Re: [lace] Miss Channer/enforcement issues (Soapbox)
typicall lacers - I could make that ... if I had all the bobbins grin Liz In a message dated 28/08/2003 18:10:18 GMT Daylight Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: Subj: Re: [lace] Miss Channer/enforcement issues (Soapbox) Date: 28/08/2003 18:10:18 GMT Daylight Time From: A HREF=mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED][EMAIL PROTECTED]/A To: A HREF=mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED][EMAIL PROTECTED]/A CC: A HREF=mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED][EMAIL PROTECTED]/A Sent from the Internet Yes, if you own something it is your right what you do with it. Also a lot of the people on this soap box have never seen the mat, second it is quite boring, third they couldn't do it and finally the only thing that excites people is the number of bobbins! KEEP LACING, VIVIENNE, BIGGINS Regards Liz Beecher - To unsubscribe send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] containing the line: unsubscribe lace [EMAIL PROTECTED] For help, write to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: [lace] Miss Channer/enforcement issues
Just another thought - I bought a software program from a Jewish company and on the disk it had the following caveat: You make make a copy of this software for personal back up purposes. Illegal copying of this software is against US and GOD's laws I felt that I had been truely warned. You are right - it is NOT morally right Liz In a message dated 27/08/2003 22:01:05 GMT Standard Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: Subj: Re: [lace] Miss Channer/enforcement issues Date: 27/08/2003 22:01:05 GMT Standard Time From: A HREF=mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED][EMAIL PROTECTED]/A To: A HREF=mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED][EMAIL PROTECTED]/A, A HREF=mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED][EMAIL PROTECTED]/A Sent from the Internet Any thoughts of stealing copies of the mat are dreadful. However annoying it may be not being able to get a copy even copying and giving it to your friend is illegal. Okay perhaps I feel really strongly about it because Biggins design and produce patterns which are blatantly copied but it is not morally right. KEEP LACING, VIVIENNE, BIGGINS - To unsubscribe send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] containing the line: unsubscribe lace [EMAIL PROTECTED] For help, write to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: [lace] Miss Channer/enforcement issues
Vivienne and all the spiders, Apologies for not joining this thread earlier but I've been making chutney - I'm sure you can all smell it from here. Here you have hit the nail on the head. For some reason, we lace makers think that to own more patterns than we could make in a life time is a really good idea. Apparantly normal women who would never break the law think nothing of photocopying a pattern and swopping it with a friend. Why? I think that the main reasons and our thinking are as follows: a) Why should I buy a book for £20 or $35 dollars when I only want one pattern. b) But it's out of print and I just HAVE to have that pattern. c) It doesn't harm anyone. d) Everyone else does it. But it does harm someone - the person who designed it, the person who published it and all of us who want it reprinted but can't get it done because apparantly there is no call for it because we've all photocopied it. OK, so when I buy a pattern I always take a copy and prick from that - why? Because then I don't mess up my original from which I work. We wouldn't prick through a page in a book so I wouldn't prick through a single sheet pattern I've bought. That's ok. Legally, I'm allowed to do this as I am doing it for my personal use in order to make the lace so long as I either keep the copy or destroy it ie I don't give it to anyone. However, I am on sticky ground if I give the the single sheet pattern or the pricking to someone else to work from. Some lace designers (but certainly not all) place the caveat on their work that you may give the pricking to a friend to work from but when it falls to pieces they cannot make another pricking. Dodgy. I know that the traditional way to make a pricking was to prick it from another pricking and then true it up (if required) and we are all guilty of at sometime saying to someone -hey give me a copy of that pricking. I've done it (once - I admit it but I claim ignorance and have never done it since) and I've been asked on many an occasion when demonstrating - Oh, I love that - please give me a copy - No bugger off and buy it you cheapskate - that should be our answer but we smile, pleased that someone loved the piece we were making and say - Of course, give me your name and address. Sometimes, I feel like shouting at people - hey it's only 65p including postage to buy it - are you that poor? Or are we saying that we want the pattern at any cost so long as it is nothing. I want this lace pattern and I am going to make it - it is wonderful, such a pretty thing but of course it isn't worth me paying any money for - well, actually I have paid at least 4p for a photocopy - hey if it's only A4 I can scan it on my pc and not pay anything - yippee. Pay for them you cheapskates - if it's beautiful it must be worth the money or go buy something else. Am I the only person in the world who has books of patterns and files of A4 / A3 patterns that I could never make