No again this was a case showing that even though it was licensed he had not broken copyright (autodesk was claiming copyright infringment) cause no matter what an EULA says you can not stomp on a consumers right to use the product as they see fit.  In this case again it was First Sale.  As for WOW I commend Blizzard for putting that in their EULA however that does not change the fact that most EULAs do not have that in them and as I said once I open the box no place will give me my money back.  Blizzard in this case would be an exception.

No again as soon as you buy a book, CD, movie, or software you have agreed to follow the terms of their copyright however what this case shows and why it is a good example is that you can't add terms to a copyright (which is essentially what all EULAs do) that stomp on a consumers rights and in this case it was the right of "First Sale".  It appears to me what EFF is saying with this example is that an EULA can't stomp on a software buyers rights.

Well I am glad you finally agree that I can disagree with something even though a court has ruled on it and not be an idiot.  It also doesn't make your point any less valuable it just means we disagree!  Just cause it takes the supreme court to over rule it doesn't make me and idiot or Ivory-tower idealist.

[quote]Is WoW an operating system?
[quote]
No - Neither is Microsoft Outlook, Internet Explorer, Word, Photoshop, or any of the other dozens of applications programs with third party extensions written for them.

That's purely aside from the fact that there is no real *legal* distinction between an OS and an application program.

Oh - wow - you mean this program is being sold to people who put it on their computers and gain nothing by doing so? Oh, no, that's right - they use it to gain an (unfair) advantage in WoW.

That is what we're talking about, he sold a program that created features these people wanted, they installed it on their computer - *their* personal property (Not on Blizzards Server), made use of those features in the game (in a way I believe we both consider unethical), and they paid him for this program.

Well, for them, they obviously got something they wanted out of this. If they had to hack into the server to do this, that's illegal. But enforcing an EULA that restricts my installing a program *on* *my* *computer*, that works in *my* Ram, utilizes instructions that run through *my* CPU, and is stored on *my* hard drive, is granting a little more power to Blizzard than I think is safe.


Ah - your argument is that companies would never be so foolish as to use a legal advantage that you believe they have a right to use in an unethical way that might, or might not, blow up in their face afterwards.

You remind me of the Ayn Rand Institute at the Microsoft Trial - They had this hilarious "Friend of the court" brief where they argued that Microsoft could not be exercising monopoly power, because it is impossible for a monopoly to exist without government fiat.

Microsoft cannot exercise Monopoly power because monopolies can't exist, therefore Microsoft can't be a Monopoly - QED

Not believing that a company would abuse this interpretation of contract law to achieve market dominance is like arguing that since assaulting someone would result in their hitting back, no one would ever assault someone. Obviously it's foolish to have laws against assault. No sense having any safeguards against someone doing something that no one with any sense would do.

You have such a wonderful faith in humanity that I feel so very certain you can forgive my cynicism. Also, sarcasm.


Blaming Blizzard for Microsoft? No. Drawing a parallel between
A) handing off to a large software company a right to prevent you from running software on your personal property when they consider it to be a threat to their profit margins,
and a large, drawn out case where a large software company attempted to use their market dominance to prevent you from running software on your personal property because they considered it to be a threat to their profit margins.

Yeah - that I will do.

Bluntly - I think you're a bit naive not to consider the possibility that, having handed software companies a very large hammer, it's just feasible what you think a nail looks like might not be what they think a nail looks like.

Jonnan

Regarding Vernor v Autodesk:



In this case the court addressed, then chose to ignore three previous rulings, in favor of citing the Wise decision. The original transaction was ruled a "sale with contractual restrictions on use and transfer of the software." Thus the software was sold, not licensed, so all following actions were allowed under 117.

Compare this ruling with the MDY case. The transaction was ruled a license, not a purchase, while citing all four of the same cases the Vernor decision adressed. The operative difference is that this decision actually incorporated the three cases the Vernor decision considered hopelessly at odds with Wise.



Software is a separate copyright issue from more traditional materials. Previous cases have ruled the loading of a program into RAM constitutes copying. Thus the very use of the software requires a form of copying which must be adressed, while films, books, CDs, etc do not necessarily require such copying.

If the acquisition of the software is legally a sale, section 117 covers this copying as necessary to the function of the product. If the transaction is a license, specific permission from the copyright holder is necessary. The EULA provides this permission, but imposes limitations on that permission. If you see that as "stomping on the consumers' rights", so be it. No one is forcing them to use the product, nor are they prevented from creating their own competing product. This, also, was addressed in the MDY decision.

The essential difference is that MS was attacking a competitor, not a parasite. If MS had had an EULA provision banning ALL web browsers (including their own!) from use with the Windows operating system, the cases would be comparable.

You are mistakenly assuming this case encourages monopolistic practices. I have no doubts whatsoever that someone will attempt to use it that way, but I also have no doubt that such usage will be stricken down.

What doesnt make since to me is that the guy dint have a plan B or a proper excape route for when Blizzer came looking for him. I mean if i was him. The monent i caught a wiff of blizzerd getting near i would of closed shop and cut my losses, but this guy didnt. He baicaly let himself get caught from what i hear.

