Mahesh T. Pai wrote:

(adding RMS and the board to the CC list)

Arun M said on Sat, Apr 17, 2004 at 02:44:52PM +0530,:

...

How can FSF India go about fighting this issue legally....

This throws up a crucial issue about the role FSF has in India....

We need to reach out and down among the masses ...

The people at sarovar.org were not willing to contest the dispute because Apple had threatened to drag in their ISP, sponsor and the company maintaining the website.

These threats will apply also to us too, if we decide to host the project.

...

-----Forwarded Message-----

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So I request FSF India to take this challenge head on and mirror PlayFair in India, their by taking this case to court on behalf of free software enthusiasts.

So far as the FSF-India is concerened, being a non-profit company...

My opinion is based strictly on practical grounds - FSF India should stay clear of this issue.

FSF India may avoid getting involved in this matter, without prejudice to any of its rights, and what follows is only for general information, so that members of this list are enlightened about these rights:

Under the relevant portions of Section 52 of the Copyright Act, the following acts shall _not_ be infringement of copyright: (aa) the making or adaptation of a computer programme by the lawful possessor of a copy of such computer programme from such copy- (i) in order to utilise the computer programme for the purpose for which it was supplied; or (ii) to make back-up copies purely as a temporary protection against loss, destruction or damage in order only to utilise the computer programme for the purpose for which it was supplied; (ab)the doing of any act necessary to obtain information essential for operating inter-operability of an independently created computer programme with other programmes by a lawful possessor of a computer programme provided that such information is not otherwise readily available; (ac)the observation, study or test of functioning of the computer programme in order to determine the ideas and principles which underline any elements of the programme while performing such necessary acts necessary for the functions for which the computer programme was supplied; (ad)the making of copies or adaption of the computer programme from a personally legally obtained copy for non-commercial personal use;

All these acts are specifically permitted by law. The program in question undoubtedly provided for inter-operabilty with Gnu, Gnu/Linux or FreeBSD systems. The so called copyright infringement is baseless. The law itself has provided the remedy against groundless threats too:

Section 60. Remedy in the case of groundless threat of legal proceedings.- Where any person claiming to be the owner of copyright in any work, by circulars, advertisements or otherwise, threatens any other person with any legal proceedings or liability in respect of an alleged infringement of the copyright, any person aggrieved thereby may, notwithstanding anything contained in section 34 of the Specific Relief Act, 1963 (47 of 1963), institute a declaratory suit that the alleged infringement of any legal rights of the person making such threats and may in any such suit- (a) obtain an injunction against the continuance of such threats; and (b) recover such damages, if any, as he has sustained by reason of such threats.

So please be aware of your rights. Though it is lawful and rightful to write such code, trivial programs are not that inspiring or exciting - there are so many other useful things waiting to be done.