in one life time simply because they are beautiful patterns that I can look at and if I want to, make? There must be more people out there like me ... aren't there ... now I'm worried. So, here's my suggestion - be good bunnies (or frogs if you want) and a) BUY the pattern because it encourages the designers to design more of them. b) Check if it is in copyright before you copy it - if you can't buy it because it is out of print then some publishers are willing for you to send a royalty to them to pass onto the designer if they are still alive or to their estate - IT MAKES YOU FEEL GOOD - when I wanted to copy something (non lace) for teaching in my day job, I contacted the copyright owner who allowed me to do so so long as I gave him credit when I used it and made a donation to charity - mind you he is a really wonderful guy. c) Suggest to the publisher that they pre-sell a piece that they want to republish - say if they get 1/2 to 2/3 of the patterns presold (perhaps 1/2 or all the cost up front and the rest when it's done) which would raise the money to reprint. d) when all else fails, GO MAKE SOMETHING ELSE - it's not the end of the world. My love to you all - I'm off to label my chutney Liz In a message dated 27/08/2003 22:01:05 GMT Standard Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: Subj: Re: [lace] Miss Channer/enforcement issues Date: 27/08/2003 22:01:05 GMT Standard Time From: A HREF=mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED][EMAIL PROTECTED]/A To: A HREF=mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED][EMAIL PROTECTED]/A, A HREF=mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED][EMAIL PROTECTED]/A Sent from the Internet Any thoughts of stealing copies of the mat are dreadful. However annoying it may be not being able to get a copy even copying and giving it to your friend is illegal. Okay perhaps I feel really strongly about it because Biggins design and produce patterns which are blatantly copied but it is not morally right. KEEP LACING, VIVIENNE, BIGGINS - To unsubscribe send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] containing the line
Re: [lace] Miss Channer/enforcement issues
As, I understand it, the principle behind copyright law is to encourage creativity by ensuring that those who invest effort in a pattern or other intellectual property may profit from it. Publishers who take the risk in publishing the work are also deserving of the right to profit. I believe whole heartedly in this principle. I pay top dollar for lace books with the hope that the publisher will continue to print them and the creator will continue to create them. It breaks my heart when I hear a gifted lace person regret ever having spent the time writing a book, and this happens quite often. I get a little confused though when the fact pattern gets as convoluted and distorted as the Channer Mat problem. Ruth Bean constantly asserts that there is no profit to be made from this pattern. I have no doubt they are correct. It is rare that you hear that anyone has made any money publishing a lace book. The market is extremely small. They already published it once, thus saturating the market. It is entirely doubtful that they would ever publish it again. I am not sure what the minimum print run is that can be profitable. I am sure it is not 100. It is probably not 1000. If Ruth Bean keeps a list of everyone who wants the pattern with the idea of publishing when it gets to 1000, I think that it will take 20 years and the people who put their names on the list first will be dead, so there will still not be a thousand people who want the pattern even then. There are roughly 7,000 lacemakers in the English speaking world. Probably 500 have the pattern. Probably 6,400 don't want it. I don't blame Ruth Bean for not wanting to take a financial bath by republishing Channer's Mat. So, if there is no profit in the pattern, hypothetically, copying it doesn't sound like it is hurting them. If you were, hypothetically, to say the profit on each pattern was $10 and they suffer a $10 loss if you photocopy the pattern, they could sue you for $10 according to Tom. I even asked them if they would allow people to photocopy the pattern and send them the amount that they would consider the profit, ie. $10 and they said no. It is too much trouble for them to accept the individual $10 sums. This is entirely understandable. Maybe someone should offer to handle the paper work of clearing the checks from honor payments so they could receive it in a yearly lump sum which would be cheaper for them to process. Meanwhile, of course, the pattern is selling on e-bay and the second hand market. When these sell the dealers profit, extraordinarily. No money is kicked back to Ruth Bean or Channer, or Bury. Theoretically people could sell one copy to each other, copy for their own use, sell to another. Personally, I would rather see the creators or the publishers profit in order to encourage creativity and the publication of more lace patterns. I appreciate the role that used book sellers play and that they work quite hard. However, it would make more sense in terms of accomplishing the goals of the copyright law to photocopy the pattern and use the $70 you would pay on e-bay for the pattern to take the president of Ruth Bean, Bury and the Channer heirs out to dinner as a special thank you for creating and publishing it originally. Morally, I find the whole thing quite confusing. Mind you, I don't even want a copy. My skills aren't up to it and I don't think it is all that pretty. Devon - To unsubscribe send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] containing the line: unsubscribe lace [EMAIL PROTECTED] For help, write to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
