Software is the product of intellectual creativity, but protection of the intellectual property residing in software is the subject of some controversy. This book captures a wide range of perspectives on the topic from industry, academe, and government, drawing on information presented at a workshop and forum.
Intellectual Property in Electronics and Software provides practical guidance and addresses key IP law issues in major jurisdictions worldwide which impact on software and electronics companies. This new edition covers the latest case law on open source software and standard essential patents and features new chapters on the possible impact of the
"Clear, correct, and deep, this is a welcome addition to discussions of law and computing for anyone -- even lawyers!"-- Lawrence Lessig, Professor of Law at Stanford Law School and founder of the Stanford Center for Internet and Society If you work in information technology, intellectual property is central to your job -- but dealing with the complexities of the legal system can be mind-boggling. This book is for anyone who wants to understand how the legal system deals with intellectual property rights for code and other content. You'll get a clear look at intellectual property issues from a developer's point of view, including practical advice about situations you're likely to encounter. Written by an intellectual property attorney who is also a programmer, Intellectual Property and Open Source helps you understand patents, copyrights, trademarks, trade secrets, and licenses, with special focus on the issues surrounding open source development and the GPL. This book answers questions such as: How do open source and intellectual property work together? What are the most important intellectual property-related issues when starting a business or open source project? How should you handle copyright, licensing and other issues when accepting a patch from another developer? How can you pursue your own ideas while working for someone else? What parts of a patent should be reviewed to see if it applies to your work? When is your idea a trade secret? How can you reverse engineer a product without getting into trouble? What should you think about when choosing an open source license for your project? Most legal sources are too scattered, too arcane, and too hard to read. Intellectual Property and Open Source is a friendly, easy-to-follow overview of the law that programmers, system administrators, graphic designers, and many others will find essential.
"I have studied Rosen's book in detail and am impressed with its scope and content. I strongly recommend it to anybody interested in the current controversies surrounding open source licensing." --John Terpstra, Samba.org; cofounder, Samba-Team "Linux and open source software have forever altered the computing landscape. The important conversations no longer revolve around the technology but rather the business and legal issues. Rosen's book is must reading for anyone using or providing open source solutions." --Stuart Open Source Development Labs A Complete Guide to the Law of Open Source for Developers, Managers, and Lawyers Now that open source software is blossoming around the world, it is crucial to understand how open source licenses work--and their solid legal foundations. Open Source Initiative general counsel Lawrence Rosen presents a plain-English guide to open source law for developers, managers, users, and lawyers. Rosen clearly explains the intellectual property laws that support open source licensing, carefully reviews today's leading licenses, and helps you make the best choices for your project or organization. Coverage includes: Explanation of why the SCO litigation and other attacks won't derail open source Dispelling the myths of open source licensing Intellectual property law for nonlawyers: ownership and licensing of copyrights, patents, and trademarks "Academic licenses" BSD, MIT, Apache, and beyond The "reciprocal bargain" at the heart of the GPL Alternative licenses: Mozilla, CPL, OSL and AFL Benefits of open source, and the obligations and risks facing businesses that deploy open source software Choosing the right license: considering business models, product architecture, IP ownership, license compatibility issues, relicensing, and more Enforcing the terms and conditions of open source licenses Shared source, eventual source, and other alternative models to open source Protecting yourself against lawsuits
As technological developments multiply around the globeâ€"even as the patenting of human genes comes under serious discussionâ€"nations, companies, and researchers find themselves in conflict over intellectual property rights (IPRs). Now, an international group of experts presents the first multidisciplinary look at IPRs in an age of explosive growth in science and technology. This thought-provoking volume offers an update on current international IPR negotiations and includes case studies on software, computer chips, optoelectronics, and biotechnologyâ€"areas characterized by high development cost and easy reproducibility. The volume covers these and other issues: Modern economic theory as a basis for approaching international IPRs. U.S. intellectual property practices versus those in Japan, India, the European Community, and the developing and newly industrializing countries. Trends in science and technology and how they affect IPRs. Pros and cons of a uniform international IPRs regime versus a system reflecting national differences.
