Re: Implied vs. explicit copyright
Andrew Suffield [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: They are generally interpreted as having different implications; must is a far stronger term. Not in American law.
Re: Implied vs. explicit copyright
Andrew Suffield [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: (c) is the closest you can get to circle-C in one-dimensional ASCII text. It's a pretty close reproduction of the symbol. Except given that you *can* say Copyright exactly, and given that they amended the statute just to provide for things that can't do c-in-a-circle... Thomas
Re: Implied vs. explicit copyright
[EMAIL PROTECTED] (Brian T. Sniffen) writes: And, despite what you've been arguing against, * Copyright (c) 2003 Sample Author I have not been arguing against this. Adding extra stuff is fine, provided it doesn't materially impede clarity, and this of course doesn't impede clarity. I'm arguing against a note that says: * (C) 2003 Sample Author Yup. And despite your repeated rants about references, there's still nothing that says and adding an extraneous symbol voids your copyright. Of course, and I have said nothing of the kind. I have said that (c) doesn't substitute for one of the officially statutorily approved things. Adding extra stuff is pointless, but perfectly legal, and harmless. Thomas
Re: Implied vs. explicit copyright
Scott James Remnant [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: I mentioned this thread to my solicitor earlier, just out of pure interest, and he was on the opinion that as (c) or (C) are the most common, not to mention closest, representation of the symbol in computer source code that any sane judge would accept them (in the UK, at least). This is probably true: for the UK. The UK does not have the rigid rules that the US does in the statute, but instead just requires notice, and leaves it up to the courts to decide what counts as notice. Surely (c) would be considered notice for all but really stupid defendants. Thomas
Re: Implied vs. explicit copyright
On Thu, Jul 24, 2003 at 03:43:19PM +0200, Henning Makholm wrote: [...] I still think it would be hard for the defendant to convince a court that he was ignorant of the *de facto* convention that people put (c) in computer programs to assert their copyright. Actually, the convention is Copyright (c), which meets the requirements anyway because of the explicit Copyright. I've never seen anyone put (c) by itself without the Copyright. (This is also why I'm wondering why this is being argued about at all. Just write Copyright (c) or just Copyright and be done with it. If you really want to save keystrokes and write just (c), then don't come crying to me if you don't get punitive damages :-) Richard Braakman
Re: Implied vs. explicit copyright
On Thu, 2003-07-24 at 16:04, Richard Braakman wrote: On Thu, Jul 24, 2003 at 03:43:19PM +0200, Henning Makholm wrote: [...] I still think it would be hard for the defendant to convince a court that he was ignorant of the *de facto* convention that people put (c) in computer programs to assert their copyright. Actually, the convention is Copyright (c), which meets the requirements anyway because of the explicit Copyright. I've never seen anyone put (c) by itself without the Copyright. (This is also why I'm wondering why this is being argued about at all. Just write Copyright (c) or just Copyright and be done with it. If you really want to save keystrokes and write just (c), then don't come crying to me if you don't get punitive damages :-) Especially as Copyright is a fairly global thing, so the exact laws differ from country to country anyway. I mentioned this thread to my solicitor earlier, just out of pure interest, and he was on the opinion that as (c) or (C) are the most common, not to mention closest, representation of the symbol in computer source code that any sane judge would accept them (in the UK, at least). Though a Copyright notice here does little other than assert the name of the author of the work, for identification purposes only. All work is inherently copyrighted and there is significant test case that I couldn't find a copyright notice is not a valid defence for breach. Scott -- Who isn't a lawyer :-) signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part
Re: Implied vs. explicit copyright
Andrew Suffield wrote: On Tue, Jul 22, 2003 at 10:38:10AM +0200, Arnoud Galactus Engelfriet wrote: That says that you MAY include a coypright notice as defined in section 401(b). If you choose to do so, then it MUST be snip You're doing it too. I see no MUST anywhere in section 401. Please constrain yourself to things which are actually part of the law. True. It says SHALL. USC 17 s401(b): If a notice appears on the copies, it shall consist of the following three elements: I believe that SHALL and MUST are equivalent in meaning in English. But technically you're right, it doesn't say must. Now, it could be that there is some US precedent that provides other reasons why a defendant's claim of innocent infringement is to be given no weight. But the statute only talks about 'c-in-a-circle', Copyright or Copr.. However, there is no statement that forming the notice by using the sequence (c) is invalid or would not be counted as equivalent. If a notice appears on the copies, it shall consist of the following three elements: (1) the symbol ? (the letter C in a circle), or the word ''Copyright'', or the abbreviation ''Copr.''; and (2) ...; and (3) ... If the law says something shall consist of certain things, then there is no reason to assume that something else may also qualify. Only the notice as given in this section allows you to get the effect of 401(d). If the law says If X, then Y and nowhere else it mentions If Z, then Y, then it is reasonable to assume Z does not lead to Y. You seem to be arguing that a court could make up a rule of its own regarding Z=Y. True, I suppose. That's what you get for living in a common law country. But the statute only says X=Y, and so based from the statute I can only conclude that things other than X do not lead to Y. Again, I am not claiming that it has equivalent status in law. Rather, I am saying that the statement Using (c) instead of circle-C or 'Copyright' renders your notice invalid has no basis in law either. 