At 09:17 AM 2/6/98 -0600, you wrote:
>If only there was a mechanism to persuade companies to allow such hobby
>use of archaic software. It would be great if there was a standard
>document, perhaps similar to that OpenVMS license, that would eliminate
>the guilt from violating someone's copyright. "What's the harm" isn't
>good enough for me. To me, preservation of the rights of the old software
>is almost as important as the software itself. But it's not easy.
>It may be impossible. You can get an old system from a dumpster
>and if you're lucky you find floppies and the manuals.
If you have the original disk then that is normally considered proof
that you have a legal copy of the software. The claim made by some of the
software companies years ago that you didn't own the software and only had
a right (non-transferable) to use it was thrown out by the US courts
several times. I was part of a software audit team put together by a major
US defense contractor and we researched this ****VERY**** thoroughly. Even
ASP agreed to this position.
>
>Take an example from one of my pet projects, the Terak computer.
>Terak was sold to CalComp, and CalComp was bought (or was always
>owned) by McDonnell-Douglas. The last anyone saw of the Terak assets
>was a semi driving from Scottsdale to New Hampshire. This Herculean
>task now consists of finding someone within MD who has the time
>and the good will to care, and who's been around long enough to
>know what the heck I'm asking for.
>
>Then I've got to persuade them to give me the right to, oh, copy some
>fifteen-year-old floppies for someone without a legit copy, or to write
>an emulator that uses the code and allow others to get a copy.
>
>I've long heard that some varieties of dark-side hacking involve
>Social Engineering that can open a door or shoulder-surf a password,
>but I doubt it's powerful enough magic to persuade a defense contractor
>to sign a paper to give you something for nothing.
I don't know about that. A friend of mine got Martin Marietta (now
Lockheed Martin) to sign over the rights to a piece of software that he
wrote on company time. He now sells the software privately. Just have to
keep asking. Send your request to their legal department, that's where it
will end up sooner or later anyway.
Joe
>
>- John
>Jefferson Computer Museum <http://www.threedee.com/jcm>
>
>
Received on Fri Feb 06 1998 - 13:59:24 GMT