Who knew that software licensing would ever turn into such hotly contested territory?
A proposed law designed to streamline the way states treat software licensing has drawn fire from a number of parties, from librarians to chief information officers, software developers to consumer groups. They believe that the proposal in question, the Uniform Computer Information Transaction Act (UCITA), favors the interests of corporations over consumers. What’s more, they say, the measure would let software companies dictate settlement terms in conflicts and potentially slow the development of better software applications. Laws, however, have not caught up to the PC era, according to the proposal’s backers. The same litigation guidelines that apply to laundry machines, cars and televisions govern litigation over software. This is why the business software industry is backing UCITA, believing that it will modernize laws regarding commercial interstate transactions to make them specifically applicable to software. Three years ago, the National Conference of Commissioners on Uniform S
