Blizzard v. MDY 소송에 대한 Public Knowledge의 의견서 한줄 요약
http://www.publicknowledge.org/node/1546
Blizzard has options for addressing cheaters, including disabling their accounts and bringing actions for breach of contract. It may also have remedies against MDY based on tortious interference with contract or other non-copyright causes of action. However, in seeking to curb MDY’s allegedly perfidious behavior, Blizzard may not undo Congress’ work in establishing statutory rights for the rest of the WoW users or for digital consumers more generally.
Blizzard’s theory is wrong, because it confuses a copyright holder’s intellectual property rights in the software it develops with a buyer’s rights in the actual copy of the software. An owner of software has a right to copy it if that copy is essential to the customer’s use of the software. (See Section 117 of the Copyright Act.) This rule is a crucial part of the balance Congress crafted between the rights of the copyright holder to manage and benefit from its expressive work, and the rights of the public to innovate, recreate and otherwise use and build on that work.Blizzard argues that players aren’t owners but merely software licensees, so section 117 doesn’t apply. But court after court has held that the question of whether a user is an owner for purposes of Section 117 depends the substance of the transaction, not just how one party wants to describe it. For example, if you buy the software, keep it on your own computer and don’t have to return it when you are done, you probably own it.