Software Ownership Research Articles

A Model for Total Cost Determination in Open-Source Software Ownership: Case of Kenyan Universities’ Learning Management System

The adoption of open-source products is slowly increasing; the increase, however, is slower than expected, considering that most open-source products are freely available. Researchers and scholars have attributed the adoption levels to, among other things, a lack of know-how of the total cost of ownership of the open-source software. Thus, it is crucial for the cost of owning the software to be developed. While an ongoing endeavor to develop a model to determine the total cost of ownership of open-source software, the models have proved to be less accurate and do not capture essential elements. Moreover, there has been a rising call for organizations to adopt open-source software to lower the software costs incurred on proprietary software. If the cost of owning open-source software were known, it would be beneficial as several organizations and institutions could adopt it readily. The data was collected from Universities in Kiambu and Embu Counties. Linear regression analysis was done to help develop the model, and a mathematical model was developed. The proposed model was: total cost of open-source software ownership = direct + +indirect + hidden costs. To validate the model, it was subjected to expert validation. The model will be an outstanding contribution to information technology as it will make it possible to come up with the total cost of owning open-source software.

My face is yours: facial recognition software and copyright ownership

The popular NBA 2K series include a facial recognition software that scans the user's face to generate a lookalike avatar. However, end user licence agreements provide for all intellectual property rights, including copyright, to be licensed or assigned to game publishers or developers. Consequently, the user may have no say whether an avatar with their facial features may be used, for instance in advertising for the game. In addition, the facial features stored in the game may be biometric data, and thus subject to strict data protection rules. This paper will analyse whether the avatar generated using a face scan is a copyrightable work of authorship. The analysis questions whether the face scan fits into different categories of works; photography, film and databases, including the sui generis photography and database rights. It concludes that copyright fails to protect the individual's facial features. Even so, the ownership clause in licence agreements on the one hand and the facial features as biometric data on the other further complicate the question of what the individual can assert as his own.

Graphs Resemblance based Software Birthmarks through Data Mining for Piracy Control

The emergence of software artifacts greatly emphasizes the need for protecting intellectual property rights (IPR) hampered by software piracy requiring effective measures for software piracy control. Software birthmarking targets to counter ownership theft of software by identifying similarity of their origins. A novice birthmarking approach has been proposed in this paper that is based on hybrid of text-mining and graph-mining techniques. The code elements of a program and their relations with other elements have been identified through their properties (i.e., code constructs) and transformed into Graph Manipulation Language (GML). The software birthmarks generated by exploiting the graph theoretic properties (through clustering coefficient) are used for the classifications of similarity or dissimilarity of two programs. The proposed technique has been evaluated over metrics of credibility, resilience, method theft, modified code detection and self-copy detection for programs asserting the effectiveness of proposed approach against software ownership theft. The comparative analysis of proposed approach with contemporary ones shows better results for having properties and relations of program nodes and for employing dynamic techniques of graph mining without adding any overhead (such as increased program size and processing cost).

Bundling cloud software to fight piracy: an economic analysis

PurposeThe emergence of internet-enabled technology has led to the software service model in which the software firm, instead of the consumer, maintains software ownership. This model can curtail software piracy more effectively than the traditional on-premises software model. However, software firms are not abandoning traditional on-premises software but embracing both models simultaneously. In this study, the authors consider a firm’s software bundling decision in combination with its piracy deterrence strategy. The paper aims to discuss these issues.Design/methodology/approachThe authors build three stylized models to analytically compare the bundling strategies under three scenarios: no piracy, piracy is present and piracy is present while the firm applies digital rights management (DRM).FindingsThe authors find pure bundling (PB) to be the optimal strategy due to the combination of competition and cannibalization effects in mixed bundling (MB). Simultaneously, consumers may enjoy greater surplus in PB than in MB, making PB the preferred strategy for both the firm and consumers. Interestingly, the win-win outcome coexists with some degree of piracy in the market.Originality/valueThe results provide important insights for firms and policy-makers and contribute to the literature on piracy and product bundling. First, the authors show piracy could be another driver for product bundling, which has never been discussed in prior literature. Second, the authors suggest an alternative perspective; that PB may be a desirable outcome for both firms and consumers when considering piracy and DRM. More surprisingly, this desirable outcome occurs with some level of piracy in the market. The presence of piracy leads to competition and cannibalization effects in MB, which eventually results in the win-win outcome in the software market for both the firm and the consumers.