17 USC 401(d) is the only thing in US law that provides for any effect if you include a copyright notice. This subsection (d) clearly states that this effect will happen [i]f a notice of copyright in the form and position specified by this section appears on the published copy or copies to which a defendant in a copyright infringement suit had access. Subsection (b) spells out how the notice shall appear. If the c-in-a-circle is missing, then the notice does not conform to subsection (b) and hence the effect of 401(d) does not occur. [Which is why I asked for precedent in the first place - I checked the US code, the Berne convention, and the UCC, and found no evidence to support this position. I had expected there to be some backing to the statement, but it appears it is merely enthusiastic speculation.] It seems perfectly clear to me. The law says If you include a notice in the form 'X, Y, Z', then we're going to ignore the defendant's claim he didn't know about your copyright. The law does not say Oh but if you omit X or type something that vaguely looks like it, that's ok. Now, I wouldn't be surprised if there was case law in the US that provided other rules about when the court should ignore the defendant's claim he didn't know about your copyright. But that's not a basis in the statute. Arnoud -- Arnoud Engelfriet, Dutch patent attorney - Speaking only for myself Patents, copyright and IPR explained for techies: http://www.iusmentis.com/
Re: Implied vs. explicit copyright
On Wed, Jul 23, 2003 at 06:11:08PM +0200, Arnoud Galactus Engelfriet wrote: Andrew Suffield wrote: On Tue, Jul 22, 2003 at 10:38:10AM +0200, Arnoud Galactus Engelfriet wrote: That says that you MAY include a coypright notice as defined in section 401(b). If you choose to do so, then it MUST be snip You're doing it too. I see no MUST anywhere in section 401. Please constrain yourself to things which are actually part of the law. True. It says SHALL. USC 17 s401(b): If a notice appears on the copies, it shall consist of the following three elements: I believe that SHALL and MUST are equivalent in meaning in English. But technically you're right, it doesn't say must. They are generally interpreted as having different implications; must is a far stronger term. Now, it could be that there is some US precedent that provides other reasons why a defendant's claim of innocent infringement is to be given no weight. But the statute only talks about 'c-in-a-circle', Copyright or Copr.. However, there is no statement that forming the notice by using the sequence (c) is invalid or would not be counted as equivalent. If a notice appears on the copies, it shall consist of the following three elements: (1) the symbol ? (the letter C in a circle), or the word ''Copyright'', or Whoops, did it again. It doesn't say \236, whatever that is (doesn't look much like a circle-C in UTF-8; doesn't render _at all_ in ASCII). It has a graphic. It doesn't place any constraints on how accurately this graphic has to be reproduced. http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2003/debian-legal-200307/msg00250.html shows that symbol as unicode 382, LATIN SMALL LETTER Z WITH CARON for me. Which illustrates my point pretty well. If the law says something shall consist of certain things, then there is no reason to assume that something else may also qualify. Only the notice as given in this section allows you to get the effect of 401(d). Here's a reason: (c) is the closest you can get to circle-C in one-dimensional ASCII text. It's a pretty close reproduction of the symbol. lead to Y. You seem to be arguing that a court could make up a rule of its own regarding Z=Y. True, I suppose. That's what you get for living in a common law country. But the statute only says X=Y, and so based from the statute I can only conclude that things other than X do not lead to Y. It is indeed the role of the courts to interpret the law according to its intent, rather than its literal wording. If the law were interpreted according to its literal wording, then we would not need the judicial system; we could leave the job to a computer. Now, I wouldn't be surprised if there was case law in the US that provided other rules about when the court should ignore the defendant's claim he didn't know about your copyright. But that's not a basis in the statute. I'm interested in any binding precedent, but I can't find any. -- .''`. ** Debian GNU/Linux ** | Andrew Suffield : :' : http://www.debian.org/ | `. `' | `- -- | pgpp2KUJkBxVa.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: Implied vs. explicit copyright
Hi, Andrew Suffield wrote: On Wed, Jul 23, 2003 at 06:11:08PM +0200, Arnoud Galactus Engelfriet wrote: If a notice appears on the copies, it shall consist of the following three elements: I believe that SHALL and MUST are equivalent in meaning in English. But technically you're right, it doesn't say must. They are generally interpreted as having different implications; must is a far stronger term. This is probably due to my lack of skill in English. My dictionary says they're synonyms. Anyway, a minor point. If a notice appears on the copies, it shall consist of the following three elements: (1) the symbol ? (the letter C in a circle), or the word ''Copyright'', or Whoops, did it again. It doesn't say \236, whatever that is (doesn't look much like a circle-C in UTF-8; doesn't render _at all_ in ASCII). It has a graphic. It doesn't place any constraints on how accurately this graphic has to be reproduced. Correct. I am unable to reproduce the c-in-a-circle symbol in a standard ASCII message. Still, you know which symbol we're talking about. If the law says something shall consist of certain things, then there is no reason to assume that something else may also qualify. Only the notice as given in this section allows you to get the effect of 401(d). Here's a reason: (c) is the closest you can get to circle-C in one-dimensional ASCII text. It's a pretty close reproduction of the symbol. This is an argument that says a court ought to interpret (c) as the c-in-a-circle symbol required by 401(b). It does not say that (c) should be regarded as an equivalent (that is, as something else that produces