From: dunnett@mala.bc.ca (Malcolm Dunnett)
Newsgroups: news.admin
Subject: Re: NetNews/CD - USENET News Available
Date: 21 Jul 92 11:33:03 -0700
Distribution: world
Organization: Malaspina College

In article <oR32NB11w165w@mantis.co.uk>, 
       mathew <mathew@mantis.co.uk> writes:

> dunnett@mala.bc.ca (Malcolm Dunnett) writes:
>> Isn't the real issue one of redistribution rights rather than "public 
>> domain". It seems to me the appropriate model would be to treat each USENET
>> article like a piece of "shareware", ie there would be no restrictions on
>> the verbatim copying of the article in any format ( including CD or paper ),
>> but any other use of the material would be subject to whatever
>> restrictions the author imposed.

> 
> Making use of this article by reading it obliges you to send me $100 in used
> notes.  Thanks very much.
> 
    Touche, but a rather contrived example. I think it's clear that what I
meant was that unrestricted copying of usenet articles ( and reading of the
articles is in a sense just "copying into the brain" ) need not affect the
authors rights in any other way - If I post a program and it gets freely
distributed I should still retain the rights to restrict the program's use
( eg a condition of "If you want to extract this program, compile it and
use it send me $100" should be valid the same way a shareware restriction
is - enforcement is of course a separate matter ). Conditions like "may
not be stored on a CD-ROM, or read on any terminal with amber phosphors"
should somehow be prevented.

> What's more, under your suggested model I can now copy the Hitch-Hiker's Guide
> to the Galaxy as much as I want.  Joy!
> 

  What I'm suggesting is a model where anything which is legitimately 
posted may be copied without restriction as long as it is not modified in a
significant way ( eg the headers and signatures remain ), and was
specifically in response to a posting which seemed to suggest that anything
posted has to be made public domain. All I'm saying is that we should
agree that "fair use" of an original ( or posted with permission ) usenet
article includes copying it in any medium. To me this is an issue separate
from the issue of who is liable if some net.criminal posts stolen material.

>
> No, somehow I don't see the courts being too keen on your idea.
> 

I've heard of cases of BBS operators being charged because stolen material
was present on their boards. The reasoning seemed to be that they knew it
was there, knew or should have known that it was not legally provided and
did not take measures to rectify the situation. A usenet news administrator
who has a copy of the Hitchhikers Guide on his system ( and knows about it) 
seems to be in the same situation. There are no absolutes, but I would
think that if we ( as the news administrators ) have publicly stated 
policies against such violations, take measures to inform our users of
such and act to rectify any infringement as soon as it's brought to our
attention then our liability would be limited, whereas if we ignore
such violations and say "It's not me it's the [nudge nudge wink wink]
computers fault" they may not take too kindly to it.

-- 
========================================================================
Malcolm Dunnett    Malaspina College         Email: dunnett@mala.bc.ca
Computer Services  Nanaimo, B.C. CANADA        Tel: (604)755-8738
Newsgroups: news.admin,comp.org.eff.talk,misc.legal.computing