RE: [lace] Miss Channer/enforcement issues
From: Bev Walker [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] I prefer to make my original designs available through lace magazines, for the price of buying the magazine. OK, we've been exploring copyright law through the hypothetical example of Miss Channer's mat. And Vivienne, I do believe most of the messages were hypothetical, using the mat as an example--not actually advocating violating Ruth Bean's copyright to produce the mat's pricking. Bev brings up something I've wondered about. If I buy the magazine with her design in it, would it violate copyright if I let my friend(s) copy her pattern? Are they supposed to buy their own copies of the magazine in order to do a pattern from it? What if the magazine is not available, either because it requires a subscription/membership for a whole year (too late, when you see a pattern in the current issue) or it's an old issue? This can actually get pretty complicated when one is dealing with lace organizations' magazines. Some magazines hold the copyright for their contents so, like books, there's a demonstrable loss from unsold copies. However, don't most of the lace orgs leave the copyright with the designer? The designer may get some sort of payment (like copies of the issue, or a bobbin), but gets no royalties for the *number* of copies of the magazine sold. When IOLI sells off extra back issues, the designers aren't getting any extra payment, so the designers aren't losing any income when I reproduce patterns in old copies. The IOLI may claim lost membership (why pay those pesky dues if Robin will let me copy patterns from her old issues?), but they don't hold the copyright on the patterns being copied. So if the copyright holder can't lose income, is it a copyright violation? If anyone's worried, I *do* buy magazines (or join organizations) in order to have my own copy of patterns, and I *don't* give away copies from my magazines. I've just wondered. Robin P. [EMAIL PROTECTED] Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA http://www.pittsburghlace.8m.com - To unsubscribe send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] containing the line: unsubscribe lace [EMAIL PROTECTED] For help, write to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
RE: [lace] Miss Channer/enforcement issues (Soapbox)
A couple of things... the first is that the pricking published by Ruth Bean is not the original but an adaptation by Anne Buck of the original. Perhaps she can have some influence on the possibility of republishing the pricking? Does anyone know when Ruth Bean Publishers started in business? If it was after 1949, there may be some question as to their right to hold a copyright that legally belongs to the heirs of Miss Channer until the year 2019. Second, this is a sterling example of the flaw in the ridiculous length of copyright duration. Catherine Channer died in 1949 and Ruth Bean Publications is sitting on her work, making it unavailable to those Miss Channer devoted her time and talents to during her lifetime! Those of us who are designing need to consider what will happen to our own work after we are no longer around to control it. A greedy (or uncaring) publisher or uncaring (or hateful) relative could bury our work in much the same way as Miss Channer's work is being buried... for nearly 3/4 of a century after we die, or longer if a corporation can get hold of the copyright! I appreciate Vivienne and other's wish to make a fair return on their work and I would never advocate copying a *living* author's work, but for heaven's sake do you really want your *legacy* consigned to obscurity at the whim of someone else? That is really what is being discussed here. Consider Sr. Judith who is well over 80 years old... she has designed nearly every scrap of Withof on the planet. What will happen to her work when she passes (God willing she lives in health many more years)? Will Withof simply disappear with her? Pattern Book 7 is already rare as hen's teeth and not being printed, and IMHO it contains some of her best work. I don't have a copy and it's unlikely I'll ever be able to get one from bookfinder.com or ebay at any price. Lacemakers 50 - 70 years from now certainly won't. Realizing that there is little we can do against the battalions of lawyers and piles of bucks corporations like Disney use to drive the copyright laws further and further out of the realm of common sense, it is still a travesty that an important work like Miss Channer's Mat will be allowed to languish for so long. When Miss Channer died, what was the expected length of her copyright and what has it ended up as years later? Even if she had thought about this at all, how could she know what would happen? Do *we* even know where this will end? Since the copyright on Mickey Mouse hasn't expired yet the length of time could be extended many more times. With the advent of DVD-based movies and music, there will be even more pressure to extend the duration copyrights. Sorry to go on so, but this is one of my soapboxes. (For non-Americans, the term soapbox comes from a time when people would stand on a soapbox (or other such wooden box) in a public place and cry out their personal message to the world.) Marcie - To unsubscribe send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] containing the line: unsubscribe lace [EMAIL PROTECTED] For help, write to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: [lace] Miss Channer/enforcement issues (Soapbox)
