Software licensing and IP law: opening up a source of uncertainty?

Abstract

This section is dedicated to the review of ideas, articles, books, films and other media. It will include replies (and rejoinders) to articles, the evaluation of new ideas or proposals, and reviews of books and articles both directly and indirectly related to intellectual property law. The use of open-source software (OSS), whereby a program's source code is made available to the community to be studied, changed and improved,1 is significant and growing. While open-source software development relies upon and utilizes the tools of intellectual property law, it does so in novel ways which pose interesting legal issues and cause some level of uncertainty in the legal framework. Open Source Software and Intellectual Property Rights provides a thorough exploration of open-source software licences and the ways in which they interact with intellectual property laws. In addition, the author, Dr Vikrant Vasudeva, argues that the existing legal protection for software is unsuitable, and in the final chapters proposes and defends a sui generis model software law to address its perceived inadequacies.