Infringing Software Property Rights: Ontological, Methodological, and Ethical Questions

This paper contributes to the computer ethics debate on software ownership protection by examining the ontological, methodological, and ethical problems related to property right infringement that should come prior to any legal discussion. The ontological problem consists in determining precisely what it is for a computer program to be a copy of another one, a largely neglected problem in computer ethics. The methodological problem is defined as the difficulty of deciding whether a given software system is a copy of another system. And the ethical problem corresponds to establishing when a copy constitutes, or does not constitute, a property right infringement. The ontological problem is solved on the logical analysis of abstract machines, and the latter are argued to be the appropriate level of abstraction for software at which the methodological and the ethical problems can be successfully addressed.

Выявление характерных особенностей программ для борьбы с компьютерным пиратством на основе интеллектуального анализа графов

The emergence of software artifacts greatly emphasizes the need for protecting intellectual property rights (IPR) hampered by software piracy requiring effective measures for software piracy control. Software birthmarking targets to counter ownership theft of software by identifying similarity of their origins. A novice birthmarking approach has been proposed in this paper that is based on hybrid of text-mining and graph-mining techniques. The code elements of a program and their relations with other elements have been identified through their properties (i.e code constructs) and transformed into Graph Manipulation Language (GML). The software birthmarks generated by exploiting the graph theoretic properties (through clustering coefficient) are used for the classifications of similarity or dissimilarity of two programs. The proposed technique has been evaluated over metrics of credibility, resilience, method theft, modified code detection and self-copy detection for programs asserting the effectiveness of proposed approach against software ownership theft. The comparative analysis of proposed approach with contemporary ones shows better results for having properties and relations of program nodes and for employing dynamic techniques of graph mining without adding any overhead (such as increased program size and processing cost).

Выявление характерных особенностей программ для борьбы с компьютерным пиратством на основе интеллектуального анализа графов

The emergence of software artifacts greatly emphasizes the need for protecting intellectual property rights (IPR) hampered by software piracy requiring effective measures for software piracy control. Software birthmarking targets to counter ownership theft of software by identifying similarity of their origins. A novice birthmarking approach has been proposed in this paper that is based on hybrid of text-mining and graph-mining techniques. The code elements of a program and their relations with other elements have been identified through their properties (i.e code constructs) and transformed into Graph Manipulation Language (GML). The software birthmarks generated by exploiting the graph theoretic properties (through clustering coefficient) are used for the classifications of similarity or dissimilarity of two programs. The proposed technique has been evaluated over metrics of credibility, resilience, method theft, modified code detection and self-copy detection for programs asserting the effectiveness of proposed approach against software ownership theft. The comparative analysis of proposed approach with contemporary ones shows better results for having properties and relations of program nodes and for employing dynamic techniques of graph mining without adding any overhead (such as increased program size and processing cost).

Leveling up: Are non-gamers and women disadvantaged in a virtual world classroom?

Today's young gamers are tomorrow's students who expect more immersion from their online learning experiences. Teachers and administrators, however, must ask are some students at a disadvantage in such a class and does gender play a role? We examine the degree to which gaming experience and gender influence sense of presence in a virtual world learning classroom. Feelings of presence are key to involvement in virtual worlds. Participants, 348 undergraduates, interacted within a custom designed virtual world classroom focusing business negotiation skills. Results reveal that while gaming experience gives a slight advantage, lack of previous software ownership and gender do not put learners at a disadvantage. This finding shows that non-gamers and females can equally participate in a virtual world classroom, relieving concerns of adoption.

Development and Instrumentation of a Framework for the Generation and Management of Self-Adaptive Enterprise Applications

Companies’ operations have become over-dependent on their supporting enterprise software applications. This situation has placed a heavy burden onto software maintenance teams who are expected to keep these applications up and running optimally in varying execution conditions. However, this high human intervention drives up the overall costs of software ownership. In addition, the current dynamic nature of enterprise applications constitutes challenges with respect to their architectural design and development, and the guarantee of the agreed quality requirements at runtime. Efficiently and effectively achieving the adaptation of enterprise applications requires an autonomic solution. In this paper we present SHIFT, a framework that provides (i) facilities and mechanisms for managing self-adaptive enterprise applications through the use of an autonomic infrastructure, and (ii) automated derivation of self-adaptive enterprise applications and their respective monitoring infrastructure. Along with the framework, our work leads us to propose a reference specification and architectural design for implementing self-adaptation autonomic infrastructures. We developed a reference implementation of SHIFT; our contribution includes the development of monitoring infrastructures, and dynamic adaptation planning and automated derivation strategies.

