Selling used software
Probably one of the most significant judicial rulings in the software industry was handed down by the EU's top court. In a nutshell, the court decided that the right of first sale applied to software, whether physically sold with media, or downloaded. For those residing under EU jurisdiction, this means that AutoCAD software licenses can be legally sold and pourchased on the second-hand market. Vendors may not interfere or othwise attempt to limit the sale or transfer of software licenses between individuals or companies. There are some limitations - for example, if one has a 12-seat network license, you can't just sell 6 of them. But as a general principle, the right to re-sell software licenses regardless of 'non-transferable' claims in an EULA, has been validated.
As a user, I think this is entirely to the benefit of all users of commercial software. Vendors now have to compete not only against their competition, but against their installed base. With luck, the era of trivial upgrades and artificial obsolences of software is now over.
Officially Awesome
