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We were more than a bit worried last month, when a judge ruled that some bot software of the game World of Warcraft somehow infringed on Blizzard's copyright. It involved a lot of really tortured logic to figure out how such software actually violates Blizzard's copyright. It certainly is true that such software may be annoying to other World of Warcraft players, but that doesn't mean it actually violates copyright. We're already seeing some of the potential unintended consequences of such a decision, as Slashdot alerts us that beyond just seeking an injunction against the software, Blizzard is specifically seeking an injunction against him revealing the code of his software, such as by open sourcing it. If the court agrees, this effectively gives Blizzard control over someone else's source code, just because a judge found it infringed on their copyright. That seems highly problematic and dangerous.

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