Autodesk loses court case
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About time.
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Too slow jon! http://www.sketchucation.com/forums/scf/viewtopic.php?f=179&t=9910
That articles still a nice read though, much more palatable than the one in the other thread.
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I agree, a very readable article.
It makes me wonder how the First Sale Doctrine affects sale/licensing of content e.g. such as that sold on FormFonts. (As a content developer myself, [not associated with FF] this is of some concern to me.)
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It doesn't affect FormFonts at all...any more than it would affect a car rental company, because we don't sell content, we rent it. If we were selling it, the annual subscription would be 50 times what it is at present. Those terms are right there on the site...available to anyone before they sign up.
Putting it simplistically, renting a car for a few dollars a day does not give you the right to then sell it to someone else for several thousand dollars....or to sub-let or even loan it to someone else without the knowledge or permission of the hire company.Even software companies that sell software (or content) on a retail basis are safe enough behind the premise that they are selling it to one person. If that person decided they wanted to sell it on, they would have to do so on that same basis, without continuing to use the product themselves. They would need to sell it cheaper, because the understanding would be that they were in no position to guarantee its usability, or to offer any kind of support or upgrade path. Any attempt to have their cake and eat it or distribute duplicated copies would be a clear case of software piracy.
The whole Autodesk case rests around the fact that a company is offering software at what any reasonable person would regard as a retail price, yet still maintaining that it is only leasing it to you on a non-transferable basis...then hiding that fact on the inside of a shrink-wrapped package.
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