the same thing). Now I am confused; are you arguing that (c) should be seen as a badly drawn c-in-a-circle symbol, or as a different symbol that courts should treat as if it were a c-in-a-circle? lead to Y. You seem to be arguing that a court could make up a rule of its own regarding Z=Y. True, I suppose. That's what you get for living in a common law country. But the statute only says X=Y, and so based from the statute I can only conclude that things other than X do not lead to Y. It is indeed the role of the courts to interpret the law according to its intent, rather than its literal wording. If the law were interpreted according to its literal wording, then we would not need the judicial system; we could leave the job to a computer. There is a big difference between a court saying Oh, '(c)' is the closest you can get in ASCII to a c-in-a-circle, so I'm gonna rule it *is* a c-in-a-circle and a court saying Well, the statute does not say anything about this '(c)' thing, but I'm going to rule that if you put '(c)' on a work, you get the effect of 17 USC 401(d) even though you didn't meet 401(b). Perhaps this is a result of my civil law background and your common law background. The first position, interpreting (stretching) rules and matching them to situations, is typical for civil law. Making up rules by analogy is typical for common law. The net result is usually the same. Arnoud -- Arnoud Engelfriet, Dutch patent attorney - Speaking only for myself Patents, copyright and IPR explained for techies: http://www.iusmentis.com/
Re: Implied vs. explicit copyright
On Wed, Jul 23, 2003 at 07:55:09PM +0100, Andrew Suffield wrote: On Wed, Jul 23, 2003 at 06:11:08PM +0200, Arnoud Galactus Engelfriet wrote: I believe that SHALL and MUST are equivalent in meaning in English. But technically you're right, it doesn't say must. They are generally interpreted as having different implications; must is a far stronger term. Be careful with this, in the context of reading law. Much like with RFCs, certain words tend to have certain very specific meanings that may, or may not, actually map to common English. My spotty memory, which is only as good as studying actual texts of bills that had, at some point, go through the US legislative system, wants to say that in this *particular* case, SHALL in a law is fairly close to MUST in an RFC. However, please take this with even more of a grain of salt than the typical IANAL statements; perhaps one of the folks on-list who have more (and more recent) experience in reading US law will render an opinion. Even if I'm right, fairly close does not necessarily mean identical, and, frankly, I think the whole thing is getting a bit silly. Having (c) in there might, or might not, be considered circle in a C if you have only ASCII to work with, by some court. Lots of arguments would be given, and (in most US courts) someone would buy whichever verdict helped them most. Certainly using it *in addition to* Copyright is unlikely to be problematic (one could always argue it was part of the rest of the text, which is allowed to have I like Baboons or other such in it, if you really must), and certainly I wouldn't want to trust that *only* (c) would be sufficient. -- Joel Baker [EMAIL PROTECTED] pgpwBFhr5t1Lz.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: Implied vs. explicit copyright
On Wed, Jul 23, 2003 at 09:26:32PM +0200, Arnoud Galactus Engelfriet wrote: If the law says something shall consist of certain things, then there is no reason to assume that something else may also qualify. Only the notice as given in this section allows you to get the effect of 401(d). Here's a reason: (c) is the closest you can get to circle-C in one-dimensional ASCII text. It's a pretty close reproduction of the symbol. This is an argument that says a court ought to interpret (c) as the c-in-a-circle symbol required by 401(b). It does not say that (c) should be regarded as an equivalent (that is, as something else that produces the same thing). Now I am confused; are you arguing that (c) should be seen as a badly drawn c-in-a-circle symbol, or as a different symbol that courts should treat as if it were a c-in-a-circle? Either. All I need to make my point is to demonstrate that the sequence (c) could reasonably be accepted. -- .''`. ** Debian GNU/Linux ** | Andrew Suffield : :' : http://www.debian.org/ | `. `' | `- -- | pgphssbm6ADlw.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: Implied vs. explicit copyright
Andrew Suffield [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: This is a plausible argument. You should know by now that plausible arguments do not form a basis in law; rather, it is merely the position put forth by the counsel for the defence. Kindly refrain from treating it as anything else. Oh, puhleez. There is no more reason for taking '(c)' to mean anything in copyright law than taking 'Flobotzink as meaning something. Or do you have case law for this? No, of course not. You have no official reference for anything suggesting that '(c)' has any meaning, and I have reference after reference giving an explicitly exhaustive list of what does have meaning, in which '(c)' is simply never listed. In my country we have courts to make decisions where the legislature has failed to completely specify or consider a particular case. Although since you appear to be in the US, I admit that I don't know what your courts are supposed to be for. Good grief, descending to insults won't help your case. In this case, the legislature *has* completely specified it. In just so many words! This is the complete list of permissible ways to make a Copyright notice: X, Y, Z. It does not say this: - No alternate representations form an acceptable notice Yes, it does. Did you even to follow up the references I have from the United States Copyright office? I guess not. http://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ03.html says: Omission of notice is publishing without a notice. In addition, some errors are considered the same as omission of notice. These are: * A notice that does not contain the symbol [here they give the symbol] (the letter C in a circle), or the word Copyright or the abbreviation Copr. or, if the work is a sound recording, the symbol [the