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GREAT work

mykhal
2003-08-13
2003-08-14
  • mykhal

    mykhal - 2003-08-13

    This is really an excellent piece of software. I could not believe the examples until I satisfied myself.
    Thanks for releasing it under GPL. I think you could patent it :)

     
    • Peter Selinger

      Peter Selinger - 2003-08-14

      I hope it will be useful to you.

      I think I could have patented it too, and my employer (university) would have even taken care of much of the process. But the decision of whether to exploit (=enforce) the patent would have then been up to them, and I would have lost control of it (although I still would have gotten a good portion of any profit). I don't believe in software patents anyway. It is a disgrace that they even exist. The only ethical choice for me is to put the algorithm in the public domain (and the software under GPL). I only hope that no part of it is covered by someone else's patent - because that is quite difficult to check. -- Peter

       
      • mykhal

        mykhal - 2003-08-14

        Well, maybe I did not mean to patent it, but making potrace closed-source commercial application. One of the first things I had in mind after I have seen the wonderful output was that someone will try to "borrow" the code and use it in his commercial product.

         

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