there absolutely is proprietary client-side javascript. it is protected by copyright like anything else. you can't just go and steal google's js, and google can't open up my website and steal my js. that's the point of laws. indie nobodys can violate the laws as long as they are small enough to fly under the radar, but you can't become successful with stolen code.
the author wasn't suggesting that her code was 'stolen' or copied verbatim, but reviewed and implemented in a similar fashion. she could have offset this possibility by obfuscating her code, using minimizers etc but the functionality is there for the world to see and from her article i got the impression that she approves of this.
consider:
1. small scrappy startup uses a copied snippet of code, gets successful and rewrites code better which original author gets to enjoy.
2. big company wants to save implementation time and knows they can't copy code. asks author for licensing fee.
And that just shows how pointless copyright law is in this particular example. It's analogous to someone inventing a device that causes food to rain from the sky across a large area, then passing laws which state that no one can eat the food that rains onto their property (without permission of that inventor).
I'm all for trade secrets (which really already exist as consequences of employee contracts and trespassing laws), but prohibiting anyone from using code that you deliberately share with the world seems so backwards to me.
They've already done that, only with patent law. The company in question is Monsanto. In their case, they sue you if their crops spread into your fields and start growing without you paying.
Of course you are correct, copyright protects code. But I didn't think that was her point.
I could be wrong, but what I took from it was that (1) the code is there, so you can learn from it, and (2) that there is a culture of tolerance to people learning and using some amount of other people's code. Both of these are true, and they made the web a better platform to develop for IMO.
And it's a particularly relevant observation at a time when some segments of the industry are pushing for a VM or native code execution facilities in the browser. Having a universal client that works from human-readable code -- and having a `view source` feature for easy reading -- has provided a platform (and atop it, a culture) where every instance serves as an example and it's likely a significant portion of the reason why the web as grown and moved forward the way it has.
The other point behind the piece may be that the value "owning" an idea is limited at best; good execution generates a lot more value, both for you and your customers and the market at large. You could spend a lot of time trying to protect your ideas either by holding your cards close to your chest or through legal strategies, but the last 20 years seem to indicate you're likely to do a lot better by going to market well.
