[John Williamson]

Eeyore wrote:

There has been case law on this subject in all countries that support
copyright and patent laws.

The law varies from country to country.

However since many Behringer products are slavish copies of their competition,
I'd like to know how they can claim copyright for something that's not theirs in
the first place !

As far as I know, the details vary, for instance what is fair use in one
place is not necessarily fair use in another. The principle remains,
though. If I design it, I own the copyright on the design, unless I
assign it to another person or company. If I patent it, I publish the
design & principle so that others can use the design & principle under
licence.

As for Behringer stuff being copies of their competition, if it's
patented, it can be licenced, otherwise, a "clean room" approach can be
used.

Admittedly, Behringer may not do this...
I would think, though, that just changing one component or dimension
*may* result in the courts considering it to be a new design, hence a
new copyright now exists for that new design. It depends how good your
lawyers are.

Most, if not all, IC maufacturers produce reference circuits which can
be used by anyone using that IC, so if both places use the same IC, is
it not possible they're both using the same reference design? Possibly
even modified the same way, even if the design teams are working
independently.
User interface is a different matter, in that you *could* claim there's
only one logical way to lay out the controls. The fact it "just happens"
to be the same way as Company X did it a while ago can be quite a field
day for the lawyers.

Didn't I read somewhere that Behringer were in trouble for copying stuff
anyway?

--
Tciao for Now!

John.