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From: mmar@sphinx.UChicago.UUCP (Mitchell Marks)
Newsgroups: net.legal
Subject: Re: Is a Shareware license enforceable?
Message-ID: <1469@sphinx.UChicago.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 24-Dec-85 21:21:07 EST
Article-I.D.: sphinx.1469
Posted: Tue Dec 24 21:21:07 1985
Date-Received: Sat, 28-Dec-85 01:08:15 EST
References: <27@decwrl.UUCP>
Organization: U Chicago -- Linguistics Dept
Lines: 49


[Naw, I don't really believe there's a line-eater.]             really believe there's a line-eater.                                    

> From: wasser@viking.DEC (John A. Wasser)
> Message-ID: <27@decwrl.UUCP>
> One possible legal point is a clause in such "licenses" that requires
> that if you make a copy and give it to someone (as allowed by the
> copyright owner) you must first make sure the recipient knows about
> the license he is (supposedly) getting into.  Can the copyright owner
> legally require you to pass on this "contract/license" as part of the
> restrictions of the copyright?  Is the "contract/license" binding on
> the recipient?

Do you know the statement in the front of Penguin books?  (I mean real
English Penguins, not books published in the U.S. since the Viking
Penguin merger.)  It goes like this:

	Except in the United States of America, this book is
	sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by
	way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out,
	or otherwise circulated without the publisher's prior
	consent in any form of binding or cover other than that
	in which it is published and without a similar condition
	including this condition being imposed on the subsequent
	purchaser.


If you're a fan of recursion and self-reference, you should enjoy
that.  The last "including *this* condition" is particularly nice,
though I'm not sure it manages to say exactly what it wants.

The general intention, however, is clear: they want to forbid ANYbody
who has the book at ANY time from rebinding it.  (The main target must
be libraries, who like to take the covers off paperbacks, laminate
them in stiff plastic, and reglue them, producing an ersatz hardcover
book.)

But why "[e]xcept in the United States"?  I've asked a few lawyers,
and the clearest answer was that U.S.  contract law does not allow
(does not enforce) this sort of third-party condition.  If this
explanation is correct, it could also apply to software.

BTW, the general principle seems good, though peculiar at first glance.
For instance, it gives a basis for breaking the restrictive covenants
that maintained segregated housing in some places.
-- 

            -- Mitch Marks @ UChicago 
               ...ihnp4!gargoyle!sphinx!mmar