National Software Forum: An Orange County group...

National Software Forum: An Orange County group organized to promote the software industry’s interests is going national.

The American Electronics Assn., a national trade group of high-tech companies, voted last week to establish a national software forum based on the AEA’s Orange County Software Forum, which was started in 1991.

“Orange County had the first software forum in the country,” said John Murphy, AEA’s Orange County Council chairman. “Last week we had a meeting of 400 people from 85 companies, and one of the things that came out was this decision to organize nationally.”

The forum is dedicated to issues of concern to software companies, from tips on how to take a software company public to lobbying on government issues such as taxes for software companies, enforcement of copyright protection and anti-virus measures.