Newsgroups: comp.archives.admin
Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!ox.com!msen.com!emv
From: emv@msen.com (Ed Vielmetti)
Subject: Re: copyright status and future development of comp.archives
In-Reply-To: oz@ursa.ccs.yorku.ca's message of 25 Jun 91 06:41:10 GMT
Message-ID: <EMV.91Jun25142055@bronte.aa.ox.com>
Sender: usenet@ox.com (Usenet News Administrator)
Organization: MSEN, Inc. Ann Arbor MI
References: <EMV.91Jun19020107@bronte.aa.ox.com>
	<1991Jun24.001311.11155@newshub.ccs.yorku.ca>
	<1991Jun24.175523.17435@cirrus.com>
	<OZ.91Jun25014110@ursa.ccs.yorku.ca>
Date: Tue, 25 Jun 1991 18:21:00 GMT
Lines: 69

<excerpt> <msgid> OZ.91Jun25014110@ursa.ccs.yorku.ca </msgid>
oz@ursa.ccs.yorku.ca (Ozan Yigit) writes:

   Maybe you misunderstood what I wrote. I am only objecting to the
   copyrighted re-post of public (that is, it is available anyone who
   wants it without any restrictions) information articles posted by
   others, while I acknowledge that it takes some effort to do the
   selective re-post, as with any other moderated newsgroup.

</excerpt> <para>
Would your objections be the same if the copyright applied only to the
entire collection of information posted to comp.archives, and not to
individual messages?  That is to say, no matter how someone got an
MSEN Archive Service posting announcing a new version of the Scheme
bibliography, they'd be able to share that with their friends so long
as they didn't give a full feed of msen.* to someone who didn't
subscribe.  This could probably be taken care of strictly with
contracts, but copyright notices serve an equivalent effect.
</para> <para>
Actually, I'd even let them (or encourage them!) to send out a full
feed of the original articles that made up the MSEN Archive Service,
sans copyright, verification, editing, ? advertising ?, keywords, see-also
information, References: lines that point back to the original
announcements, and perhaps with a few of the articles that I rejected
tossed in for good measure.
</para> <excerpt>

   My objection is mostly on the philosophical grounds, but you may
   wish to get more technical, as many people did during the the
   Stargate affair.  They began copyrighting their articles to
   disallow Stargate's copyright and its restrictions, but that was
   1986/87. 

</excerpt> <para>
The MSEN Archive Service has nothing to do with Stargate.  The lessons
have been learned.  It has a lot more to do with something like
Clarinet, especially given that I'd like to mix in some explicitly
copyrighted (no redistribution allowed) materials that appear on the
NewsBytes wire.  The intellectual property rights of the original
authors will be respected, because obviously if I piss too many people
off all this effort will be wasted.  I currently have a few individual
authors blocked from being reposted to comp.archives, I'd be happy to
add anyone who complains.
</para> <excerpt>

   Now, there is no need to bother even in the US, as per
   Geneva convention, all articles are implicitly copyright by their
   authors.  I think the implications of this for any "derivative
   works" such as the article contents of comp.archives is reasonably
   clear.

</excerpt> <para>
I don't think it's clear at all, and I resent your implications that
comp.archives is just a rebroadcasting service.  I add a significant
amount of value, not only in the selection and presentation of the
materials, but also in the verification and categorization of articles
as they come out.  In fact, it's not necessary for me to explicitly
assert copyrights to the article contents of comp.archives, because
under the terms which you have just described I already hold an
implicit copyright.
</para>

<sig>
Edward Vielmetti, vice president for research, MSEN Inc. emv@msen.com
<snappy-quote>
Comp.archives is the best thing in the news.		Bob Smart
</snappy-quote>
</sig>

