The /bin/true Command and Copyright (2009)
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The /bin/true Command and Copyright (2009)
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Re: The /bin/true Command and Copyright (2009)
#2(1990), or perhaps as late as (2009) if you have the right sense of humour.
Previous discussions:
Re: The /bin/true Command and Copyright (2009)
#3The one confusing thing to me about this is that you're not supposed to append copyright years to a notice when the contents have not changed, yet this script got copyrighted all the way to 1989.
Re: The /bin/true Command and Copyright (2009)
#4[deleted]
Re: The /bin/true Command and Copyright (2009)
#5Well damn. I guess I can’t use blank lines in my code anymore. This is going to be rough.
Also are there any copyright koans? As in a copyright notice that copyrights itself?
Re: The /bin/true Command and Copyright (2009)
#6The one confusing thing to me about this is that you're not supposed to append copyright years to a notice when the contents have not changed, yet this script got copyrighted all the way to 1989.
I’ve heard that, but I’ve also heard that the year is supposed to be updated whenever it’s published again.
Re: The /bin/true Command and Copyright (2009)
#7The court transcript of a copyright lawsuit would be hilarious:
--What is the copyright content? Nothing.
--Are you saying that that you have no copyright? No
--Okay, can you then give me a summary of the content? It's nothing
And so on.
Re: The /bin/true Command and Copyright (2009)
#8> So if you use blank lines in any of your files, you are in blatant violation of AT&T's copyright claim
Independent derivation of a work is defense against copyright infringement.
Even if the copyright on these blank lines were to be valid, it would be reasonable to claim that your own use of blank lines was independent, not a derivative work copying from theirs.
Patents do not require actual copying to infringe, but copyright does. If you can prove you did not know of the original work, or otherwise would have come up with the same thing on your own, that's enough to absolve you of copyright issues.
Re: The /bin/true Command and Copyright (2009)
#9Adding copyright notices to every source code file is reasonable because it costs next to nothing. Figuring out what is copyrightable, on the other hand, is expensive, because it requires lawyers, and a waste of time because lawyers' answers are always "it depends". You never actually know how enforceable your copyright claim is until you actually litigate, which is REALLY expensive.
Re: The /bin/true Command and Copyright (2009)
#10Adding copyright notices to every source code file is reasonable because it costs next to nothing. Figuring out what is copyrightable, on the other hand, is expensive, because it requires lawyers, and a waste of time because lawyers' answers are always "it depends". You never actually know how enforceable your copyright claim is until you actually litigate, which is REALLY expensive.
Yeah this is funny, but it's not stupid. It's also a lot simpler to have a company policy that says "every code file should have this boilerplate at the top of it" than to try to specify exactly what does and doesn't. You could even check for this in your CI pipeline, to avoid wasting time debating it in code review.