> But, at the same time, the user experiences it as a graphic. An animated GIF, for example, contains a small amount of code-like data to say how long each frame should last for and when to stop running. Is a GIF software? Is the basic circle above software? How much code do you need before something becomes software?
To me, from an ontological perspective, it's software if you wrote it like software: starting from the text form in a text editor. But it's an image if you made it in a graphical editor like Inkscape, just like how you could make an image in GIMP. The format just happens to be SVG.
I think this might also make sense from a legal perspective, as copyright law seems more focussed on the creation (how it is made / who made it / what was the purpose), and less on how it is used.
> That sure looks like software to me!
> But, at the same time, the user experiences it as a graphic. An animated GIF, for example, contains a small amount of code-like data to say how long each frame should last for and when to stop running. Is a GIF software? Is the basic circle above software? How much code do you need before something becomes software?
To me, from an ontological perspective, it's software if you wrote it like software: starting from the text form in a text editor. But it's an image if you made it in a graphical editor like Inkscape, just like how you could make an image in GIMP. The format just happens to be SVG.
I think this might also make sense from a legal perspective, as copyright law seems more focussed on the creation (how it is made / who made it / what was the purpose), and less on how it is used.
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