Reverse Engineering (legal issues)

[Pype.Clicker]

In my country, there's a law stating that reverse-engineering is always legal if applied with the sole goal of coming with a product compatible with the one reverse-engineered. I insist on "compatible" and not "drop-in replacement", of course.

Especially, you're always allowed to "watch the thing running in its normal environment and deduce how it works", which is more or less my approach atm.

I don't think the coarse-level reverse engineering i'm doing now may be sued (that's not like if i was trying to break their proprietary black box to spy how openGL commands are translated into register access).

Now if someone fears for the osFAQ i'm okay to move out those infos into the wiclicker instead.

[Solar]

Same law here... but then it's currently df's server (which is located in the US) so it's up to him.

[JAAman]

iirc, reverse engineering is always legal in the USA -- there is no law against it, and court decisions have held that copyright is not violated by reverse engineering (that is how the PC came to be -- compaq reverse engineered the PC BIOS)

however, it is common to sign a leagally binding contract forfiting that right (almost all software agreements include this clause, and some hardware does too -- though its much less common, as there isnt generally an agreement)

now this may have changed, i dont know for sure (havent really studied the updates to copyright law -- there have been 2 since 1978 -- both since 1990), but it was the case in the past, and the software agreements havent changed (there is no reason to include a reverse engineering clause if its already part of copyright law)


corrections welcome, as i am always glad to learn more updated information on US copyright law

[Pype.Clicker]

however, it is common to sign a leagally binding contract forfiting that right (almost all software agreements include this clause, and some hardware does too -- though its much less common, as there isnt generally an agreement)

ah. here belgian law differs (afaik): you can state anything you want in your licence contract, you cannot remove the right of your customer to do "legal" reverse engineering.

[JAAman]

that doesnt make sence to me:

isnt the whole point to contract law to restrict the natural rights for the purpose of an agreement?

example:
normally i have the right to charge whatever prices i want for a product, and change those prices anytime i want, and my customer has the right to purchase elsewhere if he doesnt like my prices
but
it is common to sign a contract, forfiting those rights for the benifit of both parties (i get gaurenteed sales volume, and you get gauranteed price)


(imho)it doesnt make any sence to not permit a binding contract to restrict your rights, as that invalidates the whole purpose to signing contracts -- a contract is essentially, a private agreement between parties -- and there should be nothing restricting what i can specify as the terms of that agreement (if this is the case, it would invalidate NDAs as well)

just my opinion

[guest]

IANAL but AFAIK, most countries, including America, have an exception in the copyright laws that forbids the restriction of a person's right to reverse engineer something to create interoperable/compatible products [provided a patent doesn't also exist for the same technology...]

[Pype.Clicker]

that doesnt make sence to me:

isnt the whole point to contract law to restrict the natural rights for the purpose of an agreement?

Yes, indeed, that's the point of contracts, but the point of contracts law is to define to what extend you may restrict natural rights. You cannot define anything in a contract. The contract may not, for instance, allow one to enfringe laws (any kind of) and in laws about informatic selling contracts in Belgium i can assure you that there are things that define your minimal rights concerning reverse engineering that may not be removed by a contract ... the same way the copyright laws state that as the author of a document, you have some unrestrictable rights (such as not agreeing that it is distributed) and you have restrictable rights (including who can make money about it).

[Candy]

(imho)it doesnt make any sence to not permit a binding contract to restrict your rights, as that invalidates the whole purpose to signing contracts -- a contract is essentially, a private agreement between parties -- and there should be nothing restricting what i can specify as the terms of that agreement (if this is the case, it would invalidate NDAs as well)

Contracts can override some properties of the law, but not all. They can make you forfeit some right you would normally have been given, but they can't make you sign a contract that makes you give up a constitutional right (or properly, you can sign it but you won't actually have lost that right). Reasonability is also attackable in court, if somebody makes you sign a contract for the rest of your life, you can fight that even if you signed it (if you can show why).