Nancy, I think you've found the crux of the issue.
> This is an interesting case, but not completely relevant to the early music > we are discussing on this list. From what I have read the case had a lot to > do with the money Hyperion made selling the CDs and didn't pay to Dr. > Sawkins, who reconstruction the music and made a playable edition. I don't > think Dowland and Weiss had the same royalty driven concept of ownership. > Nancy Carlin I'm not sure if there is a sub-set of international copyright law that might say that one can't use someone else's work for his own profit. Let us take an early music example, you (or I, or any one else) expend a lot of effort to make an early document readable. Oops, just remembered an old joke "The junior monk goes to the archives for the original documents. The senior monks wonder why - after all we have been copying them for hundreds of years. The junior says that he just wants to see the originals. Many hours later he misses dinner and they go to look for him. They find him deep in the archives beating his head on the table and crying "the word was "celebrate""". If someone expends the time and effort, pro bono, to extract the music from a medieval document (which as we all know are hard to read) - and then passes that on to the commmunity, again pro bono. Then does anyone have the right to take that "work product" and use it for commercial purposes without compensating the "author". The law might say that once the "author" has put in the public domain without copyright it is "fair game" to be copied and published, then charge a fee for the publishing. The fee for the publishing is valid, under any law, as there are costs involved in the preparation and marketing. This is a sticky one, I'm reminded of Bill Gates' purchase for $60,000 of Seattle Systems' DOS. Gates took a risk as to whether it would sell (but not much, as he'd already sold the OS to IBM for the PC). The Compaq suit allowed other computer companies to "reverse engineer PC BIOS", and the world was opened to M$. The lad who had developed the original system was still in Seattle living on his $60,000 - and to the best of my knowledge still is. OK, I am a dedicated capitalist, and believe that the winner should take the prize. In the M$ case there is no obligation, the man sold his product free and clear. But a gentleman would have made sure that his benefactor (foolish as he may have been to sell full rights) was taken care of. As to the music, the same applies. Many of you on this list are European, and as such have a negative view of capitalism. You have seen a modern capitalism that isn't the one that grew the US. There used to be moral values there, not because they were such gentlemen but for the practical reasont that they wanted the reputation of dealing fairly to enhance future deals. Actually I've known, and still know, a number of them. And most do want to provide for their customers and developers. But the speed of today's celebrity, and the stasis of the Robber Barons over a hundred years ago, have hidden the number of good people, good gentlemen (and ladies) who have run fair businesses for ages. There should have been no court case between Hyperion and Dr. Sawkins, Hyperion should have come to Dr. Sawkins and said " we are using your work to make playable CDs, we aren't sure if they will sell. But if they do sell we would like to compensate you with a piece of the action". That isn't a gift, it is good business practice which ensures that later work products of "pro bono" transcribers will be available to them. Good business practice, don't cut off your first supplier if you want more. Best, Jon To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
