From: whs70@dancer.uucp (22501-sohl)
Newsgroups: alt.culture.usenet,comp.org.eff.talk,news.admin,misc.legal.computing
Subject: Re: Hipocrisy is the Greatest Luxury (raise the double standard)
Date: 31 Jul 92 19:32:22 GMT
Reply-To: whs70@dancer.UUCP ()
Organization: Bellcore, Livingston, NJ

In article <seSIv2_00awJA9nXwf@andrew.cmu.edu> Peter Glen Berger <pb1p+@andrew.cmu.edu> writes:
>mccall@mksol.dseg.ti.com (fred j mccall 575-3539) writes:
>> If you post your article, shareware, etc., to the net, everyone has
>> the right to COPY it.  They may not have the right to run your
>> shareware or plagiarize your article without your permission, but
>> that's something else again.
>
>Okay.  I do not give permission for anyone to copy this article onto
>or distribute this article on CD-ROM.  Anyone who does so is
>"plagiarizing" (actually, copying) this article without my permission.
>Anyone copying this article for non-profit purposes and on any media
>other than CD-ROM, however, is copying it with my permission.
>
>The point I'm making is that the author of a work of authorship has
>the right to restrict the distribution of that work.

And when you post to Netnews/Usenet you give impled
permissions to distribute the post through all the automatic
distribution that is connected (including CD-ROM) regardless
of any words you might say to the contrary.  The courts do NOT
simply look at your words, they also take into account your
actions and posting to the network knowing that CD-ROM is
a part of the automatic distribution is an overt act that
(IMHO) the court would view as granting permission for such
distribution regardless of what your words say.

>  Whether the
>technology will accomodate such restrictions, and whether those who
>come into contact with the article are ethical enough to respect those
>restrictions are entirely different questions.

The technology does NOT have to accomodate your restrictions, your
use of the technology implies consent to the way the technology
operates.  As to ethics, there is no ethical reason (nor legal
reason) to change/modify/adopt the network to your desires.

>  Whether enforcement is
>feasible or possible is an entirely different question.  But under US
>Copyright Law, the author of a work has the RIGHT to withhold
>permission to copy his work for good reasons, bad reasons, or no
>reasons at all (except, of course, for the fair use exception).

Agreed, and when you make a deliberate choice to post you automatically
accept the way the network works regardless of the words you add.

>This article is copyright 1992 Peter G. Berger.  Distribution of this
>article on CD-ROM is expressly forbidden. 

Well Peter, I see that the ball is in your court.  Go find a CD-ROM
distributer and find this (or one of your other posts) on a CD-ROM
for sale and take the vendor to court.  Absent any such action by
you or anyone else that believes they can enforce that restriction,
we have a status quo which includes CD-ROM distribution, pay-to-read,
and other aspects of USENET that is totally contradictory to your stance.
So, if you think you have a cause of action, "sue now or forever
hold your peace."  

Standard Disclaimer- Any opinions, etc. are mine and NOT my employer's.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Bill Sohl (K2UNK) BELLCORE (Bell Communications Research, Inc.)
Morristown, NJ             email via UUCP      bcr!dancer!whs70
201-829-2879 Weekdays      email via Internet  whs70@dancer.cc.bellcore.com
Xref: sparky alt.culture.usenet:467 news.admin:6252 comp.org.eff.talk:4893 misc.legal.computing:1524