other symbol] (the letter P in a circle); * A notice dated more than 1 year later than the date of first publication; * A notice without a name or date that could reasonably be considered part of the notice; * A notice that lacks the statement required for works consisting proponderantly of U.S. Government material; and * A notice located so that it does not give reasonable notice of the claim of copright. If you are going to insist that I provide official references, the least you could do is read them when I provide them. If it did, then you would not be able to post a notice of copyright in a medium which could reliably represent neither of these. Say, for example, a gzipped tarball - which stores neither, but instead can store a sequence of bytes representing one or the other. This is an excellent reason for extending the statute (as was done) to permit something other than just C-in-a-cirle, so that the word Copyright is now permissible. I do not think that a UK court would uphold either of these positions (I make no comment as to what a US court would do, since they frequently make decisions with no apparent basis in reality). Ah, so this is about insult-Thomas-and-his-country. I stipulate, again, that there is no legislated decision one way or the other. And I am aware of no precedent in this matter. There is a clear legislated decision. It says you must do this. Then it says if you don't do this, it's the same as no notice. And there is a common agreement among a bazillion people that if you don't do it in just those terms, it doesn't come up. No copyright owner in his right mind would bother testing this; he would simply be sure to say Copyright. Moreover, since under the Berne convention, giving notice is mostly optional, it is even less likely to come up. Really, why bother? Just put Copyright and be done with it. Thomas
Re: Implied vs. explicit copyright
On Tue, Jul 22, 2003 at 12:16:10AM -0700, Thomas Bushnell, BSG wrote: Andrew Suffield [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: This is a plausible argument. You should know by now that plausible arguments do not form a basis in law; rather, it is merely the position put forth by the counsel for the defence. Kindly refrain from treating it as anything else. Oh, puhleez. There is no more reason for taking '(c)' to mean anything in copyright law than taking 'Flobotzink as meaning something. Or do you have case law for this? No, of course not. You have no official reference for anything suggesting that '(c)' has any meaning, and I have reference after reference giving an explicitly exhaustive list of what does have meaning, in which '(c)' is simply never listed. Sorry, but that still does not make it law. Note that I am not trying to show that (c) has a particular meaning. You are trying to show that it does not, and I am refuting this claim as being unfounded. In my country we have courts to make decisions where the legislature has failed to completely specify or consider a particular case. Although since you appear to be in the US, I admit that I don't know what your courts are supposed to be for. Good grief, descending to insults won't help your case. In this case, the legislature *has* completely specified it. In just so many words! This is the complete list of permissible ways to make a Copyright notice: X, Y, Z. Those precise words were invented by the US Copyright Office, an administrative body with no legislative powers. It does not say this: - No alternate representations form an acceptable notice Yes, it does. Did you even to follow up the references I have from the United States Copyright office? I guess not. http://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ03.html says: snip If you are going to insist that I provide official references, the least you could do is read them when I provide them. This reference is a publication by the copyright office. It is a modified version of extracts from Title 17 of the United States Code[0]. One of the modifications was the addition of this bulleted list. I repeat: this list has no basis in law. I do not think that a UK court would uphold either of these positions (I make no comment as to what a US court would do, since they frequently make decisions with no apparent basis in reality). Ah, so this is about insult-Thomas-and-his-country. It would dishonest of me to pretend that I know what a US court would do. I stipulate, again, that there is no legislated decision one way or the other. And I am aware of no precedent in this matter. There is a clear legislated decision. It says you must do this. Actually the real law says may and shall. The must part is another invention of the US Copyright Office. (Title 17, Chapter 4, Section 401 (a) and (b)) Then it says if you don't do this, it's the same as no notice. And This I cannot find anywhere in Title 17, Chapter 4, which is where it should appear if it were part of US law. there is a common agreement among a bazillion people that if you don't do it in just those terms, it doesn't come up. I dispute this. All I have seen are a few statements from eclectics, and bodies with no legislative or judicial ability. Certainly no common law basis. [0] http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/ -- .''`. ** Debian GNU/Linux ** | Andrew Suffield : :' : http://www.debian.org/ | `. `' | `- -- | pgpG7gwwfTXdL.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: Implied vs. explicit copyright
