Mauro M. wrote:
If they do how can they have an interest into non
disclosing information on old and no longer
commercially exploited technology?
That's their right to determine, not ours or yours.
This is arguable. As a consumer I have the right to use the hardware I purchase
in whatever way I see fit and without limitations. Moore's law has accelerated
the aging of technology consumer products, however in real terms I would expect
any goods I purchase to be usable for more than a decade.
Aside from the fact that your first sentence (well, OK second) isn't
true for a wide variety of cases (in all jurisdictions), you're hardware
is still usable. You're asking for /UPGRADABLE/. Which is a completely
different issue. Even still, there is a long history in all sorts of
industries of equipment which has a built-in obsolescence.
If a vendor decides to no longer support a product, he should be forced to
disclose the information necessary for the consumers to continue to use their
product, and any IP and licenses made void and unenforceable.
I hope that this will be clarified by future legislation, and I am confident that in Europe this will happen sooner or later.
There's a been quite a bit of discussion in the OpenSource community
about "abandonware" in it's many forms - software, computer hardware,
even copyrighted works. However, there hasn't been any real discussion
in the Intellectual Property legal realm (in either the US or Europe)
about codifying this into Copyright Law. Unfortunately, if anything,
the trends have been mostly moving the other direction, towards giving
more control to the IP owner, and less freedom to the public. So I
wouldn't hold your breath for this to change anytime soon.
--
Erik Trimble
Java System Support
Mailstop: usca22-123
Phone: x17195
Santa Clara, CA
Timezone: US/Pacific (GMT-0800)
_______________________________________________
opensolaris-discuss mailing list
opensolaris-discuss@opensolaris.org
