Structure, sequence and organization: Difference between revisions

Revision as of 18:55, 31 May 2012

Revision as of 19:19, 31 May 2012

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He formed a company named Dentcom and wrote a program in a different computer language but with similar functionality that he called ''Dentlab'', marketing it as a ''Dentalab'' successor. On 30 June 1983 Jaslow's Dentcom filed a suit alleging that Whelan had misappropriated its trade secrets.

Whelan filed a countersuit in federal court in Pennsylvania alleging that the ''Dentlab'' software violated Whelan's copyrights in the ''Dentalab'' software.

Whelan won the case and was awarded damages on the basis that ''Dentlab'' had substantially similar structure and orveralloverall organization.{{sfn|Graham|1999|p=89}}

The district court ruling in the Whelan case drew on the established doctrine that even when the component parts of a work cannot be copyrightable, the structure and organization of a work may be.{{sfn|Hamilton|Sabety|1997|p=241}}

The court in the Whelan case also drew support from the 1985 SAS Inst. Inc. v. S&H Computer Sys. Inc. in which it had been found that copyright protected organizational and structural details, not just specific lines of code.{{sfn|Epstein|2006|p=11-27}}

Sequence, structure and organization (SSO) in this case was defined as "the manner in which the program operates, controls and regulates the computer in receiving, assembling, calculating, retaining, correlating, and producing useful information."{{sfn|Kappel|1991|p=699}}

SSO refers to non-literal elements of computer programs that include "data input formats, file structures, design, organization and flow of the code, screen outputs or user interfaces, and the flow and sequencing of the screens."{{sfn|Scott|2006|p=5-56}}

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Most courts came to adopt the SSO concept in one form or another, but not all.{{sfn|Kappel|1991|p=705}}

In one case a court found that a defendant had infringed the right to prepare a derivative work when they copied the sequence, structure, and organization of the plaintiff's file formats, screen, reports, and transaction codes, even though different data fields were present.{{sfn|Stapleton|2002|p=9.6}}

In 1987 the ruling in Broderbund Software, Inc v. Unison World, Inc appeared to prevent software developers from marketing products with the same or similar user interfaces, regardless of whether there werewas anything in common in the underlying code.{{sfn|Kappel|1991|p=705}}

In the 1990 case of Lotus v. Paperback the U.S. District Court for Massachusetts decided that Paperback's VP-Planner software violated the copyright of Lotus's 1-2-3 spreadsheet program since it had the same user interface, even though the underlying code was completely different.{{sfn|Davidson|1997|p=115}}