In a message dated 97-03-30 11:37:53 EST, drew@interport.net (Derek Drew)
writes:

>They cannot sue you for copyright infringement unless you cause financial
>damage to them. Since they are not offering this old document for sale, you
>can safely copy and redistribute it at will since you are not causing harm
>to a revenue stream that they are otherwise likely to get. Copyright only
applies >when there is financial damage............

Interesting.  Derek, do you remember posting this?:
(See myth #2 in particular)
====================================================
Subj:	copyright myths
Date:	96-01-09 03:06:52 EST
>From:	drew@interport.net (Derek Drew)
Sender:	vanagon@lenti.med.umn.edu
Reply-to:	drew@interport.net
To:	vanagon@lenti.med.umn.edu (Multiple recipients of list)

http://www.clarinet.com/brad/copymyths.html

   ClariNet * Brad Templeton Home Page * Copyright Myths
  
                    10 BIG MYTHS ABOUT COPYRIGHT EXPLAINED
                                      
   By Brad Templeton
  
AN ATTEMPT TO ANSWER COMMON MYTHS ABOUT COPYRIGHT SEEN ON THE NET AND COVER
ISSUES RELATED TO COPYRIGHT AND USENET POSTING.
 
   1) "If it doesn't have a copyright notice, it's not copyrighted."
  
   This was true in the past, but today almost all major nations follow
   the Berne copyright convention. For example, in the USA, almost
   everything created privately and originally after April 1, 1989 is
   copyrighted and protected whether it has a notice or not. The default
   you should assume for other people's works is that they are
   copyrighted and may not be copied unless you know otherwise. There are
   some old works that lost protection without notice, but frankly you
   should not risk it unless you know for sure.
  
   It is true that a notice strengthens the protection, by warning
   people, and by allowing one to get more and different damages, but it
   is not necessary. If it looks copyrighted, you should assume it is.
   This applies to pictures, too. You may not scan pictures from
   magazines and post them to the net, and if you come upon something
   unknown, you shouldn't post that either.
  
   The correct form for a notice is:
        "Copyright [dates] by [author/owner]"

   You can use C in a circle =A9 instead of "Copyright" but "(C)" has never
   been given legal force. The phrase "All Rights Reserved" used to be
   required in some nations but is now not needed.
  
  
   2) "If I don't charge for it, it's not a violation."
  
   False. Whether you charge can affect the damages awarded in court, but
   that's essentially the only difference. It's still a violation if you
   give it away -- and there can still be heavy damages if you hurt the
   commercial value of the property.

  
   3) "If it's posted to Usenet it's in the public domain."
  
   False. Nothing is in the public domain anymore unless the owner
   explicitly puts it in the public domain(*). Explicitly, as in you have
   a note from the author/owner saying, "I grant this to the public
   domain." Those exact words or words very much like them.
  
   Some argue that posting to Usenet implicitly grants permission to
   everybody to copy the posting within fairly wide bounds, and others
   feel that Usenet is an automatic store and forward network where all
   the thousands of copies made are done at the command (rather than the
   consent) of the poster. This is a matter of some debate, but even if
   the former is true (and in this writer's opinion we should all pray it
   isn't true) it simply would suggest posters are implicitly granting
   permissions "for the sort of copying one might expect when one posts
   to Usenet" and in no case is this a placement of material into the
   public domain. Furthermore it is very difficult for an implicit
   licence to supersede an explicitly stated licence that the copier was
   aware of.
  
   Note that all this assumes the poster had the right to post the item
   in the first place. If the poster didn't, then all the copies are
   pirate, and no implied licence or theoretical reduction of the
   copyright can take place.
  
   (*) Copyrights can expire after a long time, putting someting into the
   public domain, and there are some fine points on this issue regarding
   older copyright law versions. However, none of this applies to an
   original article posted to USENET.
  
   Note that granting something to the public domain is a complete
   abandonment of all rights. You can't make something "PD for
   non-commercial use." If your work is PD, other people can even modify
   one byte and put their name on it.

  
   4) "My posting was just fair use!"
  
   See other notes on fair use for a detailed answer, but bear the
   following in mind:
  
   The "fair use" exemption to copyright law was created to allow things
   such as commentary, parody, news reporting, research and education
   about copyrighted works without the permission of the author. Intent,
   and damage to the commercial value of the work are important
   considerations. Are you reproducing an article from the New York Times
   because you needed to in order to criticise the quality of the New
   York Times, or because you couldn't find time to write your own story,
   or didn't want your readers to have to pay to log onto the online
   services with the story or buy a copy of the paper? The first is
   probably fair use, the others probably aren't.
  
   Fair use is almost always a short excerpt and almost always
   attributed. (One should not use more of the work than is necessary to
   make the commentary.) It should not harm the commercial value of the
   work -- in the sense of people no longer needing to buy it (which is
   another reason why reproduction of the entire work is generally
   forbidden.)
  
   Note that most inclusion of text in Usenet followups is for commentary
   and reply, and it doesn't damage the commercial value of the original
   posting (if it has any) and as such it is fair use. Fair use isn't an
   exact doctrine, either. The court decides if the right to comment
   overrides the copyright on an indidvidual basis in each case. There
   have been cases that go beyond the bounds of what I say above, but in
   general they don't apply to the typical net misclaim of fair use. It's
   a risky defence to attempt.

  
   5) "If you don't defend your copyright you lose it."
  
   False. Copyright is effectively never lost these days, unless
   explicitly given away. You may be thinking of trade marks, which can
   be weakened or lost if not defended.

  
   6) "Somebody has that name copyrighted!"
  
