[OT] Re: Intellectual Property in Network Design

Sun Feb 15 02:15:42 UTC 2015

On Fri, Feb 13, 2015 at 10:26 PM, Skeeve Stevens <
skeeve at eintellegonetworks.com> wrote:

> My views are that if artistic endeavour is involved, then it is IP.
> Architecture is certainly that... the look... but, the pipes, sewerage,
> electricity, door locks... are not. They are products, bought of the shelf
> and assembled.
>

Hi Skeeve,

I think I see where you're getting hung up. The whole thing is intellectual
property (IP). Including all of the parts. The pipes, the wires, the locks,
all of it. But that doesn't necessarily mean that each part is protectable
independent of the rest.

Copyright law basically says that if there is any substantive creative
input into a work's creation then the work is not only copyrightable,
unless the author explicitly says different it's also copyrighted. Throw a
paint filled balloon at a canvas and the resulting splatter is copyrighted.
Consider: do more unforced choices, more optional choices, more creative
choices go in to the production of a router configuration? Of course they
do.

One can be snobbish about whether that qualifies as art, but it's certainly
intellectual property (IP).

The catch here is that independent creation is proof against copyright
violation. So if there really are only three ways to configure something,
you will never successfully enforce the fact that your configuration used
one of them. Just because your router configuration is copyrighted doesn't
mean someone else can't create exactly the same configuration. And their
version will carry a full copyright too.

Regards,
Bill Herrin

-- 
William Herrin ................ herrin at dirtside.com  bill at herrin.us
Owner, Dirtside Systems ......... Web: <http://www.dirtside.com/>