Infringement 2

[Steven Weisenburger]

In reply to Cal McInvale and a few others . . . a few quick points.

I don't like the condition of the law, either, w/r/t e-texts and
copyright.  I also think it helps to know enough to avoid trouble--for
oneself, and for the people (Jody; Simon Fraser U) running this list.

So far, American jurisprudence has rather unprudentially pursued an
analogy between "magazines" and listservers/bulletin boards/websites.
Accordingly the organizer or sponsor of a list is like an "editor,"
and therefore legally accountable under copyright and libel statutes.
Now if you think about it that's pretty silly, but there it is. It
is why the 24 year old here in Lexington was charged (for running a
BBS on which some idiot posted Windows 95).

Next thing:  my experience w/ Pynchon's agent Melanie Jackson was an
education in the "fair use" clause.  I wanted rights to quote some of
his words in a 1959 Ford Foundation grant application letter that I
had legally obtained, before the Ford people sealed it, at TRP's
request.  Interesting case, for lots of reasons.  It was for an
article published in AMERICAN LITERATURE, a non-profit educational
publication, and so on.  Lawyers at Duke (where Am Lit is based) got
into it, out of an interest in the implications of the instance.  The
upshot was, we had to fight for every WORD quoted in that article.
Little nodes of three, or even (gosh, foax!) FOUR words, were very
difficult.  Moral of this story:  you can't naively assume that
just because you're quoting only part of an article, rather than the
whole article, and for educational purposes, you're safe under the
Fair Use Clause.

My main rationale for posting a cautionary message on this subject
is to ask people who use the list to act responsibly, thus to save
innocent parties from hassles and liabilities.  What you all send to
each other, one-on-one, is your own lookout.

That said, I expect I'll sign off on this topic . . .