HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: brent@media.mit.edu (Brent C.J. Britton)
Subject: Re: BSDI lawsuit
Organization: MIT Media Laboratory
Date: Thu, 31 Dec 1992 15:54:23 GMT

mnemonic@eff.org (Mike Godwin) writes:
>bhayden@teal.csn.org (Bruce Hayden) writes:
>>mnemonic@eff.org (Mike Godwin) writes:
>>
>>> If I run across a trade secret
>>>that somebody has left on the subway seat next to me, I can reveal it
>>>without having action taken against me.
>>
>>Unless you knew or should have known that the trade secret was acquired
>>by improper means. (Uniform Trade Secret Act).
>
>I believe this applies only if scienter *precedes* the acquisition,
>Bruce. It seems likely that, say, a Wall Street Journal reporter
>who comes across a trade secret after it has been left on the
>subway could publish what she finds, without fear of civil or criminal
>liability, even if it is apparent that the secret was originally acquired
>or disclosed by improper means.
>

The restatement conflicts with the uniform act on this point.

Both the restatement and the uniform TS act include in the definition of
misappropriation the use or disclosure of a TS, without consent, by a
person who had reason to know it was a TS and that knowledge of it had
been acquired by accident or mistake.  

According to the restatement, the misappropriator is required to have
notice before learning the TS. According to the uniform act, scienter
must precede "a material change in his or her position", not merely
acquisition.

-brent


-- 

---
Brent C.J. Britton <brent@media-lab.media.mit.edu> "I never expect to
see a perfect work from imperfect man." -- Publius (Alexander Hamilton)
Newsgroups: alt.suit.att-bsdi,comp.org.eff.talk,misc.legal.software
From: scs@iti.org (Steve Simmons)
Subject: Re: BSDI lawsuit
Organization: Industrial Technology Institute
Date: Tue, 29 Dec 1992 17:32:06 GMT

bhayden@teal.csn.org (Bruce Hayden) writes:

>usenet@crd.ge.com (Required for NNTP) writes:

>>. . . My limited understanding of "trade secret" law leads me
>>to believe that once the cat is out of the bag, it's out. Based on a
>>single data point, I believe that if someone reveals a trade secret the
>>original holder can take legal action against the party revealing the
>>secret, but not against any future users of the information.

>Not true. Trade secret law extends to those that acquire or disclose
>trade secrets using improper means, or know that the information was
>improperly acquired, OR SHOULD HAVE KNOWN. 

>Thus, those that see "CONFIDENTIAL AND PROPRIETARY" on the top of a
>listing may be liable if they acquire or disclose the trade secret.

Close but no cigar (and our corporate lawyer backs me up on this point).
Once a trade secret has become publicly known, it is no longer trade
secret.  So the original poster is correct -- once the cat is out of
the bag it's out, and anyone can make use of the former trade secret.

However, should that secret enter the general knowledge due to improper
actions on the part of some third party (eg, some publishing company
decides to publish the complete sVr4 source code), that third party
is liable for damages to the tune of whatever the trade secret was worth.

So you're both right.

Please note that trade secret and copyright are two entirely different
kettles of fish.  Assuming the sVr4 source code is copyright USL, the
act of publishing described above would abrogate any trade secrets
but would leave the copyright intact.  Thus you could learn from the
code and write your own, but not use *that specific code*.
-- 
	"You can't get here from here."
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From: faustus@ygdrasil.CS.Berkeley.EDU (Wayne A. Christopher)
Newsgroups: alt.suit.att-bsdi,comp.org.eff.talk,comp.org.sug,comp.org.usenix
Subject: Re: Novell buys Unix Systems Laboratory
Date: 26 Dec 1992 21:24:09 GMT
Organization: University of California, Berkeley
Distribution: inet
NNTP-Posting-Host: ygdrasil.cs.berkeley.edu

Whatever your opinions are regarding the USL/BSDI suit, I think this 
could be a good time to make them known to the Novell management.  Some
reasons for this:

	(1)  AT&T had a lot less to fear from the programmer community
	     than Novell has.  Some us cancelled our AT&T long distance,
	     but that's about all we could do.  With Novell, on the
	     other hand, we could mount a somewhat more effective
	     commercial disincentive to pursue the suit.  (Maybe not much
	     of one at that, but perhaps enough to make them think about
	     it.)

	(2)  Novell is probably buying USL more for their technology
	     than for their licensing revenue.  USL wasn't helping
	     AT&T much, so they probably saw the suit as the only way
	     they could preserve their investment (protecting their
	     licensing perogatives).  Since it is less critical for
	     Novell, maybe they will be more willing to give it up.
	
