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Re:Ask HN: Is pseudocode copyrightable? by russell on Tuesday May 19, 2009 @12:01AM (#616219)
IANAL, but nearly any recorded/written down is copyrightable. However ideas are not. If you implement from pseuso-code, it is another expression of the same idea. Different forms of expression have different rules on how different the new work must be to be unique. If you copied a function and just changed the variable names, it could be argued that it was an infringement.

If you copy a compilable function and give attribution, probably no one will care. If you copy a whole enterprise system, they might. If the original author cares, there should be a rights notification in the code. In particular Wikipedia articles have the GNU Free Documentation license, so you are pretty safe there.

Re:Ask HN: Is pseudocode copyrightable? by amichail on Tuesday May 19, 2009 @12:08AM (#616226)
The Wikipedia license is a copyleft license, which may present problems for software that is not open source.

I would also rather not credit a Wikipedia article in my closed source software unless it's really necessary.

Re:Ask HN: Is pseudocode copyrightable? by spectre on Tuesday May 19, 2009 @01:51AM (#616342)
Somehow I don't think Wikipedia would sue you for implementing their pseudocode.
Re:Ask HN: Is pseudocode copyrightable? by adelle on Tuesday May 19, 2009 @03:04AM (#616396)
I would rather credit Wikipedia as the source of a common "well-known" algorithm than leave the door open to claims from some third party.