On Wed, Mar 18, 2009 at 08:45:38PM +0000, Anthony W. Youngman wrote: > In message <20090318154151.ga4...@nagi>, Graham Percival > <[email protected]> writes >> I believe that source code is only un-copyrightable if it's done >> for a certain kinds of US government contract. (there's some law >> about government materials being public domain, although that >> obviously doesn't apply to everything that the government funds >> indirectly) >> Granted, this case is confusing. > > Being pedantic, but this most definitely is NOT true. Works created > by/for the US government are subject to the Berne treaty, and are > copyright. However, the US government is enjoined by US law from > enforcing copyright. So you can use those works without fear of suit. > > That's very different from Public Domain, and the US government could > conceivably sue in a foreign (to the US) court.
Fascinating! I've always heard it as "not copyrightable", but the wikipedia page (I know, I know, wikipedia isn't reliable) also makes it clear that there is no **domestic** copyright protection for such works. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright_status_of_work_by_the_U.S._government Cheers, - Graham _______________________________________________ lilypond-devel mailing list [email protected] http://lists.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/lilypond-devel
