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Path: sserve!manuel!munnari.oz.au!hp9000.csc.cuhk.hk!uakari.primate.wisc.edu!ames!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!usc!rutgers!igor.rutgers.edu!dartagnan.rutgers.edu!hedrick From: hedrick@dartagnan.rutgers.edu (Charles Hedrick) Newsgroups: comp.unix.bsd Subject: Re: UNIGRAM's article on the USL-BSDI suit Message-ID: <Aug.1.14.20.05.1992.26479@dartagnan.rutgers.edu> Date: 1 Aug 92 18:20:06 GMT References: <1992Aug1.042344.23428@pasteur.Berkeley.EDU> <l7k5fqINNgc9@neuro.usc.edu> <l7k6maINNgeg@neuro.usc.edu> <l7k72rINNgfn@neuro.usc.edu> <leb.712651912@Hypatia> <peter.712682727@hilly> Organization: Rutgers Univ., New Brunswick, N.J. Lines: 25 peter@micromuse.co.uk (Peter Galbavy) writes: >Sorry, have I missed something ? Are you saying that if the University you >attended holds an academic source license, then only employers with >*commercial* (about >$100000) licenses should be *allowed* to employ you ? I believe speculation about being "contaminated" is without grounds. It is possible to write contracts that prevent employees who work on certain projects from working with any competitor, but (1) the Unix licenses have no such clause, and (2) many such contracts are unenforceable. As far as restrictions on individuals, clearly the only issue would arise with people who actually work with the source. Even then, there's no clear evidence that USL would be able to cause any trouble. As far as I can tell, the claims in this case do not rest on anything so ethereal as personal contamination, but on alleged violation by Berkeley of copyright and trade secret. I will say that I have heard of a company that would not use anyone who had access to Unix source in the group that was working on their own proprietary operating system. I think they were being more careful than necessary, but I do understand why they are doing it. However I think the number of cases like that is small, and it certainly doesn't apply to everyone at an institution that has source code. Part of the license agreement is that the institution is required to limit access to people who actually need it, and that they must be told of their obligations under the agreement.