[osflash] Legal Considerations That Concern Us All - Was: Re: MTASC Future

[Tom George]

On Oct 25, 2005, at 10:27 PM, Mike Chambers wrote:

>
> which shows it is not as clear cut of an issue.
>

Indeed.

Back, when I worked on distributed computing products at IBM, there  
was some consternation when management learned about a little known  
European Union rule that said that when a manufacturer shipped two  
separate products, with separate part numbers, and the two parts  
"talked", then the manufacturer had to publish the protocol. This had  
us kinda worked up for a while--well y'know a day or two ;-)

In our case it became a moot point because IBM opted to go open  
source (as it turns out) for DCE. Not knowing exactly the source of  
that legal opinion I can't say if it was indeed the case, or if it's  
still in effect today, or if it might have anything to say about the  
Flash player and the various other Macromedia products that talk to it.

-Tom