Building energy information systems: synthesis of costs, savings, and best-practice uses

Building energy information systems (EIS) are a powerful customer-facing monitoring and analytical technology that can enable up to 20 % site energy savings for buildings. Few technologies are as heavily marketed, but in spite of their potential, EIS remain an underadopted emerging technology. One reason is the lack of information on purchase costs and associated energy savings. While insightful, the growing body of individual case studies has not provided industry the information needed to establish the business case for investment. Vastly different energy and economic metrics prevent generalizable conclusions. This paper addresses three common questions concerning EIS use: what are the costs, what have users saved, and which best practices drive deeper savings? We present a large-scale assessment of the value proposition for EIS use based on data from over two-dozen organizations. Participants achieved year-over-year median site and portfolio savings of 17 and 8 %, respectively; they reported that this performance would not have been possible without the EIS. The median 5-year cost of EIS software ownership (up-front and ongoing costs) was calculated to be $1800 per monitoring point (kilowatt meter points were most common), with a median portfolio-wide implementation size of approximately 200 points. In this paper, we present an analysis of the relationship between key implementation factors and achieved energy reductions. Extent of efficiency projects, building energy performance prior to EIS installation, depth of metering, and duration of EIS were strongly correlated with greater savings. We also identify the best practices use of EIS associated with greater energy savings.

Determinants of distribution channel choice for online software licence purchases: A transaction cost perspective

The objective of this paper is to test empirically a research model proposed in a previous paper, entitled ‘Determinants of distribution channel choice for online software licence purchases: A theoretical model’, which was published in the Journal of Digital Asset Management in 2008 (Vol. 4, No. 6). By casting the software distribution channel choice as a transaction cost analysis (TCA) problem, the research model that the authors proposed in that first paper aimed to uncover the reasons why, when purchasing a software licence for a product that is marketed using a ‘try-before-you-buy’ strategy, consumers would select the physical distribution channel not tied to any digital rights management (DRM) technologies (ie, CD-ROM) rather than the digital distribution channel that uses DRM technologies (ie, electronic software distribution through demo-unlock). With data collected from 224 customers of a software product, this follow-up paper shows that customers consider two transactions in the software ownership life cycle: the initial licence acquisition transaction and the licence management transaction related to software re-installations. The results also show that both transaction costs and TCA dimensions influence customers’ choice of software distribution channel.

Robust Software Ownership Identification System Using AES and HASH Functions

Robust Software Ownership Identification System Using AES and HASH Functions

High development cost and software piracy: a study of motives

Every year, software piracy costs billions of dollars to organisations using software as well as those producing software. This has been intensified with the ever-increasing ease, speed, and ubiquity with which information – and software – in our hyper-connected world can be shared. This study investigates how computing students, as the future technologists and professionals, approach the piracy issue. We introduce a conceptual model for software piracy motives, derive a number of relevant hypotheses about these motives, and apply statistical tests to evaluate their validity. Among other findings, results from this study indicate that the high cost of software is a major motive for software piracy, but it cannot be directly addressed, as today’s software engineering methods, in spite of all the advances made in the discipline over the past few decades, are still not efficient enough to produce software at a substantially lower cost. This suggest a need for, and we hope opens us a discussion on, new models of software and information ownership with less economic burden for individuals.

The Social Disutility of Software Ownership

Software ownership allows the owner to restrict the distribution of software and to prevent others from reading the software's source code and building upon it. However, free software is released to users under software licenses that give them the right to read the source code, modify it, reuse it, and distribute the software to others. Proponents of free software such as Richard M. Stallman and Eben Moglen argue that the social disutility of software ownership is a sufficient justification for prohibiting it. This social disutility includes the social instability of disregarding laws and agreements covering software use and distribution, inequality of software access, and the inability to help others by sharing software with them. Here I consider these and other social disutility claims against withholding specific software rights from users, in particular, the rights to read the source code, duplicate, distribute, modify, imitate, and reuse portions of the software within new programs. I find that generally while withholding these rights from software users does cause some degree of social disutility, only the rights to duplicate, modify and imitate cannot legitimately be denied to users on this basis. The social disutility of withholding the rights to distribute the software, read its source code and reuse portions of it in new programs is insufficient to prohibit software owners from denying them to users. A compromise between the software owner and user can minimise the social disutility of withholding these particular rights from users. However, the social disutility caused by software patents is sufficient for rejecting such patents as they restrict the methods of reducing social disutility possible with other forms of software ownership.

