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From: manis@ubc-cs.UUCP
Newsgroups: comp.sys.atari.st
Subject: Re: What is Public Domain
Message-ID: <869@ubc-cs.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 25-Feb-87 11:50:38 EST
Article-I.D.: ubc-cs.869
Posted: Wed Feb 25 11:50:38 1987
Date-Received: Sat, 28-Feb-87 02:45:26 EST
References: <2419@dalcs.UUCP>
Reply-To: manis@ubc-cs.UUCP (Vincent Manis)
Organization: UBC Department of Computer Science
Lines: 30
Keywords: Bundled programs, PD

In my understanding, something is public domain if it explicitly contains a
statement denying that the author has any rights in it whatsoever. The lack
of such a statement means that the text is copyrighted (though what that
means in Canada, given the uncertainty of the copyright law when applied to 
computer programs, is unclear). From that point of view NeoChrome (which I 
got with my ST even though it won't run on a mono monitor) and 1ST Word are
*not* public domain.

Atari probably won't send the police after people who make copies for
personal use (especially given the fair use doctrine), but somebody who
didn't buy a copy has, legally, no right to use it.

As a programmer, I would *never* put a program in the public domain. If I
care enough about the program to distribute it, I care enough to make sure
that my name is associated with it. Therefore, a statement such as the
following is probably appropriate:

   "Copyright (C) Sarah Jane Smith, 1987. This program may be freely
    distributed to anyone provided that this notice appears on all copies."

It's also worth noticing that most binary programs include copyrighted
materials (the run-time libraries from the compilers). Various software
vendors have various licence agreements; I like TDI's (you must include 
a statement that you developed the program with their system).

Back to the original question: since not everybody has 1ST Word, it is 
probably best not to distribute documents that are in 1ST Word format. 
In any case, that's probably just as good an idea anyway, since users
may want to print them out using a particular formatter (we have a
MicroEmacs manual here which was converted to TeX, for example).