Do you know the date of the copyright and whether it was copyrighted by Bean or Buck. Is Buck dead? As to morality? Is it moral to sit on something that you cannot profit from and keep it from the rest of the world just because you have a *legal* right to do so? Tom Andrews - Original Message - From: Panza, Robin [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: 'Marcie Greer' [EMAIL PROTECTED]; Arachne (E-mail) [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, August 28, 2003 11:05 AM Subject: RE: [lace] Miss Channer/enforcement issues (Soapbox) From: Marcie Greer [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Second, this is a sterling example of the flaw in the ridiculous length of copyright duration. Catherine Channer died in 1949 and Ruth Bean Publications is sitting on her work, making it unavailable to those Miss Channer devoted her time and talents to during her lifetime! It's my understanding that Miss Channer's mat, or a photograph of it, are all that survived her death--NOT a pricking. Anne Buck developed a pattern from a photograph of the mat, Bean published Buck's pricking and a picture of Buck's piece--NOT the original mat. I don't know if Bean commissioned the piece or the designer offered it to Bean. I also don't know how much change there was from the original mat and the developed design, but we assume Bean was legal in all this. Either the mat was changed enough, or it was late enough, to not violate Channer's estate's copyright. The copyright we are in danger of infringing is Bean's/Buck's pricking. As I understand it, if someone got a photo of the original mat and developed their own pricking, that would be legal. If they reproduced Bean's/Buck's pricking, they would be in violation of Bean's copyright. Robin P. [EMAIL PROTECTED] Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA http://www.pittsburghlace.8m.com - To unsubscribe send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] containing the line: unsubscribe lace [EMAIL PROTECTED] For help, write to [EMAIL PROTECTED] - To unsubscribe send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] containing the line: unsubscribe lace [EMAIL PROTECTED] For help, write to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: [lace] Miss Channer/enforcement issues (Soapbox)
Yes, if you own something it is your right what you do with it. Also a lot of the people on this soap box have never seen the mat, second it is quite boring, third they couldn't do it and finally the only thing that excites people is the number of bobbins! KEEP LACING, VIVIENNE, BIGGINS - To unsubscribe send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] containing the line: unsubscribe lace [EMAIL PROTECTED] For help, write to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: [lace] Miss Channer/enforcement issues
Hi Tom, and Devon, and other lacemakers! To take this question in a slightly different direction, how much would the original design have to be changed in order to call it an original design? If a creative lacemaker used the mat as inspiration and made a design that looked a great deal like the mat - but was not an exact duplication - would that be a violation of copyright? Clay - Original Message - From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]; [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, August 27, 2003 4:34 PM Subject: Re: [lace] Miss Channer/enforcement issues So, Tom, if someone were, hypothetically speaking, not that I am advocating it, to very quietly and in a non-public place, photocopy the pattern and give it to her friend, how would the damages be reckoned? Ruth Bean repeatedly goes on record as saying that it is not worth reprinting. However, they did respond with a reminder that they own the copyright at one point when someone offered on-line to photocopy it for another person. I don't think anyone is actually proposing to run off as many as a hundred copies, and if they did, they would lose their shirts on the enterprise, much as Ruth Bean, apparently would if they did it. It is the person who reproduces the pattern that suffers economic loss in this scenario, so how do you calculate damages? It would be an interesting question for a law school exam. It seems to me that every year Ruth Bean is deluged with e-mails from people pleading to have them reprint this pattern. This kind of annoyance is probably unknown for The Idiot's Guide to Safe Cracking, for instance, but the lacemakers are a fanatically law abiding group. Devon who never advocates law-breaking. - To unsubscribe send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] containing the line: unsubscribe lace [EMAIL PROTECTED] For help, write to [EMAIL PROTECTED] - To unsubscribe send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] containing the line: unsubscribe lace [EMAIL PROTECTED] For help, write to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: [lace] Miss Channer/enforcement issues
