Time zone database shut down (The Daily Parker)

If it makes you feel happier saying they don't "write" law when they plainly do, go right ahead. You seem to imagine a line in the sand between these "centuries old" case histories and today, but that line does not exist. What was done in Carlill continues today. Our world changes, and judges have to make decisions. In our system of law, those decisions change the law by setting precedent.

Let me briefly explain the alternative: In a Napoleonic law system (in theory) each judge is restricted to the statute. The statute still doesn't cover all the curiosities of a changing world of course, but each judge decides independently what to do about the gap. One judge may decide a cell phone is basically a "telephone" and that a law concerning telephones applies, while another reasons it is not a "telephone" but a "radio" and that law does not apply. The resulting inconsistency causes some problems, but people cope.

Under Common law systems judges are bound by precedent. Once the first judge decides that a cell phone is indeed a "telephone" other judges in the same jurisdiction are compelled to accept this unless they can make some finer distinction. For example a future judge might decide that the Push-to-Talk feature on a mobile is not a "telephone" but the ordinary functionality is. This system of course has its own share of problems.

Maybe you're comfortable describing most of the cases that come to mind as "centuries old". How about the 1999 Sony vs Connectix. This established that necessity is a defence against copyright infringement. Connectix admitted that they made copies of Sony's property without being licensed to do so, in order to reverse engineer the Sony copyrighted software and undertake Clean Room design. The judge found that since reverse engineering for interoperability is legal, and there was no other reasonable way to pursue this reasonable objective, Connectix were not breaking the law by copying the Sony code.

For the owners of Connectix it meant a fat cheque from Sony (to buy out their technology and protect Sony's market) instead of damages and bankruptcy. But for a tiny startup today it means you can rely on the fact that reverse engineering your competitor's systems is not, in and of itself, copyright infringement even though you won't find that anywhere in the US statute law.