Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!umich!yale!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!mcsun!ukc!strath-cs!cs.glasgow.ac.uk!bru-cc!eesrajm From: eesrajm@cc.brunel.ac.uk (Andrew J Michael) Newsgroups: comp.os.minix Subject: Re: Your articles sold for cash. Summary: Prentice-Hall knows Message-ID: <1749@Terra.cc.brunel.ac.uk> Date: 1 Aug 90 18:58:12 GMT References: <5414@castle.ed.ac.uk> Organization: Brunel University, Uxbridge, UK Lines: 75 In article <5414@castle.ed.ac.uk>, tjc@castle.ed.ac.uk (A J Cunningham) writes: > > This is part of an ad that appears in Program Now, a UK based > programming magazine: > > MINIX > > Run a Unix Type System > For only $87.75 > > A unix type multi-tasking, multi-user system that will run on IBM clones > or Atari ST. > > Including printouts and patches from USENET. > > > The Minix Centre > Forncett-End Nr Norwich Norfolk. > > > Several things disturb me about this. Firstly does this company > have permission from Prentice Hall for what they are doing? > Secondly they are selling the contents of this newsgroup for profit. The > trouble is I don't see any way to stop them. > Tony Firstly, yes, Prentice Hall does know and is quite happy with the arrangement. Secondly, let's consider quite carefully what is actually happening here. I won't repeat my earlier posting about The MINIX Centre, but I must point out that it is not the intention to make money out of other people's efforts, and never has been. The MINIX Centre's intention is to assist the MINIX community by supplying patches and updates to people who would not receive them otherwise. They are not in business to make a fat profit out of it (look at the prices charged !) It has been The MINIX Centre's policy from the start to never distribute any article or posting containing a request from its author that it not be used for commercial purposes. That is why for example neither clam nor cc68 are available from The MINIX Centre. The MINIX Centre does charge for its support service, whose staff spend a large amount of time on the phone answering questions and sending disks out the door. Those people registered with the support service receive copies of Usenet articles in a quarterly newsletter as part of the support service. The Usenet articles are not sold on their own, but are distributed in this way so that those who might otherwise never see them get a chance to do so. There is always the thorny question of commercialism in any such venture. Neither the people answering the telephones or the machines that use come free. The MINIX Centre charges because it has to do so to survive. In fact The MINIX Centre just about broke even this year, so don't get the idea that some nasty organisation is getting holidays in barbados out of your efforts, because it isn't. The MINIX Centre was created by MINIX enthusiasts who didn't like the support it got from Prentice Hall (who of course take the real profit from the Usenet fixes in each new release of MINIX). If the feeling of the net is that The MINIX Centre desist from distributing Usenet postings and articles then it will do so. It just seems a pity that such a thing should have to happen because of a misunderstanding about the commercial necessities of keeping The MINIX Centre in operation. Comments please ??? Andy Michael -- Andy Michael (eesrajm@cc.brunel.ac.uk) " Software cannot be written to 85 Hawthorne Crescent be completely free of errors." West Drayton Middlesex - Acorn Computers Ltd. UB7 9PA