Update on UCITA
New Battle Brews Over UCITA, Software Licensing Terms. by Patrick Thibodeau,
Computerworld, July 11, 2005.
ACM Tech News notes that,
“Although state-by-state adoption of the Uniform Computer Information Transactions Act (UCITA) was shot down by heavy resistance, critics contend that the act is still very influential, and the software users who led the opposition are developing their own model software-licensing law.” The ComputerWorld article says that the
Americans for Fair Electronic Commerce Transactions (AFFECT) has “been quietly drafting its own model software-licensing law. Its concern is that courts may use UCITA as a reference point in legal disputes, giving vendors a victory through the legal system that they couldn’t gain in state legislatures.”
The model bill will be based on a set of principles AFFECT developed earlier this year. For instance, UCITA all but barred any type of reverse-engineering of a software product. But AFFECT argues in its principles that “sellers marketing to the general public should not prohibit lawful study of a product, including taking apart the product.”