Computer Chess Club Archives


Search

Terms

Messages

Subject: Re: Do source code validate an engine as legal?

Author: Dann Corbit

Date: 13:05:25 06/17/05

Go up one level in this thread


On June 17, 2005 at 15:43:54, Uri Blass wrote:

>On June 17, 2005 at 14:28:28, Dann Corbit wrote:
>
>>On June 17, 2005 at 14:20:34, Cesar Contreras wrote:
>>
>>>This post it's because i want to know people point of view in this matter.
>>>
>>>I received some weeks ago some emails that make me aware of some denunciations
>>>about my engine stating that it is a clone. Since i can not know who make this
>>>denunciation and why they made it, i cannot make an statement on this fact.
>>>Maybe something related to fafis case, because it happens just after that case.
>>>
>>>So in order to stop this from the very beggining i released my source code. I
>>>don't hide any big secret, and i'm sure that 99.99% of the code was typed by me.
>>>Maybe some lines are taken from code snippets from forums, but are almost
>>>nothing. Some ideas are taken from everywhere, but the most of them are taken
>>>from papers, thesis, articles and books.
>>>
>>>Now i think that because that emails where sended to several people of this
>>>forum (a public accusation in my understanding) they think that my engine
>>>probably could be clone. I see some comments as insinuations against my engine
>>>(probably wrong about it). I feel a sensation also that because i was defending
>>>Rafael, people think that i was defended the clone cause.
>>>
>>>So my questions:
>>>
>>>can source code completly validate an engine as legal?
>>
>>Depends on what you mean.  It should remove any doubt as far as whether the
>>engine is a clone or not.  There could be a patent violation that all parties
>>are unaware of, and so it might (strictly speaking) be illegal.
>
>I think that the law should simply forbid patents.
>The idea that some person may get into trouble because of patent violation that
>he even did not know about make me angry and it is simply against justice.
>
>People should know what is illegal and what is legal.
>
>I think that patents have negative value because they encourage people to
>release nothing(otherwise they may get into trouble of patent violation).
>
>If many countries decide not to allow patents and also forbid selling or buying
>products from countries that allow patents then maybe this economic war can
>convince all countries not to allow patents(of course it is not effective if
>only few countries do it).

I agree about patents, especially for software.  To me, a software patent is
hardly different from patenting math (which _IS_ illegal).

But I will try to obey any law unless I think it is in opposition to divine law.



This page took 0 seconds to execute

Last modified: Thu, 15 Apr 21 08:11:13 -0700

Current Computer Chess Club Forums at Talkchess. This site by Sean Mintz.