The "well meaning" witch hunters have caused much

[Milos]

You can look up "clean room reverse engineering". And then you understand what the story about the "b code" is for

Clean room design is completely different story since it's about verbatim copying of hardware.
Here we have software so verbatim copying is trivial, second, we don't have any actual code directly copied (as are the facts atm).
And since there are no patentable things in Rybka, the situation is IMO quite clean legally.

[Steve B]

There's no question using the ideas is legal.

Reconstructing the program, or parts of it, when looking at the original can be legally problematic though. You can look up "clean room reverse engineering". And then you understand what the story about the "b code" is for

in your opinion
given
1)the BB report
2) Vas's recent email posted here with his permission

is there any reason for Ippo to be treated any differently here then say Fritz or Hiarcs?
that is to say..
should links be allowed and should discussion of these engines now be in a forum open to the public(unregistered lurkers)?
the EOC forum was created and made hidden as a compromise between those certain that the engine was an illegal clone and those unsure

give the events of the last few days i am finding it hard to justify the treatment of Ippo differently then all other engines
just your opinion

it is the opinion of programmers like yourself ,Hyatt,Matthias..etc etc that should weighed heavily on this issue
and the rest of us talking heads just should listen(hard to do on an Internet forum)
Regards
Steve

[Gian-Carlo Pascutto]

You can look up "clean room reverse engineering". And then you understand what the story about the "b code" is for

Clean room design is completely different story since it's about verbatim copying of hardware.

It applies to firmware and software too, there is nothing hardware specific about it.

If I wrote a complete description of how Rybka works (lets say, the BB document, or "b code"), and you implement a chess engine based on it, you have clear evidence no code from Rybka can have made it into your program, as you didn't see it when writing it, i.e. it cannot be a derivative work.

If you work from the Rybka code, this defense does not work.

[Gian-Carlo Pascutto]

in your opinion
given
1)the BB report
2) Vas's recent email posted here with his permission

is there any reason for Ippo to be treated any differently here then say Fritz or Hiarcs?

I don't know. The matter is not clear to me, as we do not know the full truth.

What I do know, is that suing anonymous authors for copyright infringement is practically as good as impossible.

What is not impossible, is to sue people who are known by name, and who own a business hosting a forum. So I fully understand the forum owners that they are very careful here: *they*, and not the Ippolit people, are vulnerable if it is illegal.

Vasik clearly called Ippolit illegal, and the Ippolit authors did not respond.

In these circumstances, I would do the same thing as the forum owners here. If someone feels differently, they're free to set up their own forum so they can get the cease & desist notices for themselves.

[Milos]

What I do know, is that suing anonymous authors for copyright infringement is practically as good as impossible.

What is not impossible, is to sue people who are known by name, and who own a business hosting a forum. So I fully understand the forum owners that they are very careful here: *they*, and not the Ippolit people, are vulnerable if it is illegal.

Vasik clearly called Ippolit illegal, and the Ippolit authors did not respond.

In these circumstances, I would do the same thing as the forum owners here. If someone feels differently, they're free to set up their own forum so they can get the cease & desist notices for themselves.

There is absolutely nothing legal in potential cease & desist notice. And justifying banning of links with that is just a smoke screen, which you have to be really naive to believe to.
The real reason is:
(1) protection of business interest and
(2) protection of ego of some ppl (i.e. ego tripping).

[Gian-Carlo Pascutto]

There is absolutely nothing legal in potential cease & desist notice.

Then feel free to set up your own forum and ignore them. But it's not your decision to make for somebody else.

[Hood]

Vasik clearly called Ippolit illegal, and the Ippolit authors did not respond.

Accused but not gave any prove ! The responses of the authors are on the chesslogik and wiki sites.

rgds
Hood

[Harvey Williamson]

At the moment we have a report by an unknown author about an engine with unknown authors. Some real names might add some credibility.

For all I know BB is one of the clone authors.

[Milos]

For all I know BB is one of the clone authors.

For all I know you are just protecting your business interest which is very well endangered. Ergo, you disqualify yourself from any serious discussion on the matter.

[Milos]

Then feel free to set up your own forum and ignore them. But it's not your decision to make for somebody else.

Lol, it's also not Graham Banks decision to make, still the whole forum is governed by it.