Andrew Suffield wrote: Actually the real law says may and shall. The must part is another invention of the US Copyright Office. (Title 17, Chapter 4, Section 401 (a) and (b)) That says that you MAY include a coypright notice as defined in section 401(b). If you choose to do so, then it MUST be the letter c in a circle, the word Copyright or the abbreviation Copr. together with some other stuff. If you do that, then a defendant's claim of innocent infringement is given no weight (section 401(d)). Section 401(d) is the key here, I think. It provides a certain advantageous effect in a lawsuit, but only if you use the 'notice of copyright in the form and position specified by this section'. And section 401(b) specifies the form as requiring 'c-in-a-circle', Copyright or Copr.. So while you can put any notices you want on your copies, you do not obtain any benefits from the statute by doing so. Now, it could be that there is some US precedent that provides other reasons why a defendant's claim of innocent infringement is to be given no weight. But the statute only talks about 'c-in-a-circle', Copyright or Copr.. Then it says if you don't do this, it's the same as no notice. And This I cannot find anywhere in Title 17, Chapter 4, which is where it should appear if it were part of US law. If you use (c) 2003 Your Name Here, your notice does not fulfill the requirement of 401(b) since the elements of 401(b)(1) are missing. Therefore you do not get the effects provided for by 401(d). http://liimirror.warwick.ac.uk/uscode/17/401.html http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/401.html All I have seen are a few statements from eclectics, and bodies with no legislative or judicial ability. Certainly no common law basis. I don't know much about common law, but the statute here seems pretty clear to me. Arnoud -- Arnoud Engelfriet, Dutch patent attorney - Speaking only for myself Patents, copyright and IPR explained for techies: http://www.iusmentis.com/
Re: Implied vs. explicit copyright
[EMAIL PROTECTED] (Thomas Bushnell, BSG) writes: Andrew Suffield [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: This is a plausible argument. You should know by now that plausible arguments do not form a basis in law; rather, it is merely the position put forth by the counsel for the defence. Kindly refrain from treating it as anything else. Oh, puhleez. There is no more reason for taking '(c)' to mean anything in copyright law than taking 'Flobotzink as meaning something. Or do you have case law for this? No, of course not. You have no official reference for anything suggesting that '(c)' has any meaning, and I have reference after reference giving an explicitly exhaustive list of what does have meaning, in which '(c)' is simply never listed. It certainly is. That's a c in a circle. It's not a flawlessly perfect circle, but I drew one as best I could. I can't draw a circle well freehand either, and neither can I generate one on a modern pixel-based printing device. So I guess that symbol is useless, unless approximations to it are permitted. It does not say this: - No alternate representations form an acceptable notice Yes, it does. Did you even to follow up the references I have from the United States Copyright office? I guess not. http://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ03.html says: Omission of notice is publishing without a notice. In addition, some errors are considered the same as omission of notice. These are: * A notice that does not contain the symbol [here they give the symbol] (the letter C in a circle), or the word Copyright or the abbreviation Copr. or, if the work is a sound recording, the symbol [the other symbol] (the letter P in a circle); * A notice dated more than 1 year later than the date of first publication; * A notice without a name or date that could reasonably be considered part of the notice; * A notice that lacks the statement required for works consisting proponderantly of U.S. Government material; and * A notice located so that it does not give reasonable notice of the claim of copright. If you are going to insist that I provide official references, the least you could do is read them when I provide them. Ah. So you were lying, or just didn't understand what you were reading. The following are all valid copyright notices: * Copyright 2003 Sample Author * echo Copyright \copyright 2003 Sample Author | tex * Copyright 2003 Sample Author. Baboons are pretty * This document was written in 2003 by S. Author. Baboons are pretty. He retains Copyright coverage on all of this document. And, despite what you've been arguing against, * Copyright (c) 2003 Sample Author That's all. There's no harm from putting a (c) in addition to the word Copyright, and it might even make things more clear. It gives a nice retro, typewriter feel to a document. I stipulate, again, that there is no legislated decision one way or the other. And I am aware of no precedent in this matter. There is a clear legislated decision. It says you must do this. Then it says if you don't do this, it's the same as no notice. And there is a common agreement among a bazillion people that if you don't do it in just those terms, it doesn't come up. Yup. And despite your repeated rants about references, there's still nothing that says and adding an extraneous symbol voids your copyright. -Brian -- Brian T. Sniffen[EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.evenmere.org/~bts/
Re: Implied vs. explicit copyright
[EMAIL PROTECTED] (Brian T. Sniffen) writes: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Thomas Bushnell, BSG) writes: Drew Scott Daniels [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: Is the an implied copyright notification (I.e. code added by person) sufficient in the debian/copyright or is it necessary to say explicitly say year copyright person? There is no such thing as implied copyright. But he didn't say there was. He said there was an (implied (copyright notification)), which there is. In the USA, setting down a form of art is sufficient to grant copyright. So writing Extra Foo added by Brian Sniffen is enough to make readers aware that I own the copyright on the Extra Foo bits. In some places, the incantation Copyright (c) 2003 Brian Sniffen has legal meaning. Even in the US, it's illegal to falsely place such a notice. The only legal form of a copyright notice is the word Copyright, and a C-in-a-circle. The (c) version does *not* count as a C-in-a-circle, so it's just meaningless extra stuff. The word Copyright is fully sufficient without C-in-a-circle as well. The Pan-American Copyright Convention requires the words All rights reserved, so it is common to include those, which would get you coverage in any signatory to that convention who isn't part of the Berne convention. But there is no such thing as an implied copyright notification either; there is either a copyright notification or there isn't. The Berne Convention and US law say that you are covered even if you don't put a notification, but that's a different beast.
