Newsgroups: comp.archives.admin Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!helios.physics.utoronto.ca!ists!newshub.ccs.yorku.ca!newshub.ccs.yorku.ca!oz From: oz@ursa.ccs.yorku.ca (Ozan Yigit) Subject: Re: copyright status and future development of comp.archives In-Reply-To: dhesi@cirrus.com's message of 24 Jun 91 17: 55:23 GMT Message-ID: Sender: news@newshub.ccs.yorku.ca (USENET News System) Organization: York U. Communications Research & Development References: <1991Jun24.001311.11155@newshub.ccs.yorku.ca> <1991Jun24.175523.17435@cirrus.com> Date: Tue, 25 Jun 1991 06:41:10 GMT dhesi@cirrus.com (Rahul Dhesi) writes: [rahul's conceptualizations of "public" elided] ... So think about which meaning of "public" is intended here. Thanks for your "public" descriptions Rahul, but they are not particularly interesting to me. I actually did spend some time thinking about this and other issues within the context of USENET, and co-wrote about it[1] in 1987. At the time we examined the copyrighted re-destribution of "public" USENET postings as a part of the Stargate affair, and the flap over it. So, however fascinating it may be, the topic under discussion is not exactly uncharted territory. ... Then tell me why this meaning should prevent the posting of copyrighted information to the net. (We already have tons of copyrighted software posted.) Maybe you misunderstood what I wrote. I am only objecting to the copyrighted re-post of public (that is, it is available anyone who wants it without any restrictions) information articles posted by others, while I acknowledge that it takes some effort to do the selective re-post, as with any other moderated newsgroup. My objection is mostly on the philosophical grounds, but you may wish to get more technical, as many people did during the the Stargate affair. They began copyrighting their articles to disallow Stargate's copyright and its restrictions, but that was 1986/87. Now, there is no need to bother even in the US, as per Geneva convention, all articles are implicitly copyright by their authors. I think the implications of this for any "derivative works" such as the article contents of comp.archives is reasonably clear. oz --- [1] Durlak J. and R. O'brien and O. Yigit, ``An Examination of the Social and Political Processses of a Cooperative Computer/Communications Network Under the Stress of Rapid Growth'', York University, 1987 (N/A) --- In seeking the unattainable, simplicity | Internet: oz@nexus.yorku.ca only gets in the way. -- Alan J. Perlis | Uucp: utai/utzoo!yunexus!oz