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JMRI wins major ruling in Federal Court Journals/Blogs
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Active Member 57 posts MRH_news_desk Active Member 57 posts
MRH_news_desk

JMRI - Java Model Railroading Interface open source software project.Model Railroading just made software history on August 13th with an historic court ruling on the enforceability of an open source software copyright, specifically in this case, the open source Java Model Railroad Interface.

KAM Industries, a model railroading software firm located in Portland, Oregon and owned by Matt Katzer, sued JMRI open source project founder Bob Jacobsen for patent infringement. Jacobsen and his associates argued that prior art existed for Katzer's patents, including Katzer's use of some JMRI code without proper permission as per JMRI's open source copyright license provisions.

Jacobsen filed a counter-suit against Katzer, claiming that Katzer's company was distributing a commercial software program that included taking prior art (program code) from the JMRI project without proper credits according to the open source license used to distribute JMRI.

Originally, the California court found that since JMRI was free, Katzer's improper "use" of code from a free software package in violation of the open source license was not a serious issue. Jacobsen appealed the decision, fearing that if it was left to stand, it could undermine all open source and creative commons agreements.

Fortunately for open source software advocates, the Federal court agreed strongly with Jacobsen that Katzer illegally "pirated" the open source code, even though JMRI is "free". This landmark case is one of the first to reach this level in the US courts, and helps prove that open source and creative commons licenses are legally enforceable even though the works are free.

This is good news for Model Railroad Hobbyist, since we depend on the Creative Commons License to protect our free magazine content and to help keep the content free.

For more details, you can read a copy of the New York Times article.
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ChrisNH Super User 1,277 posts
ChrisNH

Super News!

Thats great news! There has been a disturbing trend of people pilfering pre-existing software work and issuing a patent for it. Its nice to see the court close the door on that. Hopefully it will open the door for other patents and copyrights to be overturned. It also makes a strong case about applying an open license to anything one might want to put out as freeware. To do otherwise just invites being caught in a lawsuit for using your own work..

 

Chris

 

“If you carry your childhood with you, you never become older.”           My modest progress Blog
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Paul Rankin paul_r Active Member 96 posts
Paul Rankin paul_r

Thoughts on the Jacobsen/Katzer lawsuit

I've been following this with interest for several years, including reading the transcripts of the testimony and judges' decisions.  I've always heard that The Law has little or nothing to do with justice, but lots to do with interpreting the letter of the statutes and applying precedent.  It's as though lawyers and judges have a mordant fear of making a decision based on the INTENT of the statute writers, and instead rely solely on which precedents they choose to apply.  The Artistic License aspect of this case is so far-reaching, though, that the Appeals Court's decision to vacate and remand the District Court's decision has probably saved Web-based software creators' from a dreadful loss of the right to control their creations! 

The California District Court judge's statements showed (to me) a significant lack of understanding of how the Internet is different from the tangible world, but how the concepts of creativity are still very similar.  By saying the conditions of the license are contractual covenants rather than actual conditions of use, the judge missed the entire point of of what rights an author or artist has to his works.  The Appeals Court made the right decision. 

My true feelings are these - Katzer tried to steal other people's work and pass it off as his own.  He tried to patent other people's work and claim it as his own, and that fits my definition as fraud.  He tried to extort money from Jacobsen to the tune of $30 for every free download of DecodePro.  These actions are not only unfriendly, but seem to me to be criminal, and should also be actionable.  Katzer should pay all the court costs incurred by Jacobsen, and he should refund all the money he charged his customers for Decoder Commander.  I personally believe the cognizant District Attorney, or even the United States Attorney, should consider making an example of him to protect others who create open source software from similar thievery.
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Prof_Klyzlr Moderator 7,950 posts
Prof_Klyzlr

8 years on...

Dear MRHers,

For the number of modellers who "simply couldn't survive DCC without JMRI", 
we owe it to the JMRI team and esp Bob Jacobsen to donate...

http://www.jmri.org/donations.shtml

Happy Modelling,
Aim to Improve,
Prof Klyzlr
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