Newsgroups: rec.skydiving
Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!maverick.ksu.ksu.edu!unmvax!nmt.edu!nraoaoc
From: nraoaoc@nmt.edu (Daniel Briggs)
Subject: Re: Copyright??!
Message-ID: <1991Mar22.070901.13060@nmt.edu>
Summary: Barry had a reason
Reply-To: dbriggs@nrao.edu (Daniel Briggs)
Organization: National Radio Astronomy Observatory, Socorro NM
References: <8btWXFS00V86M653JH@andrew.cmu.edu> <5482@umbc3.UMBC.EDU>
Date: Fri, 22 Mar 91 07:09:01 GMT

In article <5482@umbc3.UMBC.EDU> robie@umbc2.umbc.edu writes:
>In article <8btWXFS00V86M653JH@andrew.cmu.edu>, bb1v+@andrew.cmu.edu
(Barry Lowell Brumitt) writes...> 
>>[a notice about his words being copyrighted]
>
>Ummm...ok, don't consider this a flame - just some feedback.  It does sound
>a little pompous to me for an "A" licensed "expert" to exert his copyright
>on a public posting. Obviously, you have a right to ask that you not be quoted
>and I am sure those here will respect that, but the last thing we need is for
>people to start throwing around legal warnings. I write for part of my living
>(my *own* words and research, thanks!) and still contribute to this and 
>rec.aviation.  If I don't want it used, I don't post it...just that simple.

*sigh*.  I hadn't wanted to post this, but I should really clear this
up.  Maybe it should be said anyway.  Barry may not have put it well,
but his words were both there for a reason, and inspired by a note I
wrote him.

I wrote a post a few months ago about a reserve cutaway where the
jumper actually cut through her suspension lines with a hook knife.
Being a novice jumper myself, I had witnessed a real weird one, and
wrote a post about it.  You all know the phenomena: eyes to fingers,
without benefit of brain.  I took some care not to reflect poorly on
our drop zone, but basically told it as I saw it at the time.  It's
easy to think about a news group as 'just us guys', and not consider
how far your words might go.  Anyway, a couple of weeks later I get a
letter in the mail.  Somehow the post made it out to _Skydiving_, and
they want to do a blurb about it for the next issue.  They couldn't
find my phone number in the book, and would I call them back to talk
about it?  About this time, I'm realizing how far it has gone.  I'm
hardly the spokesman for my drop zone, so I'd better pass the buck.  I
call the jumper in question, and have her contact _Skydiving_
directly.  She also brings the drop zone operator into the act, and I
figure that's the end of it.  Well, what happened was that the jumper
herself wanted to keep a low profile on the incident, and didn't say a
whole lot.  The drop zone operator also didn't give them a whole lot
of information for their story.  What happened was that much of the
story was a direct quote, from me, from the original article to
rec.skydiving!  (It's in the January issue, if you want to read it.)

Fortunately I had taken some care to get my facts right, and I hadn't
written anything particularly embarrassing to my DZ.  (Although as it
developed, the facts as I knew them then were not *quite* the same as
later developed in the investigation.)  For the record, the reserve
ripcord's elastic keeper was *not* worn, although it's true that some
people believed it so at the time.  I rather wish they had taken the
word of the other two people (directly) involved in this, rather than
printing that "there was some question about the condition of the
rental rig."  I can see them wanting to print all available sides of
the story, but in this case they already had the direct information
from the person who used it, and she said it wasn't so.  If they'd
asked me about the quote, or allowed me to review it, by that time I
could have told them that the fact was wrong, too.  I took some heat
locally about 'blabbing to the media before the investigation
finished', but everyone understood that it was quite accidental on my
part, so it wasn't particularly intense.

I'm a little annoyed with _Skydiving_ over this, but haven't made a
stink over it.  (If someone in the DeLand offices is reading this now,
it's the first that they've heard of it.)  While I think it was tad
rude of them to quote me without asking, I'm not particularly bent out
of shape by it.  I'll stand by anything I post, even if it does go a
little farther than I'd intended.  Yelling about implied copyright
seems a little silly to me.  It may have been a little unwise of me,
but I *did* post those statements on a public forum.  Besides, I
recognize that their zeal was out of a desire to publish the news.  I
get something out of reading their accident reports, too!  They were
quite polite in their correspondence with me, and sent me a follow up
letter, and a "sample" copy of the issue with the story.  (I got to
chop up the cover of the spare issue, since I already had my own.)

So William, while Barry might have come off a little badly in claiming
explicit copyright of his words, there has indeed been a recent
example of a very novice jumper getting a post quoted when he would
rather have not had it so.  Personally, I don't think the answer is
copyright notices, and I don't think it's ragging on _Skydiving_.  I
think it just boils down to, "if you don't want it quoted, don't say
it".  Bear also in mind that accident reports in particular are very
sensitive things, and people can be quite touchy about them.  (With
some justification, too!)  Speaking for myself, I might post about a
local accident or incident in the future, as it is both interesting
and what this group is all about, but I bloody well am going to talk
to my DZ management before I do.  Because I jumped the gun, and
_Skydiving_ was a little overzealous, a bit of misinformation got
promulgated.  No harm done, but it was certainly a learning experience
for me!

-- 
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