Re: [Gnumed-devel] (no subject)

[Karsten Hilbert]

On Thu, Jun 07, 2007 at 08:51:38PM -0700, Jim Busser wrote:

> I would be interested whether people think it important to obtain any  
> authoritative opinion on this, maybe from the free software  
> foundation (?), or if it is sufficient to work it out in principle.
I think the latter (as you do below) suffices.

> The "score" is mathematics, or a formula, that was derived from  
> information. I do not believe that information neither probably the  
> mathematical description of the information can be copyrighted.
> 
> "Trade secret" would not appear to apply since the information was  
> deliberately published by those who developed the score and/or by the  
> institutions for whom they work.
> 
> While a publisher may contend the content of the article, in the form  
> in which it was published ("the publication"), to be copyright, I  
> doubt they can contend use of the formula to be anything other than  
> "fair use", in fact it could be argued that the entire point of the  
> publication would aim to validate the work of the investigators and  
> impact of the journal achieved through adoption of the score.

I agree. This sounds very reasonable.

Karsten
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