French Government Lobbied to Ban Free Software

[Judicael Courant]

Simo Sorce wrote :
>>>>Can you modify the variable to use a script that always returns true?
>>>>Yes.
>>>>
>>>>Then that strategy is likely illegal under that law.
>>>
>>>You can do the same with proprietary, closed source, software.
>>>Have you ever heard of disassemblers and binary patches ?
>>
>>I know that, you know that, and anyone with two fingers of forehead
>>knows that.
>>
>>But some don't have the foggiest idea and think that that is OK.
> 

But the point made by the law is not the ability to bypass the
protection scheme: the point is
1) some people bypass it [so it must be possible :-)]
2) AND the provider of the software did/does not take all appropriate
measures to protect the copyrighted works, giving the state of the art
(litterally "en l'état de la technique" is "in the (given) state of the
technology")

So, if you apply the average protection scheme (publishing only
binaries, a bit of obfuscation), it should be ok.

However, if you supply the sources, which can be easily read and
modified, well, judges will probably think you helped counterfeiting...


Judicael.