Re: Implied vs. explicit copyright
On Mon, Jul 21, 2003 at 11:28:56AM -0700, Thomas Bushnell, BSG wrote: The (c) version does *not* count as a C-in-a-circle, so it's just meaningless extra stuff. Precedent and jurisdiction, please. -- .''`. ** Debian GNU/Linux ** | Andrew Suffield : :' : http://www.debian.org/ | `. `' | `- -- | pgpHmugm9F9g3.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: Implied vs. explicit copyright
Andrew Suffield [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: On Mon, Jul 21, 2003 at 11:28:56AM -0700, Thomas Bushnell, BSG wrote: The (c) version does *not* count as a C-in-a-circle, so it's just meaningless extra stuff. Precedent and jurisdiction, please. A trivial web search brought up: http://wombat.doc.ic.ac.uk/foldoc/foldoc.cgi?copyright That's a nonofficial source. But a brief web search will show you that the same thing is repeated a gillion times. The US Copyright office reports (at http://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ1.html) that the notice should contain: the symbol C-in-a-circle, or the word Copyright, or the abbreviation Copr.. C-in-parens is not C-in-circle. There is no exception granted for doing the closest thing you can. Indeed, it used to be that the word Copyright was not sufficient; you *had* to use c-in-a-circle. One reason that was changed was the increasing use of publishing systems that couldn't do c-in-a-circle. At http://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ03.html you can see more rules, for example, that there is such a thing as an omission of notice and that certain kinds of errors are automatically considered the same as outright omitting the notice entirely. If there isn't the required c-in-a-circle or the word Copyright, then it's not just a mere error, it counts as an omission of the notice entirely. So more to the point: there are many many references which say c-in-parens doesn't count, there is a reference which says what does count, and it doesn't include c-in-parens, and there is a reference which says that even trivial errors in certain parts of the notice count as no notice at all. Thomas
Re: Implied vs. explicit copyright
On Mon, 21 Jul 2003, Thomas Bushnell, BSG wrote: That's a nonofficial source. But a brief web search will show you that the same thing is repeated a gillion times. Everything I've read so far has claimed that (c) has no force of law, whereas c-in-a-circle does. However, I'm unaware of a court decision saying so one way or another. Non-legislative interpretations are nice, but it doesn't have weight like judicial precedent. Futhermore, in the US, the only thing such an omission would do is effectively remove the copyright statement, not invalidate the copyright itself. I would not be surprised if you could make the claim that in systems where there is no equivalent of a c-in-a-circle, (c) fulfills the same role. I'd be genuinely surprised if most US courts didn't buy that argument as well. [I can't speak for other court systems, however.] there is a reference which says that even trivial errors in certain parts of the notice count as no notice at all. But as far as no notice goes, it still doesn't invalidate the copyright; it just means that a defendant in such a case can claim that they weren't aware of the copyright and avoid whatever the appropriate escalation of damages is. Now that we've gone through that, when you're copyrighting something, the smart money is on doing _both_. Use Copyright (c) 1997 Foo Bar Baz. Blah Blah Blah. Unless I've totally missunderstood the situtation at worst, (c) will be interpreted as a no-op, and the copyright statement will still control. At best, (c) will be equivalent to c-in-a-circle, and you're still at the same situation. Although I still wonder whether ascii art c-in-a-circle symbols are ok. ___ / \ | C | 1997 Foo Bar Baz. No Rights Reserved. \___/ Don Armstrong -- It seems intuitively obvious to me, which means that it might be wrong -- Chris Torek http://www.donarmstrong.com http://www.anylevel.com http://rzlab.ucr.edu pgpT5ujNPCXbX.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: Implied vs. explicit copyright
[NB: I'm subscribed... don't need to be CC'ed.] On Mon, 21 Jul 2003, Thomas Bushnell, BSG wrote: In general, such claims don't work, because of the whole point of the statement: to have a single, unambiguous, bright-line test for what is a valid copyright notice, so that no interpretation, guesswork, or the like is necessary. Definetly. If I was to give advice, it would be to use 'Copyright (c)' etc. I was just playing devils advocate for a second and noting that there has been no precedent saying that (c) is not equivalent to c-in-a-circle (at least to my knowledge.) Because of that, it's not possible to know if (c) 1997 Foo bar Baz is a valid copyright statement, or an invalid one. ___ / \ | C | 1997 Foo Bar Baz. No Rights Reserved. \___/ Except that No Rights Reserved would, in Pan-American-Copyright-Treaty cases, void your copyright. Yerp. But it's fun to say, no? ;-) Don Armstrong -- [Panama, 1989. The U.S. government called it Operation Just Cause.] I think they misspelled this. Shouldn't it be Operation Just 'Cause? -- TekPolitik http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=59669cid=5664907 http://www.donarmstrong.com http://www.anylevel.com http://rzlab.ucr.edu pgpLtxRBE0Lxy.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: Implied vs. explicit copyright