Can anybody post the address of somebody at Novell to write to about
this?  Maybe it is too late to convince Novell to make USL drop the suit,
but we can at least let them know that this kind of practice doesn't make
them any friends in the programming community.

	Wayne
Newsgroups: alt.suit.att-bsdi,comp.org.eff.talk,comp.org.sug,comp.org.usenix
From: thompsn@ccu.umanitoba.ca (Adam Thompson)
Subject: Re: Novell buys Unix Systems Laboratory
Organization: University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, Canada
Date: Wed, 23 Dec 1992 05:36:02 GMT

In <1992Dec23.033508.3126@fcom.cc.utah.edu> terry@cs.weber.edu (A Wizard of Earth C) writes:

>	Both 386BSD and Linux are out of the water if USL wins against UCB,
>as both are making use of Net/2 code (although 386BSD makes rather more
>heavy use than Linux) without USL having to fire a shot.  Saying USL is
>going after 386BSD or Linux is, for the near future, only a potential
>threat.
>					Terry Lambert
>					terry@icarus.weber.edu

Sorry, Terry -- the code in Linux (TCP/IP stuff) was specifically written
WITHOUT and Net/2 code, to avoid this problem.  The author's original
beta announcement explicitly mentions the fact that he only glanced at the
Net/2 code, and in fact wrote the TCP/IP support directly from the
standards documents.  (Said documents are, to the best of my recall, a mix
of RFCs and ISO standards...)

-Adam Thompson
 thompsn@ccu.umanitoba.ca
-- 
+----------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Adam Thompson        University of Manitoba        Computer Services |
| Adam_Thompson@umanitoba.ca                  OLC Project - Unix Group |
Newsgroups: alt.suit.att-bsdi,comp.org.eff.talk,comp.org.sug,comp.org.usenix
From: terry@cs.weber.edu (A Wizard of Earth C)
Subject: Re: Novell buys Unix Systems Laboratory
Organization: Weber State University  (Ogden, UT)
Distribution: alt
Date: Sat, 26 Dec 92 23:00:01 GMT

In article <BZS.92Dec24225730@world.std.com> bzs@world.std.com (Barry Shein) writes:
>
>From: terry@cs.weber.edu (A Wizard of Earth C)
>>Again, not argued -- although your interpretation of USLs intent is still
>>open to interpretation.  I interpret it to mean that USL claims ownership
>>not of the code, but of the trade secrets embodied in the code, and that
>>non-commercial distribution was within the bounds of UCBs license, and
>>that, further, their error lies in their alleged association with BSDI,
>>a commercial venture.
>
>No, completely false. If this was true than how did Sun (for example,
>and DEC and many others) build their entire business on the UCB code
>(pre-Net/x)? Or are they not commercial?

By the fact that AT&T was prohibited from participation in the commercial
software market until after the breakup; your examples are pre-breakup
companies who might be able to enforce a prescriptive lean on the code
by virtue of their adverse possession of it.  Remember Apple's use of
a non-revokable USCD Pascal license?

>All that was required, from USL's point of view, was that you hold an
>appropriate source license from USL (or, earlier, WECO/AT&T.)

Actually, the comapnies you have named hold such licenses and are therefore
not actionable (on those grounds).

>There was never any line drawn in regards to commercial/non-commercial
>for UCB.

I disagree.  Examine the text of the original 32V licenses from WECO.

>USL had different prices for source licenses for those various types of
>customers, but that's irrelevant to what you're claiming.

It's relevant... UCB quit licensing after 32V *because* of the terms of
the licenses.


					Terry Lambert
					terry@icarus.weber.edu
---
Any opinions in this posting are my own and not those of my present
or previous employers.
-- 
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Newsgroups: alt.suit.att-bsdi,comp.org.eff.talk,comp.org.sug,comp.org.usenix
From: bzs@world.std.com (Barry Shein)
Subject: Re: Novell buys Unix Systems Laboratory
Organization: The World
	<scs.725032679@wotan.iti.org> <1992Dec23.033508.3126@fcom.cc.utah.edu>
	<ARL.92Dec24175923@deathstar.cs.hut.fi>
Distribution: alt
Date: Thu, 24 Dec 1992 18:27:49 GMT


>	Linux kernel is made by Linus Torvalds, not BSD or AT&T.
>	[Linus has been using or known unix since '90, he has
>	not seen any AT&T or BSD sources (he's not blind;-)].

