your blueprint, add another page with my blueprint, and resell the whole thing as an aggregation that can be used together to create a house with an attached garage. my garage blueprint does not infringe on your house blueprint. > > It's outside the realm of copyright law, > > and it's outside the spirit of open source. > > I think, it's quite the opposite - the spirit of open source is to share the > code and the improvements back to the community. Were would be Linux or Apache > today, if the improvements wouldn't go back to them? Good grief man, where do you think microsoft, et al, would be if you granted copyright law that level of power? while you may use it strictly for noble purposes, the law does not care who uses it, only that it is obeyed. Greg IANAL TINLA IMHO YADA YADA YADA -- license-discuss archive is at http://crynwr.com/cgi-bin/ezmlm-cgi?3