NetNews Usenet Archive 1992 #31/NN_1992_31.iso/spool/rec/humor/d/2842

Internet Message Format | 1992-12-26 | 2.9 KB

Path: sparky!uunet!olivea!mintaka.lcs.mit.edu!ai-lab!life.ai.mit.edu!burley
From: [e-mail] (Craig Burley)
Newsgroups: rec.humor.d
Subject: Re: The Twelve Bugs of Christmas is NOT IN THE PUBLIC DOMAIN!!
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Date: 25 Dec 92 22:31:34 GMT
References: <[e-mail]><[e-mail]>
    <[e-mail]>
    <[e-mail]>
Distribution: rec
Organization: Free Software Foundation 545 Tech Square Cambridge, MA 02139
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NNTP-Posting-Host: apple-gunkies.gnu.ai.mit.edu
In-reply-to: [e-mail]'s message of 20 Dec 92 23:33:49 EST

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] writes:

       I'll admit that I don't know much about copyright and trademark
   laws in the USA, but then I never claimed to be knowledgeable on those
   subjects either.  The comment that seemed to get under your skin had
   nothing to do with the point I was trying to make.

Then why say it?  Why say "I doubt you have any copyright" or whatever?
Isn't that just advertising that you have knowledge of what copyright
law is about and claiming the person doesn't own a copyright on his/her
own work?

       As for my original post, I was attempting to make a simple point.
   When you post something to the net, it may get copied without credit where
   credit is due.  I'm sure you'd agree that this happens all the time, to
   hundreds of people who post their original work to the net.  I have no
   interest in a argument/flame-war about copyright/trademark laws.

I agree, I just don't see why you need to start off such a post with a claim
that a person doesn't have a copyright ("or registered trademark or anything
like that") on something they wrote.

Obviously, in my post, I agreed with the notion that posting stuff to the
net does _risk_ it getting copied without credit.  But that doesn't mean such
copying is legal (it isn't), _nor_ (and this was _my_ point) that the
owner of the copyright shouldn't frequently remind people of the copyright
status of his/her works.  Without having others state that there _is_ no
copyright status (hence implying it's in the public domain, despite the
clear statement of the original subject line).

Basically, you _implied_ knowledge of copyright law (despite demonstrating
lack of such knowledge) by stating your doubts that it applied to the
creation in question, and you _deserve_ to be flamed for doing so.  And
I wasn't exactly showing off my knowledge of the subject matter, given
that I was telling others to _go read a book_ rather than just listen to
my opinions (as you seemed to be doing).
--

James Craig Burley, Software Craftsperson    [e-mail]
Member of the League for Programming Freedom (LPF) [e-mail]