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From: ka@hou3c.UUCP (Kenneth Almquist)
Newsgroups: net.legal
Subject: Re: Re: Protection of ideas?
Message-ID: <786@hou3c.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 27-Aug-84 18:16:38 EDT
Article-I.D.: hou3c.786
Posted: Mon Aug 27 18:16:38 1984
Date-Received: Tue, 28-Aug-84 00:27:22 EDT
References: <482@ames.UUCP> <117@scc.UUCP> <224@amd.UUCP>
Organization: Bell Labs, Holmdel, NJ
Lines: 18

> Anything that is copyrighted must also be published and so
> anyone can see it.

That is not true, at least in the United States.  Under U. S.
law, works are born copyrighted.  In other words, if you write
something, you automaticly own the copyright.  It is possible
to lose the copyright on a work.  To avoid that, you should put
a copyright notice on the work, for example:

	Copyright 1984 by Kenneth Almquist.

You do not have to register a work for the copyright to be valid,
but the copyright office will happily register unpublished works
if you want them to.  You only have to send the beginning and
end of your program to the copyright office, so if you don't want
people in the copyright office to see your code, you can place
25 page comments at the beginning and end of your program.
				Kenneth Almquist