Well I think that is where everyone fundamentally agrees, software is for some reason treated differently, but that is also where I think the agreement breaks down.  Myself as well as EFF and PK don't believe that software should be different.  They should have the same copyright protections no more and if they want an EULA that is fine but it shouldn't be allowed to run afoul of existing consumer protections.  I see no reason software needs to have more protections than any other copyrighted materials.  If I buy it I own it, I can then do what I want with it such as sell it, modify it, copy it, and so on within copyright law limits.

If standard copyright protections were enough to deal with software issues, companies would not pay their lawyers to write them, and courts would not uphold them.

The major point of contention is that you are not even looking at the copyright holder's point of view. All you see is an agreement you feel is taking your rights - the company sees an agreement which is the only possible way to exercise their rights. Standard copyright protection as currently legislated cannot conceivably provide software the same protection it provides printed material. A copyright holder's only recourse is to license the material and enforce its rights by EULA.

The best solution to this situation would have been for the DMCA to have be written to address these issues. The second best would be another law to supersede DMCA, which adresses copyright control issues. Unfortunately, getting 218 congressmen, 51 senators, and a president to pass effective legislation without loopholes you could drive a Macy's parade through just isn't going to happen.

The solution we have now is geting a handful of judges to agree on what the law should have said. At this point, courts are very un-democratic versions of congress - they're getting lobbied (and that's exactly what an amicus brief is), passing laws (or interpretations of laws, which have the force of laws), and making decisions that affect our daily life - and they answer to absolutely no one.

It's not ideal, but it has one major advantage over how laws are *supposed* to be made - it works. More than you can say for congress most of the time.

I agree and this is one of the primary reasons that I am dubious of some court rulings as I see what you are describing all the time.  Just cause it works doesn't mean I have to like it or agree with it!

I agree with you here, not a large fan of the DMCA but I don't disagree with this.

I don't see why standard copyright protection are not enough for software?  Also courts have not always upheld EULAs.  Oh I am looking at their point of view however I just don't buy that they need extra protections.

These extensions are either licensed or only work because of an inbuild feature of a given program as intended by the devs of the program.




But they do not own the WoW Program. Neither did the programmer of wowglider. But his program uses and needs the wow program to do anything. Which is illegal.




I do not believe microsoft has the right to forbid certain software to be executed on windows. At least if there is competitioner software which is not forbidden.
Also i never generelized that way.
And in the case you were describing. it would certainly "blow their face afterwards".



Errrhm sry? Netscape died because inet explorer came for free with windows.
Even if one buyed netscape it would not have hurt mircosoft since you already buyed inet explorer from them in any case.
So i see no reason why mircosoft would have forbidden the use of netscape on windows.

Not to mention that this is a very bad parallel since wowglider does not compete with wow.

First, returning a product after a rejected EULA. Not a legitimate solution.

There are costs incurred in purchasing a fraudulent product, shipping if you buy it online, time spent, fuel expenditures. In my case, I'm looking at 8 bucks easy to "take" a game back. I will stop violating them and return objectionable EULA containing products when I am reimbursed in a proper fashion for such a violation. The exchange of legal tender is a binding contract, the restricting EULA is a breach of that contract, it's very simple. They violate mine, I violate theirs.

Second, extra protections being necessary, bullshit. Spelling out copyright for all the fucking retards that don't know they aren't allowed to copy and distribute it, sure.

Stardocks licensing agreements have no such thing in them. All restrictions are protected by copyright law. The only thing that could even be considered extra protection is the ban on reverse engineering, and to actually do something with the legal right to reverse engineer it would require breaking copyright law.

A termination clause so EA can shut off their activation server without patching it out of their games and fuck you over has nothing to do with protecting their software. It has to do with fucking you over.

Psychoak a little vitriolic for my taste but I hear you and 100% agree with you.

I must admit Stardock is one of the few software companies that actually gets it, and there for earns every dollar I give them. 

If you steal laptops and bring them to *your* house, plug them into *your* electrical outlets, and connect them to *your* router, they are still stolen laptops, and you are still a thief.

Bringing something into your house, or in this case, transferring something to your computer, does not imply a transfer of ownership rights.



Two wrongs never make a right, and you don't fight fire with gasoline. You're just making another excuse for them to create their DRM, and you're just making the problem worse.

That's an absurd contention. Companies will pay lawyers to do anything lawyerly that they think will gain them an advantage. It doesn't matter whether it's an advantage they need or not, just that it's an advantage they can use. Companies will also pay lobbyists to work to get laws passed to give the lawyers something to work with. That's what we're looking at here - not companies doing something they need to do in order to stay in the business they are in, but companies doing something they think gives them an advantage that helps them not have to deal with the reality that would exist if they didn't buy off our legal system to help them screw over their customers to help pad their bottom lines.

bots ftw!

You do fight fire with gasoline, perhaps you've never heard of back burning?

The other statement is patently absurd, sheer naivety to apply it to the situation.

When using a logical fallacy argument, you actually have to apply it in a logical fashion, else you're simply creating a logical fallacy yourself. "Two wrongs don't make a right" is a counter to the logical fallacy of justification by example. It's just fine if I lie because other people lie. It has no bearing on protecting yourself from someone doing you harm, defense of yourself and your property is not a wrong, it's a right.

It would however apply to EA stealing from their customers because pirates steal from them.