his section is a political message from the League for Programming Freedom to the users of Window Maker.
We have included it here because the issue of interface copyright is important to the GNU project and window managers !
Apple, Lotus, and now CDC have tried to create a new form of legal monopoly: a copyright on a user interface.
An interface is a kind of language---a set of conventions for communication between two entities, human or machine. Until a few years ago, the law seemed clear: interfaces were outside the domain of copyright, so programmers could program freely and implement whatever interface the users demanded. Imitating de-facto standard interfaces, sometimes with improvements, was standard practice in the computer field. These improvements, if accepted by the users, caught on and became the norm; in this way, much progress took place.
Computer users, and most software developers, were happy with this state of affairs. However, large companies such as Apple and Lotus would prefer a different system---one in which they can own interfaces and thereby rid themselves of all serious competitors. They hope that interface copyright will give them, in effect, monopolies on major classes of software.
Other large companies such as IBM and Digital also favor interface monopolies, for the same reason: if languages become property, they expect to own many de-facto standard languages. But Apple and Lotus are the ones who have actually sued. Apple's lawsuit was defeated, for reasons only partly related to the general issue of interface copyright.
Lotus won lawsuits against two small companies, which were thus put out of business. Then Lotus sued Borland; Lotus won in the trial court (no surprise, since it was the same court that had ruled for Lotus twice before), but the court of appeals ruled in favor of Borland, which was assisted by a friend-of-the-court brief from the League for Programming Freedom.
Lotus appealed the case to the Supreme Court, which heard the case but was unable to reach a decision. This failure means that the appeals court decision stands, in one portion of the United States, and may influence the other appeals courts, but it does not set a nationwide precedent. The battle is not over, and it is not limited to the United States.
The battle is extending into other areas of software as well. In 1995 a company that produced a simulator for a CDC computer was shut down by a copyright lawsuit, in which CDC charged that the simulator infringed the copyright on the manuals for the computer.
If the monopolists get their way, they will hobble the software field:
If interface monopolies are accepted, other large companies are waiting to grab theirs:
Users invest a great deal of time and money in learning to use computer interfaces. Far more, in fact, than software developers invest in developing *and even implementing* the interfaces. Whoever can own an interface, has made its users into captives, and misappropriated their investment.
To protect our freedom from monopolies like these, a group of programmers and users have formed a grass-roots political organization, the League for Programming Freedom.
The purpose of the League is to oppose monopolistic practices such as interface copyright and software patents. The League calls for a return to the legal policies of the recent past, in which programmers could program freely. The League is not concerned with free software as an issue, and is not affiliated with the Free Software Foundation.
The League's activities include publicizing the issues, as is being done here, and filing friend-of-the-court briefs on behalf of defendants sued by monopolists.
The League's membership rolls include Donald Knuth, the foremost authority on algorithms, John McCarthy, inventor of Lisp, Marvin Minsky, founder of the MIT Artificial Intelligence lab, Guy L. Steele, Jr., author of well-known books on Lisp and C, as well as Richard Stallman, the developer of GNU CC. Please join and add your name to the list. Membership dues in the League are $42 per year for programmers, managers and professionals; $10.50 for students; $21 for others.
Activist members are especially important, but members who have no time to give are also important. Surveys at major ACM conferences have indicated a vast majority of attendees agree with the League on both issues (interface copyrights and software patents). If just ten percent of the programmers who agree with the League join the League, we will probably triumph.
To join, or for more information, phone (617) 243-4091 or write to:
League for Programming Freedom
1 Kendall Square #143
P.O. Box 9171
Cambridge, MA 02139
You can also send electronic mail to lpf@@uunet.uu.net
In addition to joining the League, here are some suggestions from the League for other things you can do to protect your freedom to write programs:
House Subcommittee on Intellectual Property
2137 Rayburn Bldg
Washington, DC 20515
Senate Subcommittee on Patents, Trademarks and Copyrights
United States Senate
Washington, DC 20510
(These committees have received lots of mail already; let's give them even more.)
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If you want to have more free software a few years from now, it makes sense for you to help encourage people to contribute funds for its development. The most effective approach known is to encourage commercial redistributors to donate.
Users of free software systems can boost the pace of development by encouraging for-a-fee distributors to donate part of their selling price to free software developers---the Free Software Foundation, and others.
The way to convince distributors to do this is to demand it and expect it from them. So when you compare distributors, judge them partly by how much they give to free software development. Show distributors they must compete to be the one who gives the most.
To make this approach work, you must insist on numbers that you can compare, such as, ``We will donate ten dollars to the Frobnitz project for each disk sold.'' Don't be satisfied with a vague promise, such as ``A portion of the profits are donated,'' since it doesn't give a basis for comparison.
Even a precise fraction ``of the profits from this disk'' is not very meaningful, since creative accounting and unrelated business decisions can greatly alter what fraction of the sales price counts as profit. If the price you pay is $50, ten percent of the profit is probably less than a dollar; it might be a few cents, or nothing at all.
Some redistributors do development work themselves. This is useful too; but to keep everyone honest, you need to inquire how much they do, and what kind. Some kinds of development make much more long-term difference than others. For example, maintaining a separate version of a program contributes very little; maintaining the standard version of a program for the whole community contributes much. Easy new ports contribute little, since someone else would surely do them; difficult ports such as adding a new CPU to the GNU C compiler contribute more; major new features or packages contribute the most.
By establishing the idea that supporting further development is ``the proper thing to do'' when distributing free software for a fee, we can assure a steady flow of resources into making more free software.
Copyright (C) 1994 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
Verbatim copying and redistribution of this section is permitted
without royalty; alteration is not permitted.