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September 27, 2006: Another Round of Motions from Katzer

September 27, 2006: Katzer's lawyer has filed another motion to dismiss parts of the amended complaint.

In it, he doesn't argue that Katzer didn't copy the JMRI software in violation of the copyright terms, probably because even HE can't stretch the truth that far. Instead, he argues that copyright doesn't protect free and open source (FOSS) software! You can read the entire argument in the motion filed with the court, in particular the section named "Plaintiff has waived his ability to sue under the Copyright Act" starting on page 13. Basically, it says that since JMRI makes the software available on the web, free of charge (although not free of restriction), when someone like Katzer takes it and uses it in violation of those restrictions, we can sue him in contract law only, if at all. The shocking part of Katzer's argument is that he says we have no rights under either copyright or contract to enforce.

This argument strikes right at the heart of much of FOSS licensing. It's already hard enough for the FOSS community to enforce its legal rights. If we lose the possibility of protecting the integrity of our work via copyrights, we'll be in a terrible situation. We hope you'll help us in this fight. Click here to donate (anonymously if you prefer).

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