Don Armstrong [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: On Mon, 21 Jul 2003, Thomas Bushnell, BSG wrote: That's a nonofficial source. But a brief web search will show you that the same thing is repeated a gillion times. Everything I've read so far has claimed that (c) has no force of law, whereas c-in-a-circle does. However, I'm unaware of a court decision saying so one way or another. Non-legislative interpretations are nice, but it doesn't have weight like judicial precedent. Of course, but the point is that the law is already very clear. I think the onus is one someone else to prove the contrary, given the clear text of the law and the history of anal-retentive interpretations of this particular sort of thing. And anyhow, it's easy enough to just put Copright there. Futhermore, in the US, the only thing such an omission would do is effectively remove the copyright statement, not invalidate the copyright itself. Right, but if there is no copyright statement, then there has been no notice of copyright. I would not be surprised if you could make the claim that in systems where there is no equivalent of a c-in-a-circle, (c) fulfills the same role. I'd be genuinely surprised if most US courts didn't buy that argument as well. [I can't speak for other court systems, however.] In general, such claims don't work, because of the whole point of the statement: to have a single, unambiguous, bright-line test for what is a valid copyright notice, so that no interpretation, guesswork, or the like is necessary. But as far as no notice goes, it still doesn't invalidate the copyright; it just means that a defendant in such a case can claim that they weren't aware of the copyright and avoid whatever the appropriate escalation of damages is. Right. Now that we've gone through that, when you're copyrighting something, the smart money is on doing _both_. Use Copyright (c) 1997 Foo Bar Baz. Blah Blah Blah. Unless I've totally missunderstood the situtation at worst, (c) will be interpreted as a no-op, and the copyright statement will still control. At best, (c) will be equivalent to c-in-a-circle, and you're still at the same situation. There is no harm for putting (c) down. Just always say Copyright. Although I still wonder whether ascii art c-in-a-circle symbols are ok. ___ / \ | C | 1997 Foo Bar Baz. No Rights Reserved. \___/ Now, *that* might meet the terms of the statute. Except that No Rights Reserved would, in Pan-American-Copyright-Treaty cases, void your copyright. Thomas
Re: Implied vs. explicit copyright
On Mon, Jul 21, 2003 at 04:12:28PM -0700, Thomas Bushnell, BSG wrote: So more to the point: there are many many references which say c-in-parens doesn't count None of which are legally significant. there is a reference which says what does count, and it doesn't include c-in-parens, and there is a reference which says that even trivial errors in certain parts of the notice count as no notice at all. So in brief, there is no basis in law for the statement that (c) is not valid as a notice of copyright. If your lawyer can't make a convincing argument in court that (c) is an acceptable alternative to the specified symbol, in a medium which cannot represent the official symbol, then find yourself a better lawyer. (Whether they would win or not varies per jurisdiction) -- .''`. ** Debian GNU/Linux ** | Andrew Suffield : :' : http://www.debian.org/ | `. `' | `- -- | pgpWbgl5Ma7K4.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: Implied vs. explicit copyright
Andrew Suffield [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: So in brief, there is no basis in law for the statement that (c) is not valid as a notice of copyright. Sure there is. The law says that the following are the only valid things: C in a circle The word Copyright. The abbreviation Copr. The law says that making mistakes in this area means there is not an erroneous notice, but no notice at all. If your lawyer can't make a convincing argument in court that (c) is an acceptable alternative to the specified symbol, in a medium which cannot represent the official symbol, then find yourself a better lawyer. Except that the medium does permit the symbol Copyright, so that's no good. The effect of a notice is to increase damages for infringement and eliminate one kind of defense. The question is not did you know it was copyrighted, for which anything that communicates intent would be good enough. The question is much more rigid, it's was there a valid notice. If the notice is erroneous, then it counts as a valid notice provided it still communicates intent. But if the notice is omitted, then it doesn't communicate intent. And the law is explicit that if it lacks all three of c-in-a-circle, Copyright, and Copr., then it is not merely erroneous, but omitted. (Similarly, the date must be correct within one year or the notice is omitted [not just erroneous]; there is a list of such things, for which any mistake means there is no notice, not just an erroneous one.) At best you can argue that (c) communicates intent: communicates the information this is coprighted. But communicating that information just isn't relevant to getting treble damages or defeating an ignorance defense. So the law says, in no uncertain terms, that Copywrite (misspelled) is not a valid notice, period. Similarly, it gives no indication that (c) means anything at all, and it says explicitly that the copyright ID is a special magic token, any variation of which renders the notice officially nonexistent. So the moral is: put the word Copyright down, always. Thomas
Re: Implied vs. explicit copyright
