PROMs and Copyrights...

[Mike]

>
>I can tell you (as a past Hypertech employee) that copying the stock binary,
>making changes, and then selling it as your own work is NOT illegal.  This
>has been a legal  issue of long debate.  Once the binary is modified, it is
>no longer copyrighted material.  Re-selling of non-modified binaries IS
>illegal, however.
>

This makes sense. I figure if I bought the car, I bought all the firmware
that came with it and I can do as I please with it, including showing it to
the world for all to see, as long as I don't make a profit from it.

Okay, so what about free-distribution then? If I buy a chip from ADS, make
copies of it and then give them to friends with the same car, there must be
some "illegality" in that since these guys are benefitting from ADS'
expertise but ADS is getting nothing from it...even if I didn't make a
profit from it. Basically, it's not my firmware to copy and distribute
(freely or not), right? 

<*sigh*> Any lawyers on the list?

>
>And, Hypertech doesn't get any "inside information" from the manufacturers.
>Time to market on new factory releases is only possible by purchasing the
>first car in town of that model, getting started immediately, and working
>hard.  Unforeseen technical challenges on selected models will always hurt
>time to market, of course.
>

I sorta figured GM wouldn't give/sell info to Hypertech. I guess I was
thinking that since Hypertech is the only one doing a "Power Programmer" (or
are there others now?) I figured they had an inside source for technical
info that the others couldn't crack by brute force reverse engineering.


--
 Mike