RE: [dvd-discuss] Copyright ranges

[Richard Hartman <hartman(at)onetouch.com>]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: microlenz@earthlink.net [mailto:microlenz@earthlink.net]
> Sent: Tuesday, August 06, 2002 6:53 PM
> To: dvd-discuss@eon.law.harvard.edu
> Subject: RE: [dvd-discuss] Copyright ranges
> 
> 
> On 6 Aug 2002 at 9:46, Richard Hartman wrote:
> 
> From:           	Richard Hartman <hartman@onetouch.com>
> To:             	"'dvd-discuss@eon.law.harvard.edu'" <dvd-
> discuss@eon.law.harvard.edu>
> Subject:        	RE: [dvd-discuss] Copyright ranges
> Date sent:      	Tue, 6 Aug 2002 09:46:51 -0700 
> Send reply to:  	dvd-discuss@eon.law.harvard.edu
> 
> > 
> > 
> > > -----Original Message-----
> > > From: microlenz@earthlink.net [mailto:microlenz@earthlink.net]
> > ... 
> > > No progress here....I'm beginning to be 
> > > skeptical of the claims 
> > > that software is speech that deserves copyright but not that 
> > > it is speech that 
> > > deserves FA protection.
> > > 
> > 
> > That's because software is generally much more like an invention
> > that it is like a book or a piece of art.  Well ... some
> > software.  Applications (e.g. word processors) are tools,
> > and analogous to inventions ... but games, especially the
> > ones w/ definiate story lines (e.g. Myst, Deus Ex) are
> > more analogous to movies.
> > 
> > In truth software -- taken as a whole -- is neither animal
> > nor vegetable, but something unique and a -new- form of
> > IP protection (neither copyright nor patent) should be 
> > developed.  Then the limitations, obligations and protections
> > could be specified in a way that is appropriate to the
> > medium.
> > 
> > I agree on the FA protection -- regardless of the 
> > copyright/patent/other issue software _can_ be used
> > to express ideas.  Note: it _can_, but it does not
> > _always_ do so ... Deus Ex told a quite dark story
> > of government & big business conspiracies ... and
> > yet, what idea is expressed in MS Word or Excel?
> > IMO Deus Ex would deserve 1st Am. protections, but
> > Word?  Nah.
> 
> OK so if it,word, doesn't deserve FA protection because it's 
> "functional" then 
> is it expressing someting worth copyright protection as well? 
> Kaplan would 
> argue that it does.
> 
> 

He would be wrong. What is the idea expressed by the
word processor?  (Not expressed _using_ a word processor,
but by the word processor per se)

-- 
-Richard M. Hartman
hartman@onetouch.com

186,000 mi./sec ... not just a good idea, it's the LAW!