Open Source Software and Copyright Law
Open Source Software and Copyright Law
‘What is worth copying is prima facie worth protecting'1is the genesis of intellectual property rights. These rights refer to the property that is a creation of the mind: inventions, literary and artistic works, symbols, names, images, and designs used in commerce.
The computer software industry has developed in the recent due to which the “open source software” or “free software” is gaining widespread attention. There has been an increased use and acceptance of computers with its fast – paced development but the software industry struggles to meet the demand of its users. Now, what users seek are rapid releases, quick bug fixes and easy customization. The critics have a notion that today’s software industry cannot survive in this growing market without taking some revolutionary steps.
The open source movement revolves around the notion of making software “open source” or making the source code available to everyone. The word “open” refers to making source code freely available to other developers so that they can enhance the software, modify the code, or fix software bugs and glitches.2 The word “source” refers to statements written by a software programmer in a programming language, such as C, C++, Pascal, Fortran, Java or Basic.3
As computers do not understand our language these statements instruct the computer as to what commands to process. They can only understand 'machine language' or 'machine code' i.e. instructions consisting of a series of 0s and 1s. Software tools convert source code into object code. It is actually the object code that the computer executes and understands and it is very difficult for humans to read or modify this code.
A source code of a computer program if it is open is a literary work within the Copyright Act. However often it is not disclosed and kept as trade secret. Software is very easy to copy but very difficult and expensive to create; it is very important to protect
‘What is worth copying is prima facie worth protecting'1is the genesis of intellectual property rights. These rights refer to the property that is a creation of the mind: inventions, literary and artistic works, symbols, names, images, and designs used in commerce.
The computer software industry has developed in the recent due to which the “open source software” or “free software” is gaining widespread attention. There has been an increased use and acceptance of computers with its fast – paced development but the software industry struggles to meet the demand of its users. Now, what users seek are rapid releases, quick bug fixes and easy customization. The critics have a notion that today’s software industry cannot survive in this growing market without taking some revolutionary steps.
The open source movement revolves around the notion of making software “open source” or making the source code available to everyone. The word “open” refers to making source code freely available to other developers so that they can enhance the software, modify the code, or fix software bugs and glitches.2 The word “source” refers to statements written by a software programmer in a programming language, such as C, C++, Pascal, Fortran, Java or Basic.3
As computers do not understand our language these statements instruct the computer as to what commands to process. They can only understand 'machine language' or 'machine code' i.e. instructions consisting of a series of 0s and 1s. Software tools convert source code into object code. It is actually the object code that the computer executes and understands and it is very difficult for humans to read or modify this code.
A source code of a computer program if it is open is a literary work within the Copyright Act. However often it is not disclosed and kept as trade secret. Software is very easy to copy but very difficult and expensive to create; it is very important to protect