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From: tdn@spice.cs.cmu.edu (Thomas Newton)
Newsgroups: net.micro.mac
Subject: Re: Posting software from Compuserve
Message-ID: <1080@spice.cs.cmu.edu>
Date: Fri, 10-Oct-86 01:09:58 EDT
Article-I.D.: spice.1080
Posted: Fri Oct 10 01:09:58 1986
Date-Received: Fri, 10-Oct-86 05:47:11 EDT
Organization: Carnegie Mellon University
Lines: 30

The only thing that Compuserve could semi-reasonably claim copyright over is
the particular collection of software in the MAUG libraries.  Think about it
for a minute.  Everything in those libraries is either public domain -- thus
nobody has the right to prevent people from duplicating it -- or copyrighted
by some person or company other than Compuserve -- in which case, Compuserve
has no right to forbid duplication since they don't hold the copyright.  Now
the real copyright owners can limit distribution, but generally if something
copyrighted is in the Compuserve/GENIE/Delphi libraries, it's because Compu-
Serve & competitors provide convenient "public" distribution channels, *NOT*
because the copyright holder wants to limit the distribution. In the case of
the Mac, only one exception comes to mind:  the System & Software Supplement
programs that Apple makes available to Compuserve, GENIE, and Delphi do come
with rather restrictive terms.
				 
Of course, this doesn't prevent C$erve from trying to claim the copyright on
other people's software anyway. . .  An issue of their "magazine" I received
shortly before I cancelled my account (they imposed a $5 per month minimum
on accounts billed via Checkfree and would not listen to the suggestion that
they scrap the minimum fee and handle the Checkfree issue as GENIE does) had
a letter column in which one of the Compuserve people made the amazing claim
that copying programs downloaded from their libraries violated their "rules"
and ** Federal law **.  Get the shovels for this one, folks.

> Maybe I should copyright it, and then sue 'em!  :-)

In fact, copyrighting programs that you plan to give away is generally a good
idea, because you then have some authority to prevent misuse.  If one marks a
program as public domain, anyone can do anything with it including selling it.

                                        -- Thomas Newton