Newsgroups: bit.listserv.pacs-l
Date:         Thu, 1 Oct 1992 16:49:17 CDT
From:         Public-Access Computer Systems Forum <LIBPACS@UHUPVM1.BITNET>
Subject:      Comments on Gutenberg Newsletter

3 Messages, 124 Lines
*-----

From: tdowling@lib.washington.edu (Thomas Dowling)
Subject: Re: Internet Training

"Michael S. Hart" writes:
> <THIS MESSAGE IS PRIVATE, CONTAINS CONFIDENTIAL INFORMATION,
> AND, IS INTENDED TO BE READ ONLY BY THE PEOPLE TO WHOM IT IS
> ADDRESSED.  RECIPIENTS MAY NOT COPY, CHANGE, DISTRIBUTE, USE
> OR DISCLOSE IT IN WHOLE OR IN PART WITHOUT MICHAEL S. HART'S
> WRITTEN PERMISSION.   Copyright [1992] Michael S. Hart>
>
> There is a reason for this. . .a major publisher has said in
> so many words they intend to collect all my notes, publish a
> compendium of them, and post them all on electronic servers.
> Some of what I post on particular lists or combinations is a
> purely experimental process to see what kind of reactions an
> audience is likely to have, then to polish up what I have to
> say. . .or give up on it entirely in some cases.

Thank you for allowing us to beta test your opinions for you.
It's comforting to know that my reaction to your posts serves
some useful purpose.

My reaction, by the way, is one of amazement: amazement that
your post can contain anything "confidential" (PACS-L numbers
over 4600 subscribers after all), and that a publisher would
find your posts so important as to compile them but then do
no more with them than post them again (where's the book deal,
where's the hypermedia version?--they've already *been* posted).

Hope that helps.

(BTW, does saving your post to my disk count as copying it?)

Thomas Dowling
University of Washington Libraries
Standard disclaimers--anything the UW doesn't agree with
was probably line noise.
*-----

From:         "Michael S. Hart" <HART@vmd.cso.uiuc.edu>
Subject:      Re: Comments on Gutenberg Newsletter

First of all, let me thank you all for your responsiveness.

I LIKE PACS, and have been a member for quite a while.

I enjoy the feedback, and use it quite a bit for polishing my work.

As far as copyright goes. . .there have been a few misapprehensions.

The Project Gutenberg Newsletter is NOT copyrighted. . .only the
editorial stuff i.e. Newsletter2 is. . .and we have given our
permission to everyone who has officially requested it. . . .
However, to answer a few points:

I would like to be able to post editorial and subjective comments
without having them spread all over before I can polish them up--
for hopeful release to the general public.

When you get a pizza ad in your mailbox, you can do pretty much a
total range of things with it, including destroy it. . .but copy!
That is what copyright is. . .the right to copy something.

Please allow me the right to choose when and where my words would
appear. . .that way I don't have to write everything as "Crossing
the Internet Threshold" recommends. . .as though it were going to
be printed in the New York Times.

I would like to think the PACS people would feel this is a valid,
and proper, use of net discussion groups.  From what I have heard
ALL our notes are copyright protected, unless we go to efforts to
insure that they are not.

More stuff later from the legal beagles, upon request, and not on
request, too, I am sure.

My apologies if I have opened a can of worms.  I should just like
to be able to get feedback on what I say without it being posted,
at least to places I don't know about.

Thank you for your interest,

Michael S. Hart, Professor of Electronic Text
Executive Director of Project Gutenberg Etext
Illinois Benedictine College, Lisle, IL 60532
No official connection to U of Illinois--UIUC
hart @uiucvmd.bitnet or hart@vmd.cso.uiuc.edu
*-----

From:          <PEMMONS@WCU>
Subject:      Comments on Gutenberg Newsletter

 Before one can register on any responsibly run computer BBS, one must read and
 acknowledge a disclaimer to the effect that the BBS carries NO PRIVATE
 MESSAGES. There is a standard paragraph of legalese covering this which a
 sysop had better present to all his callers or risk liability, thanks to
 Congress and the FCC.

 Of course, bulletin boards and networks which feature e-mail are common, and
 the confidentiality of these communications is usually respected in practice.
 But at the very least, a sysop is responsible for what appears on or gets
 disseminated from his system, and he would be well advised to read everything,
 including everything that is not addressed to him. Furthermore, if he is
 conscientious, he will also back up his system frequently. This standard
 precaution, of course, constitutes the copying of something which may or may
 not be addressed to him.

 All this being the case, if a notice claiming such stringent reservation of
 the author's rights started appearing on messages on my bulletin board, I
 would have to advise the writer that he seemed to be under a potentially
 serious legal misunderstanding as to the nature of a BBS and was misinforming
 my other callers as well. He would have to either cease and desist voluntarily
 or be dropped from membership.

 If these conditions are true of a single personally operated BBS, they must be
 at least equally true within a large network. The writer who inserts
 these notices seems to be very well informed about copyright, privacy, and data
 transmission. I am curious as to what legal legerdemain makes his claims
 compatible with the nature of telecommunications, not only practically but
 legally, under which we all labor like it or not.