A bundle of software rights and duties

Like the ownership of physical property, the issues computer software ownership raises can be understood as concerns over how various rights and duties over software are shared between owners and users. The powers of software owners are defined in software licenses, the legal agreements defining what users can and cannot do with a particular program. To help clarify how these licenses permit and restrict users' actions, here I present a conceptual framework of software rights and duties that is inspired by the terms of various proprietary, open source, and free software licenses. To clarify the relationships defined by these rights and duties, this framework distinguishes between software creators (the original developer), custodians (those who can control its use), and users (those who utilise the software). I define the various rights and duties that can be shared between these parties and how these rights and duties relate to each other. I conclude with a brief example of how this framework can be used by defining the concepts of free software and copyleft in terms of rights and duties.

Software ownership: Where does it lie when it comes to M&A and outsourcing?

The downturn and the rise in new types of technology such as cloud computing, virtualisation and SaaS have made it harder for organisations to keep track of their IT estates, especially when it comes to outsourcing and M&A. But at FAST Ltd, we believe that a better understanding of software ownership and liability, and forward planning from the outset may help.

University Software Ownership and Litigation: A First Examination

Software patents and university-owned patents represent two of the most controversial intellectual property developments of the last twenty-five years. Despite this reality, and concerns that universities act as "patent trolls" when they assert software patents in litigation against successful commercializers, no scholar has systematically examined the ownership and litigation of university software patents. In this Article, we present the first such examination. Our empirical research reveals that software patents represent a significant and growing proportion of university patent holdings. Additionally, the most important determinant of the number of software patents a university owns is not its research and development ("R&D") expenditures (whether computer science-related or otherwise) but, rather, its tendency to seek patents in other areas. In other words, universities appear to take a "one size fits all" approach to patenting their inventions. This one size fits all approach is problematic given the empirical evidence that software is likely to follow a different commercialization path than other types of invention. Thus, it is perhaps not surprising that we see a number of lawsuits in which university software patents have been used not for purposes of fostering commercialization, but instead, to extract rents in apparent holdup litigation. The Article concludes by examining whether this trend is likely to continue in the future, particularly given a 2006 Supreme Court decision that appears to diminish the holdup threat by recognizing the possibility of liability rules in patent suits, as well as recent case law that may call into question certain types of software patents.

An Exploration of the Ideologies of Software Intellectual Property: The Impact on Ethical Decision Making

This article helps to clarify and articulate the ideological, legal, and ethical attitudes regarding software as intellectual property (IP). Computer software can be viewed as IP from both ethical and legal perspectives. The size and growth of the software industry suggest that large profits are possible through the development and sale of software. The rapid growth of the open source movement, fueled by the development of the Linux operating system, suggests another model is possible. The large number of unauthorized copies of software programs suggests that many people do not believe in laws regarding software copyright. There are many and varied views of software as IP, even within the information systems (IS) profession. In this article, four distinct subgroups of IS professionals are identified. The article describes the four subgroups and their respective ideological views on software ownership; it explores the subgroups’ attitudes regarding software laws; and finally, it explains the ethical positions embraced by each subgroup.

Software maintenance and global competitiveness

Effective software maintenance is essential to achieving global software competitiveness. Organizations' increasing dependency on software and the shortage of software skills combine to require an increase in the span of responsibility within the software maintenance function. The span of responsibility determines the cost of software ownership since it is the amount of software depended on by the enterprise divided by the number of people who maintain the software. Managers of software maintenance can improve the span of responsibility by •establishing and using organizational resources in five manners to sustain operational support for existing information systems, •applying resources to strengthen four views of software maintenance, from individual to national, •creating and applying action to eliminate the 26 main shortfalls in doing software maintenance, and •reducing the seven main risks to information system quality. This paper provides a call for action to improve software maintenance in order to strengthen enterprise and national global competitiveness. © 1997 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Software maintenance and global competitiveness

Effective software maintenance is essential to achieving global software competitiveness. Organizations' increasing dependency on software and the shortage of software skills combine to require an increase in the span of responsibility within the software maintenance function. The span of responsibility determines the cost of software ownership since it is the amount of software depended on by the enterprise divided by the number of people who maintain the software. Managers of software maintenance can improve the span of responsibility by •establishing and using organizational resources in five manners to sustain operational support for existing information systems, •applying resources to strengthen four views of software maintenance, from individual to national, •creating and applying action to eliminate the 26 main shortfalls in doing software maintenance, and •reducing the seven main risks to information system quality. This paper provides a call for action to improve software maintenance in order to strengthen enterprise and national global competitiveness. © 1997 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.