On Mon, Jul 21, 2003 at 05:42:20PM -0700, Thomas Bushnell, BSG wrote: Andrew Suffield [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: So in brief, there is no basis in law for the statement that (c) is not valid as a notice of copyright. Sure there is. The law says that the following are the only valid things: C in a circle The word Copyright. The abbreviation Copr. The law says that making mistakes in this area means there is not an erroneous notice, but no notice at all. This is a plausible argument. You should know by now that plausible arguments do not form a basis in law; rather, it is merely the position put forth by the counsel for the defence. Kindly refrain from treating it as anything else. In my country we have courts to make decisions where the legislature has failed to completely specify or consider a particular case. Although since you appear to be in the US, I admit that I don't know what your courts are supposed to be for. If your lawyer can't make a convincing argument in court that (c) is an acceptable alternative to the specified symbol, in a medium which cannot represent the official symbol, then find yourself a better lawyer. Except that the medium does permit the symbol Copyright, so that's no good. The effect of a notice is to increase damages for infringement and eliminate one kind of defense. The question is not did you know it was copyrighted, for which anything that communicates intent would be good enough. The question is much more rigid, it's was there a valid notice. If the notice is erroneous, then it counts as a valid notice provided it still communicates intent. But if the notice is omitted, then it doesn't communicate intent. And the law is explicit that if it lacks all three of c-in-a-circle, Copyright, and Copr., then it is not merely erroneous, but omitted. (Similarly, the date must be correct within one year or the notice is omitted [not just erroneous]; there is a list of such things, for which any mistake means there is no notice, not just an erroneous one.) At best you can argue that (c) communicates intent: communicates the information this is coprighted. But communicating that information just isn't relevant to getting treble damages or defeating an ignorance defense. So the law says, in no uncertain terms, that Copywrite (misspelled) is not a valid notice, period. Similarly, it gives no indication that (c) means anything at all, and it says explicitly that the copyright ID is a special magic token, any variation of which renders the notice officially nonexistent. All of this is more from the counsel for the defence. It is your interpretation of the law; it is not the law itself. The law, as formulated in the US, says this: - Copyright forms an acceptable notice - circle-C forms an acceptable notice (plus the year and name) It does not say this: - No alternate representations form an acceptable notice If it did, then you would not be able to post a notice of copyright in a medium which could reliably represent neither of these. Say, for example, a gzipped tarball - which stores neither, but instead can store a sequence of bytes representing one or the other. This could even be extended to an argument that since digital data is merely a representation of the stated acceptable forms, it does not in itself constitute a valid notice - so you can only make an acceptable notice on paper. I see nothing in the US copyright law which contradicts this, and it is consistant with many related precedents in many jurisdictions (copyright assignment must be made on paper, not via email). I do not think that a UK court would uphold either of these positions (I make no comment as to what a US court would do, since they frequently make decisions with no apparent basis in reality). I think that it is not implausible for any court to decide that (c) is an acceptable alternate representation of the circle-C sign in an ASCII text stream. Note that the circle-C sign is unreproducible in a C source file - it can only be represented. I stipulate, again, that there is no legislated decision one way or the other. And I am aware of no precedent in this matter. -- .''`. ** Debian GNU/Linux ** | Andrew Suffield : :' : http://www.debian.org/ | `. `' | `- -- | pgpVybJQEdkIK.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: Implied vs. explicit copyright
[EMAIL PROTECTED] (Thomas Bushnell, BSG) writes: Drew Scott Daniels [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: Is the an implied copyright notification (I.e. code added by person) sufficient in the debian/copyright or is it necessary to say explicitly say year copyright person? There is no such thing as implied copyright. But he didn't say there was. He said there was an (implied (copyright notification)), which there is. In the USA, setting down a form of art is sufficient to grant copyright. So writing Extra Foo added by Brian Sniffen is enough to make readers aware that I own the copyright on the Extra Foo bits. In some places, the incantation Copyright (c) 2003 Brian Sniffen has legal meaning. Even in the US, it's illegal to falsely place such a notice. Given all of that, I think it would be better if you *could* put such a statement into debian/copyright, but probably not a good idea for you to independently write one. -Brian -- Brian T. Sniffen[EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.evenmere.org/~bts/
Re: Implied vs. explicit copyright
Drew Scott Daniels [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: Is the an implied copyright notification (I.e. code added by person) sufficient in the debian/copyright or is it necessary to say explicitly say year copyright person? There is no such thing as implied copyright. But that doesn't really help answer the question. Can you give the exact details of the situation?
Implied vs. explicit copyright
Is the an implied copyright notification (I.e. code added by person) sufficient in the debian/copyright or is it necessary to say explicitly say year copyright person? Upstream explicitly states year copyright person. Iirc, I read somewhere that (c) is not the same as the copyright simple and isn't sufficient in some jurisdictions. For this reason I think that maintaining an explicit copyright notification is necessary. Drew Daniels
