Comment Preceidents? (Score 1) 122
Check it:
Hot, that means I can write white-room version of an MP3 encoder and distribute it lawfully, I simply cannot install it and use it. (It's an example, ignore the foreign patent implications of MP3 and the DMCA reverse-eng possibilities.)
On page 3 the court reiterates a precedent from Deepsouth Packing Co. v. Laitram Corp that states it is "not an infringement to make or use a patented product outside of the United States". Nice. Amazon can't go after peeps outside the US over patents (well, duh, but still, good to say it again). On page 5 the court goes over a law Congress made in response to that stopping exports of multiple pieces with no other use than to create an infringing whole. Still nice for US extraterritorials.
Seems the decision and Stevens's dissent focus on whether software is analogous to blueprints or components, hinging on the language of Deepsouth.
-mix
AT&T holds a patent on an apparatus for digitally encoding and compressing recorded speech. ... It bears emphisis, however, that uninstalled Windows software does not infringe AT&T's patent any more than a computer standing alone does; instead, the patent is infringed only when a computer is loaded with Windows and is thereby rendered capable of performing as the patented speech processor.
Hot, that means I can write white-room version of an MP3 encoder and distribute it lawfully, I simply cannot install it and use it. (It's an example, ignore the foreign patent implications of MP3 and the DMCA reverse-eng possibilities.)
On page 3 the court reiterates a precedent from Deepsouth Packing Co. v. Laitram Corp that states it is "not an infringement to make or use a patented product outside of the United States". Nice. Amazon can't go after peeps outside the US over patents (well, duh, but still, good to say it again). On page 5 the court goes over a law Congress made in response to that stopping exports of multiple pieces with no other use than to create an infringing whole. Still nice for US extraterritorials.
Seems the decision and Stevens's dissent focus on whether software is analogous to blueprints or components, hinging on the language of Deepsouth.
-mix
