Xref: utzoo comp.sys.amiga:14689 comp.sys.misc:1182 comp.sys.ibm.pc:12110 comp.sys.mac:12902 comp.sys.atari.st:7657 Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!seismo!sundc!pitstop!sun!decwrl!labrea!agate!pasteur!ames!hao!gatech!purdue!i.cc.purdue.edu!j.cc.purdue.edu!pur-ee!iuvax!bsu-cs!dhesi From: dhesi@bsu-cs.UUCP (Rahul Dhesi) Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga,comp.sys.misc,comp.sys.ibm.pc,comp.sys.mac,comp.sys.atari.st Subject: Re: Shareware? Hah! Message-ID: <2152@bsu-cs.UUCP> Date: 18 Feb 88 20:35:53 GMT References: <4815@ihlpg.ATT.COM> <3343@killer.UUCP> <42540@ti-csl.CSNET> Reply-To: dhesi@bsu-cs.UUCP (Rahul Dhesi) Organization: CS Dept, Ball St U, Muncie, Indiana Lines: 28 In article <42540@ti-csl.CSNET> peterson@mips.UUCP (Bob Peterson) writes: > They have, on occasion, contacted individuals offering on for-pay >BBS's collections of files downloaded from Compuserve. On those >occasions the individual was asked to remove files downloaded, since >that specific activity is prohibited by the contract a user agrees to >when signing up with Compuserve. As I remember it, the CompuServe contract says that since stuff on CompuServe belongs to others, one may not download it for commercial purposes. The emphasis is on protecting the rights of the owner of the files which, as Bob Peterson says in his article, is not CompuServe. This implies that so long as the owner of the downloaded files doesn't object, one can do anything one wants with the downloaded software. There is simply no merit in the claim that CompuServe can get a compilation copyright for material that is already copyrighted without getting explicit permission from each copyright holder. It is *illegal* to create a compilation of copyrighted material for commercial purposes without explicit permission from the copyright holder of each item included in the compilation. CompuServe is on record as claiming that if you download software from its forums and give it away to others, you are stealing somebody else's work. Since essentially all downloadable software is shareware or public domain, one can see that this is an absurd and self-serving claim made solely to fool the public. -- Rahul Dhesi UUCP: !{iuvax,pur-ee,uunet}!bsu-cs!dhesi