Re-using copyrighted code

[llanitedave]

On Sunday, June 9, 2013 2:08:54 PM UTC-7, zipher wrote:
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> > Fair use has nothing to do with money. It depends on how the work is
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> > used and how you've changed it. Weird Al's song parodies are fair use,
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> > even though he sells them.
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> That can't really be claimed without a case being brought against him.
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>  Michael Jackson, for example, probably could have made a case against
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> WierdAl, but did not -- that does not automatically mean that
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> WierdAl's use was fair-use in the slightest.  In fact, it probably was
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> not, but MJ made enough money that he probably also didn't want to the
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> PR loss.
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> 

Weird Al can be a complex case, because sometimes his songs are true parodies, and sometimes they're more satires.  Parody has a pretty firm history of being protected under fair use, and Weird Al's MJ-inspired songs ("Fat" and "Eat It") are clearly parodies.  (As is his more recent Lady Gaga sendup "Perform This Way", while his Star wars saga "The Story Begins" and Coolio-esque "Amish Paradise" are more like satires).

So in the case of Weird Al's Michael Jackson parodies, he would be protected under law if MJ had decided to sue.

However, there's another reason that Weird Al's "victims" never file a suit.  First, he always gets permission from them BEFORE publishing a song.  Second, the objects of his skewering usually like the fact that they've been noticed by him.  Madonna actually suggested the idea of "Like a Surgeon", and when he did "Smells Like Nirvana", the group felt like they'd finally made it.

This is all kind of OT, of course, except to point out that fair use is not as straightforward as it might seem, but neither is prohibition of reuse.

However, I have yet to see an example of source code that qualifies as either parody or satire under any standard.