Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!cornell!rochester!uhura.cc.rochester.edu!msir
From: msir@uhura.cc.rochester.edu (Mark Sirota)
Newsgroups: comp.misc
Subject: What is "public domain", exactly?
Message-ID: <812@ur-cc.UUCP>
Date: 6 Feb 89 23:19:21 GMT
Reply-To: msir@cc.rochester.edu (Mark Sirota)
Organization: Univ. of Rochester, Computing Center
Lines: 20

I hope this is the proper newsgroup for this.

I'm wondering exactly what "public domain" means.

If I distribute a program I've written, and say "do what you want with it
so long as you don't make any money and credit is given where credit is
due", is that public domain?  If not, what is it?  Shareware?  Copy-left?
(What is copy-left?)

Perhaps what I really want is definitions of all these related terms.

Thanks in advance.  Please don't post replies unless you sincerely believe
they are of general interest or need discussion; I will summarize the
replies when the flow settles down.  Please note that I don't generally
frequent this newsgroup.
-- 
Mark Sirota - University of Rochester, Rochester, NY
 Internet: msir@cc.rochester.edu
 Bitnet:   msir_ss@uordbv.bitnet
 UUCP:     ...!rochester!ur-cc!msir