That may be true, however: Emboldened with a favorable court judgement
USL may well push this towards something like look-and-feel, there is
strong language about proprietary concepts in the suit, not merely
copied code.

How many different ways can someone write, for example, namei()? Or
implement BSD-style directory management (now that many BSD features
have been incorporated into SVR4 I assume that USL considers these
concepts their own?)

Mere similarity may become the issue since it would be very hard to
prove that someone (not to mention "everyone who contributed") has
never seen any proprietary code which may have influenced the design
they later chose to implement.

>	PLEASE, _read_ the code then talk again.

That's irrelevant unless you can really look at it as a bunch of
lawyers, judges and jurors will see it, and also take into account how
much of a legal battle Linux could withstand to even make their point
(my guess: about zero, and with an unfavorable decision to fight it
will get much more expensive.)

-- 
        -Barry Shein

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From: terry@cs.weber.edu (A Wizard of Earth C)
Newsgroups: alt.suit.att-bsdi,comp.org.eff.talk,comp.org.sug,comp.org.usenix
Subject: Re: Novell buys Unix Systems Laboratory
Date: 26 Dec 92 22:14:58 GMT
Distribution: alt
Organization: Weber State University  (Ogden, UT)

In article <ARL.92Dec24175923@deathstar.cs.hut.fi> arl@cs.hut.fi (Ari Lemmke) writes:
>In article <1992Dec23.033508.3126@fcom.cc.utah.edu> terry@cs.weber.edu (A Wizard of Earth C) writes:
>:	   Both 386BSD and Linux are out of the water if USL wins against UCB,
>:   as both are making use of Net/2 code (although 386BSD makes rather more
>:   heavy use than Linux) without USL having to fire a shot.  Saying USL is
>:   going after 386BSD or Linux is, for the near future, only a potential
>:   threat.
>
>	NO NO NO, do _not_ start this thread again.
>
>	Linux kernel is made by Linus Torvalds, not BSD or AT&T.
>	[Linus has been using or known unix since '90, he has
>	not seen any AT&T or BSD sources (he's not blind;-)].
>
>	PLEASE, _read_ the code then talk again.
>
>	KERNEL != some device drivers. RML (although you can't see me ;-)

So what you are saying is that new code written by someone familiar with
UNIX does not necessarily embody the trade secrets which USL claims to
own simply because it performs the same tasks?

Isn't this basically the argument under litigation?

Or are you arguing a clean-room rewrite?  This also is not possible, if,
as you say, "Linus has been using or known unix since '90" and "he's not
blind".

In the ammended suit, it appears to me that the claims to ownership of the
disputed "trade secrets" isn't effected by what code embodies them.  This
is the basis for the much argued "contamination" of programmers, which is
complicated by the non-disclosure (something not possible if the trade
secrets are to be kept).


					Terry Lambert
					terry@icarus.weber.edu
---
Any opinions in this posting are my own and not those of my present
or previous employers.
-- 
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From: hsu@cs.hut.fi (Heikki Suonsivu)
Newsgroups: alt.suit.att-bsdi
Subject: Re: Novell buys Unix Systems Laboratory
Date: 23 Dec 92 15:27:02 GMT
	<scs.725032679@wotan.iti.org> <1992Dec23.033508.3126@fcom.cc.utah.edu>
Distribution: alt
Organization: Helsinki University of Technology, Finland
NNTP-Posting-Host: laphroaig.cs.hut.fi
In-reply-to: terry@cs.weber.edu's message of Wed, 23 Dec 92 03:35:08 GMT


In article <1992Dec23.033508.3126@fcom.cc.utah.edu> terry@cs.weber.edu (A Wizard of Earth C) writes:
   many reasons, not the least of which is commercial support.  The most likely

I use free software because it *has* support, which no commercial company
has been able to provide to me this far.  True, my views are not views of
the greater public, as I'm mostly using software development tools and
things like TeX.

Commercial software is better supported in the USA than it is in the
Europe.  Local support either ignores the problems or forwards them to USA,
so if you get help, you get it in some monts, when you have already figured
out a workaround or replaced the faulty software.  Faulty software here
means products like MSC 5.0, Microport Unix, SunOS, most other unix
variants, Ingres and many others I have been forced to use because no
reasonable free alternative existed that time.

Now the situation is changing rapidly, most unix tools and all the
development tools have been replaced with GNU variants and free 386 unixes
are getting stable enough to be used in commercial environments, not just
home use.

