This is being retained on the Strategis Website for purposes of comparison and historical interest. Prior to the Government deciding to expressly protect computer programs by the Copyright Act, there was considerable debate over the proper form of protection. Computer programs do not fit easily into any of the traditional categories of copyright or patent.
Patents traditionally protect utilitarian items such as machinery or other kinds of hardware.
Software usually achieves a utilitarian result but operates as a result of a written work ie., the source code. Software being essentially utilitarian should only be protected if disclosure is made - it is wrong to provide a term of protection almost three times as long as the term of patent protection when there is no disclosure required to obtain copyright protection. Now all the rules of copyright that apply to literary works apply to software, even when the application seems to be somewhat stretched.