Research on The Impact of Open Source Code on The Intelligence Property Theory ---Focus on Copy Right Act

• Main Authors: Yun-Lung Kang, 康雲龍
• Other Authors: 作者未提通
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Published: 2007
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/bjw5b4

碩士 === 銘傳大學 === 法律學系碩士班 === 95 === Research On The Impact Of Open Source Code On The Intelligence Property Theory ---Focus On Copy Right Act ABSTRACT As Microsoft continues dominating the operating system industry, many consumers have started to shift their focus to other alternatives such as Open Source Software, also known as free software. Rather than charging consumers, Open Source Software makes the original source code accessible to everyone. The primary objective is to accelerate the growth of the software industry. The United States of America initiated protecting computer software under Copyright Act; this movement has made many other countries follow the same path. However, supporters of Open Source argued that software should not be protected under copyrights because they believe that software liberty is only possible when the source code can be released to everyone. With all the hard works they’ve done, it intends to prove that computer software can still help to better the culture of technology when it was not protected by copyrights. Thus, it is necessary to reevaluate and restructure the Copyright Act system. The primary objective of establishing copyrights is to offer legal protection for people who share their original works with the public. In addition, they hope to their works can be used as others’ inspirations and foundations to create another original work. Computer software can be divided into two different codes- object code and source code. The object code is a robotic language in mixtures of 0 and 1. It cannot be understood by human beings. The way the source code is written is very close to English, and this is what we read to acquire knowledge and further develop new ideas. This is the goal of Copyright Act. Because the source code is equivalent to profit in business terms, most businesses choose to make only the object code transparent. This caused a major loss of opportunities to learn because the source code is not accessible. Thus, reevaluation of computer software’s protection under copyrights and the rise of the open source code give us great inspiration to think on broader perspectives.