Actually, the sale to Novell would be a great business to AT&T.  They
probably get a good price now, but if they fail the Net2 suit, the shares
will undoubtely drop a lot.  Not just because of the free software, but
also because of lots of savings to OSF, BSDI and other companies which
could use or are using Net2 code.

Commercial software is good only for companies making commercial software.
For customers, it would be a lot better if the software would be free.  I
would rather pay $10k to a company for free software than $5k to a company
for commercial software.  Good example of this would be the GCC for
Solaris.  I would expect this to be seen in things like accounting software
in a couple of years, when the larger customer base will realize this.

-
Heikki Suonsivu, T{ysikuu 10 C 83/02210 Espoo/FINLAND,
hsu@{otax.tky.hut,cs.hut,clinet}.fi  +385-0-8031121
/G=Heikki/S=Suonsivu/O=hut/OU=cs/PRMD=Inet/ADMD=Fumail/C=FI,
mcsun!hutcs!hsu, riippu SN, Email preferable.
Newsgroups: alt.suit.att-bsdi,comp.org.eff.talk,comp.org.sug,comp.org.usenix
From: bzs@world.std.com (Barry Shein)
Newsgroups: alt.suit.att-bsdi,comp.org.eff.talk,comp.org.sug,comp.org.usenix
Subject: Novell buys Unix Systems Laboratory
Date: 21 Dec 92 17:55:09 GMT
Distribution: alt
Organization: The World


Announced today on the news, $350M, official announcement 2PM EST,
Unix is a trademark of Novell, Inc.

No idea what this portends for the suit against BSDI.



-- 
        -Barry Shein

Software Tool & Die    | bzs@world.std.com          | uunet!world!bzs
Purveyors to the Trade | Voice: 617-739-0202        | Login: 617-739-WRLD
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From: wb8foz@skybridge.SCL.CWRU.Edu (David Lesher)
Newsgroups: alt.suit.att-bsdi,comp.org.eff.talk,comp.org.sug,comp.org.usenix
Subject: Re: Novell buys Unix Systems Laboratory
Date: 23 Dec 1992 00:25:14 GMT
Organization: NRK Clinic for habitual NetNews abusers - Beltway Annex
Distribution: alt
Reply-To: wb8foz@skybridge.scl.cwru.edu (David Lesher)
NNTP-Posting-Host: skybridge.scl.cwru.edu

Others said:
# >I particularly liked the word "purify..." :?

Purity of Essence...
Watch out for florides!
Drink only rain water, and pure grain alcohol!

:-}

--
A host is a host from coast to coast..wb8foz@skybridge.scl.cwru.edu
& no one will talk to a host that's close..........................
Unless the host (that isn't close).........................pob 1433
is busy, hung or dead....................................20915-1433
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From: hsu@cs.hut.fi (Heikki Suonsivu)
Newsgroups: alt.suit.att-bsdi,comp.org.eff.talk,comp.org.sug,comp.org.usenix
Subject: Re: Novell buys Unix Systems Laboratory
Date: 23 Dec 92 16:56:24 GMT
	<scs.725032679@wotan.iti.org> <1992Dec23.033508.3126@fcom.cc.utah.edu>
	<scs.725118848@wotan.iti.org>
Distribution: alt
Organization: Helsinki University of Technology, Finland
NNTP-Posting-Host: laphroaig.cs.hut.fi
In-reply-to: scs@iti.org's message of 23 Dec 92 13:54:08 GMT


In article <scs.725118848@wotan.iti.org> scs@iti.org (Steve Simmons) writes:
   Why hasn't USL sued the Jolitzes?  It is a reasonable strategy to pick
   one target first, establish your case, then go on to the others.

To be more specific, pick the target which is a commercial institution and
still small enought that it cannot stand large-scale attack from a large
company.  Jolitzes would be more difficult:

a) They are not a business, so they might get a layer by the state (not
good one, but anyway).

b) They would probably gain more public support than a company might get.
It isn't just money which is important in a court, votes may also count :-)

On the other side, something like OSF would be a large enough to sustain a
long and expensive fight.

FSF is more careful to avoid anything which would get them involved, so
they might be a bad target (and probably would get lots of outside
support).

