[7615] in cryptography@c2.net mail archive
Re: Ridding IP of logic, reason, and law
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (P.J. Ponder)
Sat Jul 29 17:48:09 2000
Date: Sat, 29 Jul 2000 17:46:43 -0400 (EDT)
From: "P.J. Ponder" <ponder@freenet.tlh.fl.us>
To: Rich Salz <rsalz@caveosystems.com>
Cc: cryptography@c2.net
In-Reply-To: <39830A57.1FF1315D@caveosystems.com>
Message-ID: <Pine.OSF.4.21.0007291741080.28100-100000@fn3.freenet.tlh.fl.us>
MIME-Version: 1.0
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On Sat, 29 Jul 2000, Rich Salz wrote:
> > If the US federal government owns this algorithm, then it can't be
> > patented.
>
> I'm not sure if you are referring to SHA1 in particular, or in general.
> While I don't know about SHA-1, the US Government *can* own patents.
> For example, here's one that's actually kinda relevent. :)
Yeah, you're right. I remember the patent discussion came up a while back
with the NSA's Semantic Forest thing. I think it's the heat, global
warming is ruining my memory. As I recall, though, there was at one time
a provision of law in the US that the federal government couldn't
copyright their documents. Maybe that is changed now. I still seems like
US federal 'inventions' should belong to the people. Who the hell are
they representing anyway?
[The U.S. government can't copyright things but it can patent
them. Copyright is not the same as patents. --Perry]
