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From: webber@brandx.rutgers.edu.UUCP
Newsgroups: alt.flame
Subject: Re: of flames and sources (was: Re: Fred - A terminal Program)
Message-ID: <534@brandx.rutgers.edu>
Date: Tue, 3-Nov-87 06:19:46 EST
Article-I.D.: brandx.534
Posted: Tue Nov  3 06:19:46 1987
Date-Received: Fri, 6-Nov-87 06:41:14 EST
References: <246@ddsw1.UUCP> <203@papaya.bbn.com> <451@brandx.rutgers.edu> <268@ddsw1.UUCP>
Distribution: alt
Organization: Rutgers Univ., New Brunswick, N.J.
Lines: 49
Summary: sigh.
To: webber@aramis.rutgers.edu

DISCLAIMER:  I AM NOT A LAWYER.  I AM QUITE AWARE THAT LAWYERS DIFFER
ON THE EXACT SIGNIFICANCE OF ALL OF THIS -- I.E. THEY FIGURE THERE IS
MONEY IN BOTH SIDES OF THE ISSUE.  A SENSIBLE PERSON AVOIDS INVOLVEMENT
IN ANY ACTION THAT INVOLVES:
         1) THE PURCHASE OF A NEW SET OF CLOTHES, 
     OR  2) A 1$ PURCHASE ORDER
     OR  3) LAWYERS.

In article <268@ddsw1.UUCP>, jmturn@ddsw1.UUCP (James Turner) writes:
> ...
> *FLAME ONE BIGTIME*
> 
> All rights reserved means "I keep all copyrights to this product." It damn
> well does not mean I'm going to come chasing down to your house with a
> gaggle of lawyers if you change one byte of my code. Anyone who puts that
> kind of interpretation on it strikes me as paranoid, assuming that anyone
> who posts to the net is out for nothing but their own ends. For the record,
> this is what *I* meant by "All rights reserved" If it is not the exact legal
> meaning, it is because I DID NOT ask a lawyer about the exact phrasing,
> because I'm NOT making any money off this, and therefore am not going to
> spend hundreds or thousands of dollars on it. ...

Common practice for people who don't want to tangle with legal
nonsense is to not put in a copyright notice but rather appeal to
things like ``The Hacker's Ethic'' and such.  As soon as you put in a
Copyright notice, you are talking lawyers -- whether you mean to or
not, that is what you are doing.  Furthermore, it is doubtfull that
all of this subsequent ``clarification'' actually modifies the
original copyright notice -- to have effect, at the minimum one would
hope to find it included in the next copyright notice.  Using a
copyright means one thing and one thing only: it is a notice to all
that you are asserting your rights under the law.  Since the
government does not enforce these rights directly for you, it is a
notice that you personally will enforce them by seeking out all
violators (for to do less risks loosing those rights in the courts eyes).
[To see the lengths that some people will go to to enforce these
rights, check out the recent Trojan Horse problems on the micro boards].

So, if you don't want to be seen as threatening people with lawsuits,
don't use copyrights.  If you want to keep open the option to sue
people should you feel like it, then use copyrights and expect flames
(and cautious people to not go anywhere near your ``gift'').

You can't have it both ways.

> * FLAME OFF *
ditto.

------ BOB (webber@aramis.rutgers.edu ; rutgers!aramis.rutgers.edu!webber)