This edited volume provides a broad and comprehensive picture of the intersection between Artificial Intelligence technology and Intellectual Property law, covering business and the basics of AI, the interactions between AI and patent law, copyright law, and IP administration, and the legal aspects of software and data.
Whereas user-facing applications are often written in modern languages, the firmware, operating system, support libraries, and virtual machines that underpin just about any modern computer system are still written in low-level languages that value flexibility and performance over convenience and safety. Programming errors in low-level code are often exploitable and can, in the worst case, give adversaries unfettered access to the compromised host system. This book provides an introduction to and overview of automatic software diversity techniques that, in one way or another, use randomization to greatly increase the difficulty of exploiting the vast amounts of low-level code in existence. Diversity-based defenses are motivated by the observation that a single attack will fail against multiple targets with unique attack surfaces. We introduce the many, often complementary, ways that one can diversify attack surfaces and provide an accessible guide to more than two decades worth of research on the topic. We also discuss techniques used in conjunction with diversity to prevent accidental disclosure of randomized program aspects and present an in-depth case study of one of our own diversification solutions.
3D printing (or, more correctly, additive manufacturing) is the general term for those software-driven technologies that create physical objects by successive layering of materials. Due to recent advances in the quality of objects produced and to lower processing costs, the increasing dispersion and availability of these technologies have major implications not only for manufacturers and distributors but also for users and consumers, raising unprecedented challenges for intellectual property protection and enforcement. This is the first and only book to discuss 3D printing technology from a multidisciplinary perspective that encompasses law, economics, engineering, technology, and policy. Originating in a collaborative study spearheaded by the Hanken School of Economics, the Aalto University and the University of Helsinki in Finland and engaging an international consortium of legal, design and production engineering experts, with substantial contributions from industrial partners, the book fully exposes and examines the fundamental questions related to the nexus of intellectual property law, emerging technologies, 3D printing, business innovation, and policy issues. Twenty-five legal, technical, and business experts contribute sixteen peer-reviewed chapters, each focusing on a specific area, that collectively evaluate the tensions created by 3D printing technology in the context of the global economy. The topics covered include: • current and future business models for 3D printing applications; • intellectual property rights in 3D printing; • essential patents and technical standards in additive manufacturing; • patent and bioprinting; • private use and 3D printing; • copyright licences on the user-generated content (UGC) in 3D printing; • copyright implications of 3D scanning; and • non-traditional trademark infringement in the 3D printing context. Specific industrial applications – including aeronautics, automotive industries, construction equipment, toy and jewellery making, medical devices, tissue engineering, and regenerative medicine – are all touched upon in the course of analyses. In a legal context, the central focus is on the technology’s implications for US and European intellectual property law, anchored in a comparison of relevant laws and cases in several legal systems. This work is a matchless resource for patent, copyright, and trademark attorneys and other corporate counsel, innovation economists, industrial designers and engineers, and academics and policymakers concerned with this complex topic.
Although individuals or companies can pursue civil remedies to address violations of their intellectual property rights, criminal sanctions are often warranted to ensure sufficient punishment and deterrence of wrongful activity. Congress has continually expanded and strengthened criminal laws for violations of intellectual property rights to protect innovation, to keep pace with evolving technology and, significantly, to ensure that egregious or persistent intellectual property violations do not merely become a standard cost of doing business for defendants.
In 1988, a Roundtable committee, in conjunction with the Industrial Research Institute, developed a set of model agreements to streamline the negotiation process. The intent was that these models would decrease the time and effort needed to develop a research agreement, as well as provide a starting point for companies and universities new to negotiating agreements. In general, the models were well received by the academic and industrial communities. However, one concern, intellectual property rights, continues to pose significant hurdles to successful negotiation. Intellectual Property Rights in Industry-Sponsored University Research: Guide to Alternatives for Research Agreements identifies the contentious issues related to intellectual property rights and develops contract language that makes it easier to negotiate agreements for industry-sponsored university research. This report clarifies issues that cross institutional boundaries when university-industry research agreements are negotiated.