iTulip intellectual property theft incident #384395647

[Raz]

Re: iTulip intellectual property theft incident #384395647

Ceiling.

!!!

(Sorry, Metalman - but that IS funny!)

[ThePythonicCow]

Re: iTulip intellectual property theft incident #384395647

for those of you who are software engineers & not writers, how'd you like it someone copypasta your code & sold it as theirs? no likey, right?

Chunks of code should not be copied ver batim, unless done so under the terms allowed, such as the GNU General Public License (GPL).

But software ideas and key terms are shared rather openly, outside of some trade secrets and some patented stuff. Trade secrets are easy to understand, albeit difficult to maintain for a long time. Just don't tell anyone outside of a select circle that agrees to keep the secret. All of us do that from time to time. Software patents are a bad idea, in my view. I never sought patent protection for my code, and I looked the other way when others disrespected code patents.

One of the key elements of a successful software effort in my view was always the creation and naming of a key concept or two, with the intention that the concepts and names will "go viral." I was always tickled pink when something that I conceived, named, designed, built and nursed into production then became well known within some community, and when a name I carefully chose became a common term of their vernacular.

If someone claimed else claimed falsely to be the primal originator, that would mildly irritate me. But that's not usually what happens.

Rather people "discover" (that's what it feels like to them, properly so) a bundle of concepts and some useful terms for naming those concepts, and "share" their "find" with others. That's good. It brings a smile to my face to see that happen to my software creations. It means that my ideas have gone out into the world, rather as children do, and made their way with some success.

If my name were usually attached to such concepts or names, that would be a bad sign, as it would be if my son were usually introduced to others, through his adult life, as my son, rather than as his own man. It would signify that that creation had failed to achieve a life of its own. Not good.

[Down Under]

Re: iTulip intellectual property theft incident #384395647

!!!

(Sorry, Metalman - but that IS funny!)

Yer, bloody oath, I agree