"How did your subordinates copy those features? Jonathan. Jim asked as he knocked on the glass door of CTO Jonathan's office and took a cup of coffee.

Jonathan sighed, took his hands off the keyboard, pillowed them behind his head, and said in a somewhat helpless tone: "Jim, I don't think we can do that, we have to create, not copy, what you keep urging us to do now is an act you hated before, remember?" You hate the studios that copied us and smashed them one by one, but now why would you want us to do the same? ”

"Of course it's different, those small companies that copied us, legally speaking, we are protected by computer copyright, of course we have to deal with them." Jim walked into Jonathan's office, sat across from him, drank coffee and said:

"But the situation at this point is that, legally, the other party's menus, commands, hierarchies are not protected by computer copyright, so we can just take them and use them on our software."

"So, Jim, what is the legal definition of protected and unprotected?" Jonathan asked, looking at his vice president of commercial transactions.

Jim shrugged: "We have more money, and the other side is poor, whether it's the Computer Copyright Act or the U.S. Constitution or any other U.S. law, it protects the richer side, that's the definition." ”

"Thank you for being honest with me, a whole new definition of legal protection." Jonathan smiled wordlessly.

Jim said seriously: "No thanks, this world is like this, the law of the jungle is the strong, and the mall is the same, it is this way of evolution that makes the strong stronger, so we take away their creativity, it is justified, if they dare to complain, we can be like elephants, gently lift our feet, and crush that damn ant." ”

"No dream engineer wants to copy someone else's idea, Jim, we'll find other ways to do the same thing, but time may be a little ......," Jonathan took a deep breath before speaking out to reject Jim's proposal.

Although Jim has been in the company for five months, he is still not used to dealing with people like Jim, this kind of person is the kind of social fraternity in college who likes to bully himself in high school, and he likes to bully himself as a nerdy bastard, he and Jim are two kinds of people, and every time he and Mickey talk to him about the company's development and dreams, that guy is ready to laugh out loud.

Jonathan didn't understand what was ridiculous, and that a person who didn't know anything about computers had the right to laugh at them when a software engineer like them, who developed software to change the world, talked about their dreams.

And I don't know if this guy was influenced by the Soviets when he went to the Soviet Union to inspect before, he spoke vulgarly, and he swore at every turn, and many employees were verbally humiliated by him.

"Time, that's time, Jonathan, I initially understand that there is no plan to launch that software for the time being, at least at the normal level, so take advantage of now, launch a version of the update as soon as possible, install all the functions that you find convenient, seize more markets, pile up higher sales figures, get higher valuations, earn more money, and ensure that the software is launched after us, and it will not have any influence, this is what you should consider as a CTO." Jim put down his coffee cup and looked at Jonathan with a burning gaze, interrupting Jonathan's words:

"If it's just Lotus doing this kind of thing that makes you feel embarrassed, give me a copy of that software, and I'll send it to MicroPort, so that we copy the spreadsheet function, and they copy the electronic document function, doesn't it sound like it can reduce the shame in your heart by half?"

Jonathan lowered his head and was silent for more than ten seconds before he spoke: "Actually, I still can't believe that I am worth tens of millions, all this is full of unreality, it always feels like it's just a dream, maybe one time I woke up, and when I woke up, I found myself back in the garage two years ago, only me and Mickey, happily and painfully typing the code that summer." ”

"I'll solve the problem of the garage, I'll help you and Mickey buy it and give it to you as a Christmas gift, so that you can go back to nostalgia once in a while, but you also have to satisfy me for functional problems, realize those more efficient functions, and seize the market." Jim looked at Jonathan, "That's it, tell me you can fix this soon?" ”

Jonathan nodded speechlessly: "I'll do my best." ”

"It's not about trying, it's something you have to do." Jim finished speaking, picked up his coffee cup, and walked towards the door, "Don't let me rush you again, Jonathan." ”

Jim walked down the hallway, shaking his head, dealing with the founders of these technology companies was a pain in the ass for him.

In the United States, it is a very dangerous thing to have a bottom line of personality with a net worth of hundreds of millions, which means that other rich people who have no bottom line will find an opportunity to swallow him sooner or later.

And now the Lotus company has two such strange existences, that is, the two founders, and he has to find a way to ensure their safety, so that they will not be swallowed by those merchants who find an opportunity, digest their wealth, and then pull them out into two poor eggs.