-
Heikki Suonsivu, T{ysikuu 10 C 83/02210 Espoo/FINLAND,
hsu@{otax.tky.hut,cs.hut,clinet}.fi  +385-0-8031121
/G=Heikki/S=Suonsivu/O=hut/OU=cs/PRMD=Inet/ADMD=Fumail/C=FI,
mcsun!hutcs!hsu, riippu SN, Email preferable.
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From: brent@media.mit.edu (Brent C.J. Britton)
Newsgroups: alt.suit.att-bsdi,comp.org.eff.talk,comp.org.sug,comp.org.usenix
Subject: Re: Novell buys Unix Systems Laboratory
Summary: copyright duration answer
Date: 31 Dec 92 18:10:44 GMT
Distribution: alt
Organization: MIT Media Laboratory

In article <17759@umd5.umd.edu> mark@roissy.umd.edu (Mark Sienkiewicz) writes:
>In>
>p.s.  I've seen code that says "Copyright 1973 Bell Telephone Laboratories
>Inc".  Under the old copyright law, shouldn't that be expired by now?
>
Current US copyright law gives a 28-year duration from the date copyright
was originally secured, for pre-1978 works.  If the copyright holder
renews during the last year of the first 28-year term (in this case, in
2001), then the duration is extended to 75 years from the date copyright
was originally secured.

So, if Bell (or whomever) plays their cards right, the code you've seen
should be protected until 2048.

-brent



-- 
---
Brent C.J. Britton <brent@media-lab.media.mit.edu, brent@eff.org> "I never
expect to see a perfect work from imperfect man." -- Publius (Hamilton)
Newsgroups: alt.suit.att-bsdi,comp.org.eff.talk,comp.org.sug,comp.org.usenix
From: terry@cs.weber.edu (A Wizard of Earth C)
Subject: Re: Novell buys Unix Systems Laboratory
Organization: University of Utah Computer Center
Date: Fri, 25 Dec 92 01:55:24 GMT

In article <1992Dec23.133820.10173@crd.ge.com>, davidsen@ariel.crd.GE.COM (william E Davidsen) writes:
|> In article <Bzp683.C2s@ccu.umanitoba.ca>, thompsn@ccu.umanitoba.ca (Adam Thompson) writes:
|> | In <1992Dec23.033508.3126@fcom.cc.utah.edu> terry@cs.weber.edu (A Wizard of Earth C) writes:
|> | 
|> | >	Both 386BSD and Linux are out of the water if USL wins against UCB,
|> | >as both are making use of Net/2 code (although 386BSD makes rather more
|> | >heavy use than Linux) without USL having to fire a shot.  Saying USL is
|> | >going after 386BSD or Linux is, for the near future, only a potential
|> | >threat.
|> | 
|> | Sorry, Terry -- the code in Linux (TCP/IP stuff) was specifically written
|> | WITHOUT and Net/2 code, to avoid this problem.  The author's original
|> | beta announcement explicitly mentions the fact that he only glanced at the
|> | Net/2 code, and in fact wrote the TCP/IP support directly from the
|> | standards documents.  (Said documents are, to the best of my recall, a mix
|> | of RFCs and ISO standards...)
|> 
|>   Oh, Terry probably considers that a "trivial unimportant issue" too.

No, I don't think it's a "trivial unimportant issue"... I simply believe
it's irrelevant in terms of whether or not there will be litigation.

I believe that Linux is more likely to be "sold commercially" -- in the same
way that a number of companies are selling support services for other GPLed
products.  You could, of course, decide to sell 386BSD yourself and thus
mark yourself as a potential commercial threat.  If you did so, I believe
that 386BSD would become the more likely of the two targets.

It has been commonly accepted that where BSDI goes, so goes UCB; I think that
this is an arguable connection.  A less arguable connection is that where UCB
goes, so goes 386BSD.

I think in the circumstance of judgement against UCB, the existance of
386BSD will no longer be argued; however, I think Linux will still be
contended, and that this is what likely to attract a suit.


					Terry Lambert
					terry@icarus.weber.edu
					terry_lambert@novell.com
---
Any opinions in this posting are my own and not those of my present
or previous employers.
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From: smb@research.att.com (Steven Bellovin)
Subject: Re: Novell buys Unix Systems Laboratory
Date: Tue, 22 Dec 1992 13:32:49 GMT
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories

In article <1992Dec22.063542.25302@cadreor.cadre.com>, neil@cadreor.cadre.com (Neil W. Van Dyke) writes:
> Barry Shein (bzs@world.std.com) wrote:
> > Announced today on the news, $350M, official announcement 2PM EST,
> > Unix is a trademark of Novell, Inc.
> > 
> > No idea what this portends for the suit against BSDI.
> 
> Things should be interesting.
> 
> Hmm...  Maybe we'll be seeing a commercial Plan 9 release soon...

Plan 9 is still a research project at AT&T Bell Laboratories.  It's got
nothing to do with USL, so far as I know.
Newsgroups: alt.suit.att-bsdi