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From: asente@cascade.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.news
Subject: Re: Policing Ourselves (Was: Re: Followup on "Man of Steel ...)
Message-ID: <122@cascade.ARPA>
Date: Mon, 7-Jul-86 17:35:26 EDT
Article-I.D.: cascade.122
Posted: Mon Jul  7 17:35:26 1986
Date-Received: Wed, 9-Jul-86 01:40:58 EDT
References: <308@hp-sdd.UUCP> <4703@sun.uucp> <484@cbmvax.cbmvax.cbm.UUCP> <4784@sun.uucp>
Reply-To: asente@cascade.UUCP (Paul Asente)
Distribution: net
Organization: Stanford University CIS Apple Orchard
Lines: 38

In article <4784@sun.uucp> chuq@sun.uucp (Chuq Von Rospach) writes:
>Good question. Here is a scenario.  Man of Steel, Woman of Kleenex is posted
>to the network, sans copyright.  Someone out there grabs it and considering
>it to be in the public domain, decides to publish it in an anthology of
>works.  I mean, it's free, it's well written, and it has a name author
>attached.  Said anthology sells 1 million copies paperback and 25,000
>hardback plus a Science Fiction Book Club alternate.  Anthology makes a
>mint.  Niven makes nothing.
>
>Guess who is at fault?  Most likely, Ken and USENET.  The anthologist had
>no reason to believe it wasn't public domain and used it in good faith.  A
>story from a name author in the above situation could be worth about
>$25,000, more or less.  Since we are guilty of the breach, we're liable to
>repay Niven for that lost revenue.  We're also liable for court costs to
>recover the above, our court costs, possibly punative damages, and possibly
>a figure for lost future revenue.  Total cost? Good question. Say $100,000.

This seems extremely far-fetched.  Publishing something copyrited
without the copyright does NOT put it into the public domain.  Perhaps
Chuq was thinking of trade secrets.  The hypothetical anthologist is on
pretty shaky ground if he sees this story and assumes it's in the public
domain.  The original poster has infringed upon the copyright; there's
little doubt of that.  But he (and Usenet) shouldn't be liable to the extent
Chuq imagines.

Consider an analagous situation.  I make a photocopy of the story for
use in a public speaking class.  Someone walks by my desk, sees the copy,
and notices that there's no copyright attached.  He therefore assumes it's
public domain and includes it in an anthology.  Or imagine I've typed the
story into the computer to do a word analysis for some reason or other.
I print it out and neglect to pick it up; someone else does.

I don't fault Chuq for notifying Niven; that was a considerate of him
and certainly guaranteed that there would be no further problems.  But
I think it was unnecessary.

	-paul asente
	    asente@cascade.stanford.edu	    decwrl!glacier!cascade!asente