What does “Software Law” means?
National and international Software Law covers a wide variety of legal classifications, design and enforcement issues. Software Law is generally related to the drafting of contracts, such as:
- Software production
- Software transfer and
- Software support and maintenance
Software contracts are generally “assigned” – sometimes by the court – to the first step of a classic area of law such as purchase law, contractual work law or rental/lease laws. In detail, however, this basis classification has been constantly adapted to the peculiarity of the software industry. This “adjustment process” is not completed yet.
In addition to the purely contractual, ordinary component, the copyright law (based on European directives) with its peculiarities, represent a major column of the German Software regulation and legislation. Due to the simple production and distribution of software, flanking protective measures may be considered, also in patent and trademark issues. For instance, software as such may be exempt from patent protection (German and European, this does not concern the American patent system); however, in individual cases this does not prevent the authorities from examining and granting property rights.
Copyrights and Software: which is the connection?
The intellectual property of software and similar regarding principles follows copyright laws.
Can standard software licenses be used for individual software?
The existing standard licensing agreements of current software up to the regulations of the GPL – in whatever version – frequently regulate a number of cases under the viewpoint of different legal orders and see the essential core contents of an individual software (planning phase, creation phase, use / maintenance phase etc.).
What do we need to know in order to clarify your questions?
Legal software-related issues can not be easily generalized, as the range of problems may be extremely large and complex. In order to have the chance to help you clarify your queries, we need to be exhaustively informed about all the information related to your software. Contact us.