Any thoughts of stealing copies of the mat are dreadful. However annoying it may be not being able to get a copy even copying and giving it to your friend is illegal. Okay perhaps I feel really strongly about it because Biggins design and produce patterns which are blatantly copied but it is not morally right. KEEP LACING, VIVIENNE, BIGGINS - To unsubscribe send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] containing the line: unsubscribe lace [EMAIL PROTECTED] For help, write to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: [lace] Miss Channer/enforcement issues
If perchance, a hypothetical lacer made a copy of Miss Channer's Mat and gave it to a friend, and if Ruth Bean had someway of knowing about such a private transaction, and if she could find a lawyer to take the case; she would be entitled to the profit she would have made had she sold the recipient lacer the pricking. Hardly worth going after, is it? Now, maybe some of our British friends could enlighten me on British copyright law, but in the States a copyright is only good for fifty years after the death of person who copyrighted it. Now as memory serves me, copyrights were recently brought up in Congress and extended in order to put money in the coffers of Walt Disney, Inc. whose copyrights on his troop of characters were about to expire. I wonder if under British copyright law the copyright on a hundred plus year old mat has not expired. Besides, I wouldn't want one. I would need at least eight for a complete place setting. Anyone game? Tom Andrews - Original Message - From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] ; [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, August 27, 2003 3:34 PM Subject: Re: [lace] Miss Channer/enforcement issues So, Tom, if someone were, hypothetically speaking, not that I am advocating it, to very quietly and in a non-public place, photocopy the pattern and give it to her friend, how would the damages be reckoned? Ruth Bean repeatedly goes on record as saying that it is not worth reprinting. However, they did respond with a reminder that they own the copyright at one point when someone offered on-line to photocopy it for another person. I don't think anyone is actually proposing to run off as many as a hundred copies, and if they did, they would lose their shirts on the enterprise, much as Ruth Bean, apparently would if they did it. It is the person who reproduces the pattern that suffers economic loss in this scenario, so how do you calculate damages? It would be an interesting question for a law school exam. It seems to me that every year Ruth Bean is deluged with e-mails from people pleading to have them reprint this pattern. This kind of annoyance is probably unknown for The Idiot's Guide to Safe Cracking, for instance, but the lacemakers are a fanatically law abiding group. Devon who never advocates law-breaking. - To unsubscribe send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] containing the line: unsubscribe lace [EMAIL PROTECTED] For help, write to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: [lace] Miss Channer/enforcement issues
Although not hard and fast. The cases I have read would indicate that a Fifteen percent (15%) change would be a new design. I'd go Twenty percent (20%) to be sure. How you measure that is a jury question. I might suggest you leave out the hard parts. Tom - Original Message - From: Clay Blackwell [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]; [EMAIL PROTECTED]; [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, August 27, 2003 3:59 PM Subject: Re: [lace] Miss Channer/enforcement issues Hi Tom, and Devon, and other lacemakers! To take this question in a slightly different direction, how much would the original design have to be changed in order to call it an original design? If a creative lacemaker used the mat as inspiration and made a design that looked a great deal like the mat - but was not an exact duplication - would that be a violation of copyright? Clay - Original Message - From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]; [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, August 27, 2003 4:34 PM Subject: Re: [lace] Miss Channer/enforcement issues So, Tom, if someone were, hypothetically speaking, not that I am advocating it, to very quietly and in a non-public place, photocopy the pattern and give it to her friend, how would the damages be reckoned? Ruth Bean repeatedly goes on record as saying that it is not worth reprinting. However, they did respond with a reminder that they own the copyright at one point when someone offered on-line to photocopy it for another person. I don't think anyone is actually proposing to run off as many as a hundred copies, and if they did, they would lose their shirts on the enterprise, much as Ruth Bean, apparently would if they did it. It is the person who reproduces the pattern that suffers economic loss in this scenario, so how do you calculate damages? It would be an interesting question for a law school exam. It seems to me that every year Ruth Bean is deluged with e-mails from people pleading to have them reprint this pattern. This kind of annoyance is probably unknown for The Idiot's Guide to Safe Cracking, for instance, but the lacemakers are a fanatically law abiding group. Devon who never advocates law-breaking. - To unsubscribe send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] containing the line: unsubscribe lace [EMAIL PROTECTED] For help, write to [EMAIL PROTECTED] - To unsubscribe send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] containing the line: unsubscribe lace [EMAIL PROTECTED] For help, write to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