"When I first joined Lotus, I was full of remorse for bullying those nerds in high school, but now I ......" Jim staggered to his office with his coffee cup in hand, muttering to himself as he walked:

"God is fair, I've tortured nerds, so now arrange for me to guard nerds, this is definitely the most painful and desperate punishment for my fucking abuser, I don't know if the plane ticket is booked, I'm going to have a few frolicks with California girls to vent my stress."

……

Stanford Law School Legal Aid Center.

Stanford Law School is a graduate school, and it is rare for undergraduates to hang out here.

But the Legal Aid Center is open to all Stanford students, where you can learn about the legal issues you want to answer, and it's a fast, convenient and free legal consultation service.

Sophia O'Connor is a top student at Stanford Law School, and she spends her spare time helping Stanford alumni with legal advice, but her intuition tells her that the golden retriever named Tommy Hawke in front of her today seems to be a bad person.

"Miss O'Connor, I'd like to consult with you about the copyright law of Title 17 of the United States Code, and I've asked the legal counsel of my brotherhood, but he can't answer me, so I'm here." Tommy said straight to the point to the woman in front of him wearing black-rimmed glasses.

Sophia nodded: "Of course there is no problem, but I am curious that you have already consulted a lawyer, either that lawyer is not good at copyright law, or your problem is too time-consuming to elaborate, I hope you will not be in a situation where it is too time-consuming." ”

"Rest assured, it's a very simple question." Tommy said affirmatively, "Is computer software copyrighted?" ”

Sophia said without thinking: "Of course, of course it is protected. ”

"That is, if I copy a piece of software and make it exactly the same as the copied software, the other party will sue me, right?" Tommy continued.

Sophia frowned slightly: "Yes, you stumped the lawyer with this question?" I suspect he just doesn't want to pay attention to you, remember when I reminded you to be more concise? ”

"Okay, the difficulty has increased, I changed the look of the software, for example, the one I copied was wearing a red dress, and my software was wearing a blue dress, is it still protected?" Tommy nodded and asked with a smile.

Sophia still answered in the affirmative: "Of course, just because you change the color doesn't change the plagiarism of your software." ”

"The difficulty has increased, our two software are only written in the same C language, but the operation, menu, structure level, etc. already look different, is it still plagiarism?" Tommy asked Sophia.

"Although the copyright law does not yet have computer-related copyright regulations, referring to past cases, yes." Sophia paused for a few seconds and gave her answer.

Tommy became interested: "Referring to past cases, there are no relevant mature computer software copyright regulations, just referring to past cases?" To change the question, two cars, an American car developed first and a Japanese car developed later, both belong to the family car, everything else is already different, are you sure that the court will rule that the Japanese car copied the American car? ”

“…… This question is actually a bit troublesome. Sophia pursed her lips, she needed to come up with more intuitive words to solve the problem, but three words obviously couldn't solve the problem.

Tommy continued: "In other words, if the American car developed the forward function first, the Japanese car could no longer be designed to drive forward like the American car? If that's really the case, American car companies would have taken Japanese car companies to court a long time ago, so think about it, Miss O'Connor, what is the difference between the two software and these two cars so far? Why does it still count as plagiarism? ”

“…… Well, this is really difficult, and you need to cross-check a lot of relevant legal terms before I can answer you, if you are not in a hurry, maybe come back next week, I can give you some intuitive advice then? Sophia exhaled softly and gave her own answer.

"No, and one last question, I hope you'll give me some ideas next week, which is whether a software's function menu hierarchy should count as a protected patent for the software, or as an unprotected method of operation for serving users, just like the forward function of a car." Tommy stood up, thanked Sophia, and prepared to leave.

Seeing that the other party finished speaking, Sophia immediately prepared to leave in a hurry, and subconsciously asked, "So, do you want it to be protected, or not?" ”

"Well, ma'am, it doesn't matter to me whether I'm protected or not, I just want to know it, because I want to make sure that whatever side I'm on is for." Tommy turned his head to look at her and walked out of the legal aid center with a smile.

The second update~~ Tomorrow's update may be the same as tonight's, because there will be no time to code words during the day tomorrow~~ Say it in advance, thank you~

(End of chapter)