Not an attorney myself, but it seems like some trouble in arguing
copyright for such might stem from the "merger doctrine" (see for
example http://www.answers.com/topic/merger-doctrine). Since a
protocol could be argued to be purely functional many would argue
that it has no original expressive value.
I am not certain if an attorney would indeed make such an argument, but if one did I might be inclined to disagree based on the following argument.
Consider HTML to be one instance of XML. I could define another XML language in which <HEAD> ~ <ACORN> and <BODY> ~<FLUID> and <A href=string1> ~ <XLINK where=string2> and so forth. I can indeed exercise originality in the names of the tags I use in my XML. The functionality of the markup language could in fact be identical between two different XML's. Hence the set of tag names, the mapping of tag names to semantic functions, and perhaps even the list of semantic functions fulfilled by my "protocol" could contain originality. I think the case of protocols like TCP, IP, and HTTP is closely parallel (each is a syntactic wrapper associating tag names with semantic actions)-- these three just happen to be open standards which have expressly abandoned any claim to copyright.
So I vote yes. Now wait for somebody more knowledgeable to respond.
At 04:50 PM 9/7/2005, you wrote:
>I'm interested in learning about the degree of copyrightability of
>communications protocols in the United States.
>
>By "communication protocol", I mean the specific way that data is
>encoded for communication between systems or agents. Presumably a
>document describing the protocol is copyrightable, as would be
>software that implements the protocol. But the protocol itself?
>Offhand, it doesn't seem likely in a post-Feist environment.
>
>An example of the sort of protocol I mean is HTTP, used e.g. by
>Internet Explorer to communicate with web servers.
>
>
>This is not a request for legal advice; I'd just like to educate
>myself about the subject. I'm hoping that it has appeared in journals
>or caselaw.
>
> --David E Hollingsworth
>
>
>#############################################################
>This message is sent to you because you are subscribed to
> the mailing list <CNI-COPYRIGHT[_at_]cni.org>.
>To unsubscribe, E-mail to: <CNI-COPYRIGHT-off[_at_]cni.org>
>To switch to the DIGEST mode, E-mail to <CNI-COPYRIGHT-digest[_at_]cni.org>
>To switch to the INDEX mode, E-mail to <CNI-COPYRIGHT-index[_at_]cni.org>
>To postpone your subscription, E-mail to <CNI-COPYRIGHT-null[_at_]cni.org>
>Send administrative queries to <CNI-COPYRIGHT-request[_at_]cni.org>
>
>Visit the CNI-COPYRIGHT e-mail list archive at
><https://mail2.cni.org/Lists/CNI-COPYRIGHT/>.
Received on Thu Sep 08 2005 - 23:15:39 GMT
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.2.0 : Mon Mar 26 2007 - 00:35:55 GMT