advice needed
sneha
(Querist) 02 March 2010
This query is : Resolved
"A" was working with a IT company where he had developed a software program now he has started his own company and now developing almost the same software application.
How he can protect himself from copyright suit?
Sanjeev Panda
(Expert) 02 March 2010
The Software copyright is the most controversial area of Copyright law. Often to determine whether there is so called substantial copying or similarity between your work i.e. your source code of the software and your earlier work while in employment of previous company and the protectable elements of copyrightable software of previous company is not always easily answered in computer software realm. The literal copying is infringement while the copying of non literal elements, like common steps in development software may be excusable applying the principle of doctrine of merger. For example, you may have seen that graphical user interface of many software are same because there are only limited ways to doing it. Thus, one cannot make literal imitation of source code or object code of the software. A very difficult area of law and needs expertise in software engineering to decide whether the copyright infringement has happened or not.
Sanjeev Panda
(Expert) 02 March 2010
I would suggest you go through a very nice legal article on copyright infringement of computer software published in New York Law Journal. The link is http://euro.ecom.cmu.edu/program/law/08-732/Copyright/CopyrightInfringementOfSoftware.pdf
Kumar Thadhani
(Expert) 03 March 2010
FULLY AGREE WITH EXPERT Mr.PANDA.
