Re: how much is too much?

[Isaac]

On Mon, 30 May 2005 23:31:59 +0200, Alexander Terekhov <terekhov@web.de> wrote:
> 
> John Hasler wrote:
>> 
>> Isaac writes:
>> > Well, the copyright statute says that one of the exclusive rights of the
>> > copyright holder is the *preparation* of derivative works.  (See 17 USC
>> > 106).  You don't have to distribute or copy such works in order to
>> > infringe.  Creating a derivative work without is enough.  It is not clear
>> > to me that the literal words of 2(a) of the GPL do not apply to someone
>> > who modifies code on his own system.
>> 
>> I think that 17 USC 117 applies here.  
> 
> But not here. AFAIK, except bug fixing, the German law doesn't have 
> 17 USC 117 like exception for (private) software "Bearbeitungen" 
> (copyrightable derivative works) and "Umgestaltungen" (uncopyrightable 

Are you sure?  I thought the EU copyright directive required states
to provide some 17 USC 117 protections.  It would be a mistake to
suggest that 17 USC 117 authorizes the general creation of derivative
or collective works on ones own system.  17 USC 117 covers modifications
required to run programs when one ones a copy.  IMO that would include
linking code to a library, but might not cover rewriting the library
to add new functionality.

Isaac