If Zotero is slurping up these Endnote-created .ens files without users 
even knowing about it, that would be one thing.

But if .ens files can be created by many people, and if users can use 
Zotero to import any of these .ens files, and if users _choose_ to use 
Zotero to import Endnote-created .ens files, in violation of their 
EndNotes licesnes...  that might be a license violation and a legal 
culpability on the users part, but is there any legal culpability on 
Zotero's part? 

EndNote, according to that Press Release, is claiming that Zotero is not 
allowed to import _any_ .ens files, that importing .ens files violates 
EndNote's intellectual property because nobody else is allowed to parse 
the file format. Now, as I understand it, there is absolutely no legal 
prohibition on reverse engineering anything---the thing may be protected 
by patent or copyright and you may not be able to use it even if you do 
reverse engineer it. But there's nothing illegal about reverse 
engineering it. Unless perhaps you've signed a contract saying you 
wouldn't (did George Mason? Perhaps, if they have an EndNote license).

I hope George Mason U is willing to stand up for Zotero. It's popular 
enough that hopefully they will. None of these legal issues are clear, 
but EndNote certainly isn't _obviously_ in the right, and my guess would 
be they would not win any lawsuit. But with most of our employers, 
historically, being able to _win_ a lawsuit isn't needed to get our 
employers to back down, the threat alone is sufficient.

Jonathan

Peter Murray wrote:
> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
> Hash: SHA1
>
> On Sep 28, 2008, at 8:58 PM, Reese, Terry wrote:
>>>> This seems like a real grey area.  I can see Thomson Scientific
>>>> putting up a fuss when using ENS files generated by the creator of
>>>> EndNote.  But ENS files can -- and have -- be created by just about
>>>> anyone (librarians, journal publishers, researchers) and published on
>>>> the open web.
>
> (As the original author of the quoted section above, please replace 
> "can -- and have -- be created" with "can -- and have -- been created".)
>
>> I'm not sure that's what they are saying.  Endnote does come with ens 
>> files that they create (I believe, that was the case the last time I 
>> looked at the software), managed and provided as part of their 
>> application.  They certainly can claim rights to those (this isn't 
>> really a gray area) -- and unless the Zotero software is able to 
>> determine user generated files from files distributed as part of the 
>> Endnote application, then it could be problematic.
>
>
> Agreed -- if Thomson Scientific created the ENS style file in 
> question, then it is their intellectual property and there are 
> probably grounds for the lawsuit.
>
> The version of EndNote I have (circa 2005) came with a couple dozen 
> styles, and as of now Thomson Scientific has 3,500 up on their EndNote 
> Styles website.  Even these may not be created by Thomson Scientific 
> itself -- the notes in the Zotero enhancement ticket mention that some 
> of the styles might be user-contributed.  A quick perusal of the 
> Zotero code that decodes the ENS file 
> (https://www.zotero.org/trac/browser/extension/trunk/chrome/content/zotero/xpcom/enstyle.js?rev=2908#L112) 
> would seem to show that there is nothing in the ENS file that points 
> to who created the style.  If there was some way to exclude EndNote 
> style files created Thomson Scientific, then Zotero would probably be 
> okay.
>
> But, then again, I'm not a lawyer...
>
>
> Peter
> - --
> Peter Murray                            http://www.pandc.org/peter/work/
> Assistant Director, New Service Development  tel:+1-614-728-3600;ext=338
> OhioLINK: the Ohio Library and Information Network        Columbus, Ohio
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>
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-- 
Jonathan Rochkind
Digital Services Software Engineer
The Sheridan Libraries
Johns Hopkins University
410.516.8886 
rochkind (at) jhu.edu