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SubjectRe: Reverse engineering (was ...UDI...)


On Sat, 10 Oct 1998, John Alvord wrote:

> On Fri, 9 Oct 1998, Kenneth Albanowski wrote:
>
> >
> > [There have been several statements along these lines. Here's just one of
> > them:]
> >
> > On Fri, 9 Oct 1998, Ely Wilson wrote:
> >
> > > Does this mean that you in Europe could disassembler a binary, then modify
> > > it so it reatins it's general function, email it to us americans modified
> > > thus saving us the desparity of being prosecuted :) i think so.
> > >
> > > Also, federal laws protect patent/copyright. It is *NOT* forbidden to
> > > dissassemble a source. Take a system BIOS for instance, to replicate a
> > > BIOS you would do (and it HAS been done) a complete dissassemble, then
> > > write down EVERYTHING it does, BUT NO CODE (yes I am leaving out details)
> >
> > With respect, this was ages ago. (Compaq). A lot of water has passed under
> > that bridge, and some more recent decisions have occurred that complicate
> > matters. At least, as a layman, I believe matters have been complicated
> > enough that I don't trust myself to judge safely what the current
> > situation is -- and I'd advise others not to. If no-one actually knows for
> > certain, I'd suggest that the FSF, or Redhat, or one of the other groups
> > should retain council, pay a lawyer to try and determine the actual
> > current status of reverse engineering in the US -- and then write this up
> > for everyone's use.
> >
> > (My rationale? The Stac vs. Microsoft decision. As I understood it, this
> > determined that Stac misappropriated Microsoft's trade secrets by reverse
> > engineering Microsoft's code. I don't understand this. Moreover, it is
> > effectively a nonsense statement, according to my understanding of the
> > definition of "trade secrets". Hence, I'm not going to trust anyone but a
> > lawyer to determine what this actually means -- if anything.)
>
> Small correction: STAC won over Microsoft, Microsoft had to remove
> doubledisk support, Microsoft had to pay several million US dollars in
> compensation.
>

This was the original suit. Afterwards Microsoft filed a countersuit,
which MS won. (but got less money). This countersuit is what Kenneth
was refering to.

Volodya Dergachev

> Of course the legal conclusion could be the same either way.
>
> john alvord
>
>
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