Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!lll-winken!lll-tis!helios.ee.lbl.gov!pasteur!ucbvax!decwrl!mejac!gryphon!richard
From: richard@gryphon.CTS.COM (Richard Sexton)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: Re: "PD Piracy"
Summary: oxymoron
Keywords: hold the oxy :-)
Message-ID: <6847@gryphon.CTS.COM>
Date: 11 Sep 88 08:42:46 GMT
References: <2601@sugar.uu.net>
Reply-To: richard@gryphon.CTS.COM (Richard Sexton)
Organization: Trailing Edge Technology, Redondo Beach, CA
Lines: 34

In article <2601@sugar.uu.net> peter@sugar.uu.net (Peter da Silva) writes:
>
>I have just been informed...
>> ...that a West-Berlin based company
>> is offering Browser along with 46 other PD/ShareWare products as a
>> sampler for DM 95,- (about $50)...
>
>The person who informed me of this went on to say that this is a clear
>offense against general PD rules, since the disks are being sold for
>$5 apiece. The message went on to offer to help me should I wish to seek
>legal recourse.
>
>the concept of a compilation copyright is pretty widely accepted.
>
>I understand that some of the other authors whose works have been included in
>this collection are upset. They should certainly contect the company and make
>their feelings known. I don't see what they can legally do, though.

Right. They can't do anything. Once a program has been released into
the public domain, anybody can do anyting they want with it.

If some software author is annoyed that their PD program is being
sold, they probably should have include some phrase like:

Copyright 1988 by Foo Bar. All rights reserved. Never to be sold.
Rights for limited non-commercial distributon granted. For any
other use, contact the author at: (address).

Thats *probably* enough to do it, but of course a lawyer would
know better.


-- 
               The only good Nazi is a dead Argentinian.
richard@gryphon.CTS.COM                               {backbone}!gryphon!richard