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From: ljdickey@water.UUCP
Newsgroups: comp.sys.atari.st
Subject: Re: copyright and BREAKOUT.ACC
Message-ID: <674@water.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 9-Dec-86 16:46:48 EST
Article-I.D.: water.674
Posted: Tue Dec  9 16:46:48 1986
Date-Received: Wed, 10-Dec-86 09:13:15 EST
References: <8612051453.AA13329@ohio-state.ARPA>
Organization: U of Waterloo, Ontario
Lines: 19

Almost every books I own (hundreds) has some statement about the copyright
near the front of the book.  There are exceptions.  (One says, charmingly,
that anyone can copy any part of the book they want to.)  There are
conventions about where the copyright notice should be and what it should
look like.

I think that according to the copyright convention used in the United States
an author who circulates his book without proper copyright notice no longer
has any claim to copyright.

Now, I have a copy of something called "BREAKOUT.ACC".  As far as I can see,
in the copy that I have, there is no copyright notice. Without that notice,
should I feel an obligation not to copy it?  I think not.

I would guess that the owners of BREAKOUT.ACC long ago lost their legal
claim to any protection that copyright might imply under US copyright law.
Of course, they might still have the source code, and could modify
it in ways that enhance its value, and perhaps could establish some
claim to copyright on the modified code.