Re: Where we went astray-- Antitrust and Microsoft

Gabriel Wachob <gwachob[_at_]aimnet.com> wrote:
>
> On Sun, 2 Nov 1997, John H. Lederer <johnl[_at_]ibm.net> wrote:
>
> <Good points about marginal costs snipped>
>
> > I have considered two modifications of software copyrighting:
> >
> > (1) require disclosures of the source code. much as we effectively or
> > particularly require disclosure of other copyrighted material. This
> > might have a very salutary effect. For instance, IBM abandoned
> > supporting Win32 programs in OS/2 as they had Win16 programs because of
> > the conviction that Microsft would make chnages in the Win32 API's that
> > would be hard to keep up with. I think, that with disclosure of the
> > source code, it would be much easier to make functionally equivalent
> > OS's.
>
> This wouldn't work because much of the value of a piece of software is
> in the trade secrets it embodies.
>
> You simply are nuts to attempt to "reverse engineer" the internal
> components of an entire OS like Win95, so the only way you are going to
> reproduce the software (in an economically viable way) is to have a
> well-defined, relatively static API, or to have access to the source
> code.
>
> You do not need to give out your trade secrets in your OS to provide a
> complete description of your API (the interface to the internal
> operations of the OS) to outsiders. The problem is that Microsoft has
> apparently used information not published in its APIs when writing its
> own applications. They used trade secrets in their OS to benefit their
> application software, and this issue is whether this is
> anticompetitive...
>
> Forcing MS to disclose their source code **would** solve this problem,
> but I think it would destroy the software industry since once you see
> how a person does something in software, unless they have that idea
> patented, its usually trivial to reproduce legally (that is produce with
> the same performance and functionality).
>
> Forcing the publication of internal source code would also be a disaster
> for any software publisher as it would encourage other folks to write
> software that relies on or uses internal hooks that are not designed for
> others to use. If you've written any significant amount of software,
> you'll know exactly what I'm talking about (program to an interface, not
> an implementation).
>
> > (2) change the term of copyright for software
>
> I'm all for that. Copyright is intended to incentivize (and reward)
> authors for their work. Most software is of little economic value to
> the author after a few years. BUT, I'm really not sure that shortening
> the term would make a big economic impact for that reason. HOWEVER,
> This would help greatly the free software movement, which is more
> responsible for the success of the Web and the Net than any of the
> latecomers like Netscape or Microsoft.

(In regard to copyright, I think you are forcing it to do something that it was not intended to do.

Copyright is not intended to protect an idea or process. It protects a particular expression.

The objections revealing source code may essentially say that if the source code were revealed, we would no longer have the properties of a patent.

I think it an open question whether the software industry would benefit or be hurt by revealing source code.

Certainly copyright was not originally coneived of as a way to make things secret. In fact, the contrary would be true, I think--- copyright was intended to further the spread of knowledge, not to further propritary and secret uses of knowledge.

Regards,
 John

John H. Lederer
<johnl[_at_]ibm.net> Received on Wed Nov 05 1997 - 14:21:45 GMT