this post was submitted on 25 May 2025
60 points (91.7% liked)

Rust

7017 readers
6 users here now

Welcome to the Rust community! This is a place to discuss about the Rust programming language.

Wormhole

[email protected]

Credits

  • The icon is a modified version of the official rust logo (changing the colors to a gradient and black background)

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Maybe not the best example then, but not the only example. If you unintentionally create something that resembles the original too much you may still become liable. It’s hard to draw the line, which is why many in such a position would prefer to be safe rather than sorry.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

How so? People come up with the same idea all the time independently of each other. When doing clean room implementation (the ideal best case), you are not liable if what you create at the end matches 1-1 with the original. You never know anything about the implementation detail of the original. Academia also acknowledged independent discovery and publication of many things. Why would clean room implementation be different?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Because coming up with the same implementation independently is legal, while copying someone else’s implementation isn’t. Which method you used to arrive at your implementation can be difficult to prove either way, which is why it’s important for implementors to be able to say they never looked at the original. It’s a legal defence, in case you ever need to stand in front of a judge or jury who will question how you arrived at yours.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

That's... what I'm saying. Clean room implementation is legal. You accidentally arrive at the same conclusion independently. And yes, it is tedious to do it but it is legal.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 week ago

Ah yes, then we are in agreement. I thought we were talking about unintentionally arriving at the same implementation after looking at the original, which is where the discussion started.