So, if I read your post correctly, the facts themselves cannot be copyrighted and the presentation of those facts in a standard format such as a GEDCOM file cannot be copyrighted, not by the software company and not by the person who compiled the data.
But, if I'm reading the original post correctly, that's apparently not what Broderbund is doing. They (appear to be) saying that the file produced by their software is copyrighted because it is in a proprietary format. I believe they can do that legally because I've seen that claim before many times.
So, we can get around the vendor's claim on our data by simply presenting it in an original way. And also, as a practical matter, why would any vendor care about my family data in the first place? There'd be no money in it. They also would have a hard time getting hold of my data in their format anyway.