   You can't "copyright a name," or anything short like that. Titles
   usually don't qualify, but I doubt you could write a song entitled
   "Everybody's got something to hide except for me and my monkey."
   (J.Lennon/P.McCartney)
  
   You can't copyright words, but you can trademark them, generally by
   using them to refer to your brand of a generic type of product or
   service. Like an "Apple" computer. Apple Computer "owns" that word
   applied to computers, even though it is also an ordinary word. Apple
   Records owns it when applied to music. Neither owns the word on its
   own, only in context, and owning a mark doesn't mean complete control
   -- see a more detailed treatise on this law for details.
  
   You can't use somebody else's trademark in a way that would unfairly
   hurt the value of the mark, or in a way that might make people confuse
   you with the real owner of the mark, or which might allow you to
   profit from the mark's good name. For example, if I were giving advice
   on music videos, I would be very wary of trying to label my works with
   a name like "mtv." :-)

  
   7) "They can't get me, defendants in court have powerful rights!"
  
   Copyright law is mostly civil law. If you violate copyright you would
   usually get sued, not charged with a crime. "Innocent until proven
   guilty" is a principle of criminal law, as is "proof beyond a
   reasonable doubt." Sorry, but in copyright suits, these don't apply
   the same way or at all. It's mostly which side and set of evidence the
   judge or jury accepts or believes more, though the rules vary based on
   the type of infringement. In civil cases you can even be made to
   testify against your own interests.

  
   8) "Oh, so copyright violation isn't a crime or anything?"
  
   Actually, recently in the USA commercial copyright violation involving
   more than 10 copies and value over $2500 was made a felony. So watch
   out. (At least you get the protections of criminal law.) On the other
   hand, don't think you're going to get people thrown in jail for
   posting your E-mail. The courts have much better things to do than
   that. This is a fairly new, untested statute.

  
   9) "It doesn't hurt anybody -- in fact it's free advertising."
  
   It's up to the owner to decide if they want the free ads or not. If
   they want them, they will be sure to contact you. Don't rationalize
   whether it hurts the owner or not, ask them. Usually that's not too
   hard to do. Time past, ClariNet published the very funny Dave Barry
   column to a large and appreciative Usenet audience for a fee, but some
   person didn't ask, and forwarded it to a mailing list, got caught, and
   the newspaper chain that employs Dave Barry pulled the column from the
   net, pissing off everybody who enjoyed it. Even if you can't think of
   how the author or owner gets hurt, think about the fact that piracy on
   the net hurts everybody who wants a chance to use this wonderful new
   technology to do more than read other people's flamewars.

  
   10) "They e-mailed me a copy, so I can post it."
  
   To have a copy is not to have the copyright. All the E-mail you write
   is copyrighted. However, E-mail is not, unless previously agreed,
   secret. So you can certainly report on what E-mail you are sent, and
   reveal what it says. You can even quote parts of it to demonstrate.
   Frankly, somebody who sues over an ordinary message might well get no
   damages, because the message has no commercial value, but if you want
   to stay strictly in the law, you should ask first. On the other hand,
   don't go nuts if somebody posts your E-mail. If it was an ordinary
   non-secret personal letter of minimal commercial value with no
   copyright notice (like 99.9% of all E-mail), you probably won't get
   any damages if you sue them. Note as well that the law aside, keeping
   private correspondence private is a courtesy one should usually
   honour.
     _________________________________________________________________
  
  IN SUMMARY
     * These days, almost all things are copyrighted the moment they are
       written, and no copyright notice is required.
     * Copyright is still violated whether you charged money or not, only
       damages are affected by that.
     * Postings to the net are not granted to the public domain, and
       don't grant you any permission to do further copying except
       perhaps the sort of copying the poster might have expected in
       the ordinary flow of the net.
     * Fair use is a complex doctrine meant to allow certain valuable
       social purposes. Ask yourself why you are republishing what you
       are posting and why you couldn't have just rewritten it in your
       own words.
     * Copyright is not lost because you don't defend it; that's a
       concept from trademark law. The ownership of names is also from
       trademark law, so don't say somebody has a name copyrighted.
     * Copyright law is mostly civil law where the special rights of
       criminal defendants you hear so much about don't apply. Watch out,
       however, as new laws are moving copyright violation into the
       criminal realm.
     * Don't rationalize that you are helping the copyright holder; often
       it's not that hard to ask permission.
     * Posting E-mail is technically a violation, but revealing facts
       from E-mail isn't, and for almost all typical E-mail, nobody could
       wring any damages from you for posting it.
    _________________________________________________________________
  
   Permission is granted to freely copy (unmodified) this document in
   electronic form, or in print if you're not selling it. On the WWW,
   however, you must link here rather than copy it. If you had not seen
   a notice like this on the document, you would have to assume you did
   not have permission to copy it. This document is still protected by
   you-know-what even though it has no copyright notice.
     _________________________________________________________________
  
   It should be noted that the author, as publisher of an electronic
   newspaper on the net, makes his living by publishing copyrighted
   material in electronic form and has the associated biases. However, DO
   NOT E-MAIL HIM FOR LEGAL ADVICE; for that use other resources or
   consult a lawyer. Also note that while most of these principles are
   universal in Berne copyright signatory nations, some are derived from
   Canadian and U.S. law. This document is provided to clear up some
   common misconceptions about intellectual property law that are often
   seen on the net. It is not intended to be a complete treatise on all
   the nuances of the subject. A more detailed copyright FAQ, covering
   other issues including compilation copyright and more intricacies of
   fair use is available in the same places you found this note, or here.
   Also consider gopher://marvel.loc.gov/11/copyright for actual
   statutes. Another useful document is the EFF's IP law primer.
  
   Other net articles on my Home Page
  
   Up to ClariNet e.News home page

======================================================
Regards,
Jim Davis
87 GL Syncro
88 GL Wolfsburg