Charging the net....

[a_rubin at dsg4.dse.beckman.com]

In <PBX8114w164w at mantis.co.uk> mathew at mantis.co.uk (mathew) writes:

>woods at robohack.UUCP (Greg A. Woods) writes:
>> In article <1991Apr22.192306.29134 at looking.on.ca> brad at looking.on.ca (Brad Te
>> Brad, if you send me a free copy of a book, I can do any number of
>> things with it while steadfastly holding to the Copyright Act. [...]
>> it in any work of my own.  I can totally destroy it.  I can photocopy
>> it and put the original away for safe-keeping.        ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>  ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>No you can't. That's breaking copyright law, and is explicitly prohibited in
>the copyright notices on most books. You know, the bit which says "No part of
>this publication may be reproduced [...] in any form or by any means [...]
>photocopying [...] or otherwise."

I think you are wrong here.  Copyright law protects the CONTENT, not the FORM. 
I have no idea whether that clause is enforceable.  Besides, the clause preports
to be a license agreement, rather a copyright condition.

[mathew omissions]

>And you can make "fair use" copies of sections of the book. But not the whole
>book.

Actually, not entirely true.  If a textbook is out of print, but still under
copyright, you can copy it for use as a textbook.  I don't know if that is under
the "fair use" regulations, or some other.


>>                                                  I can give away the
>> photocopy and destroy the original.

>You can't do that, either. "This book is sold subject to the condition that
>it shall not [...be...] circulated [...] in any form of binding or cover
>other than that in which it is published."

You may be right, although that preports to be a license agreement,
rather than a copyright condition.

>> Shareware, as distributed across Usenet, cannot exist in practice, 
>> since the "license" it is shipped with is un-enforcable.

>In what sense?  It has already been enforced on occasion -- I have read that
>companies have been forced to pay up for shareware they have copied -- so
>your claim that it is "unenforcable" is curious.

I don't think it's enforcable either.  It may violate company policy at some
companies, but it's not enforcable.  Do you have specific examples?

>>                                                           I would say
>> it is even more useless than the average shrink-wrap "license", since
>> there is no way you can make me read the license before I read the
>> file in my spool directory, thus I can have (i.e. own) a copy before I
>> agree to the license.

>You have to own a copy of a textual representation of the file. However,
>before you get the program you must voluntarily uudecode and uncompress it.
>In the case of much PC shareware, the uncompress process displays a banner
>message proclaiming that the program is shareware and telling you to consult
>the license before running it.

>> Also, be careful when you say "complete control over copying of the
>> work".  What this really means is "complete control over profiting
>> from the work".

[mathew's response omitted]

mathew is correct here, although the telephone directory (white pages) has
been ruled public domain -- if anyone owns it, it is the individual
subscribers.

>>                  Once something is published, control over use or
>> distribution cannot be done.

>Again, this is simply not true. There are many cases of books and albums
>being recalled after publication because of copyright violation.

Examples???  Books that were published in violation of copyright can be recalled
(after publication), but that's not what you said.

>>                               (Here I mean distribution of the ideas,
>> etc. -- a book may pass from hand-to-hand without restriction by the
>> copyright holder.)

>For free, yes; you can give a book to a friend. For profit, no; you can't
>lend a book, hire it out or re-sell it. Not legally, anyway; again, in
>practise the publishers turn a blind eye to people selling second-hand books
>for charity, on market stalls, and so on.

I doubt this very much.  (Haven't you heard of used book stores.)  I'm not sure
you can lend a book for profit, but you can sell it unless there is a VALID
LICENSE AGREEMENT prohibiting it.  (I suppose that you can lend a book for
profit by selling it for $1,000,000.25 with a buyback guarantee of
$1,000,000.)  It is not prohibited by copyright law.

>Are you sure you're up-to-date with your copyright law?  Your references to
>"the Copyright Act" leave me in doubt.

I'm not sure what Greg means by "the Copyright Act", but you don't seem very
familiar with copyright law either.

 >mathew

-- I am not a lawyer either
--
a_rubin at dsg4.dse.beckman.com  
My opinions are my own, and do not represent those of my employer.