Re: Copyright laws

From: Michael Steinmann (claywar@moltar.cetlink.net)
Date: 10/17/96


On Wed, 16 Oct 1996, Ebon Mists wrote:

> As far as just putting copyright blah  blah on something goes... Ok. You
> 'copyright' your zone.
> 
> I steal a copy, go into a text editor, change it a little bit, and change
> the copyright to ME. I now use it in my mud.
BUZZ!  Notta, theres a little thing called plagiarism, and go and ask any 
english teacher, and plagiarism is not fixed by changing a small portion 
of the work, if you use that work, as a base, or unmodified, it is still 
copyright that person.

> 
> Legal actions ensue. You sue be for stealing your area.
> 
> Who's to say you didnt steal mine? It would be your word against mine. Sure,
> you could have your players say that areas been in your mud for 2 years, but
> I could just as easily say I wrote mine 3 years ago, and the mud has been in
> beta without any 'witnesses' IE: players.
> 
> It comes down to a you say vs. I say issue. Unless you had some extremely
> convincing evidence in your favor, the case would not go anywhere. I'm not
> positive on that 4 year copyright thing that someone posted, but even if
> that were true... during that 4 year perios without a legal copyright
> documented somewhere in some government office, it's a matter of my word
> versues yours, in which case, the actual copyright becomes pointless.
> 
> Hades
> 
> This email Copyright 1996 by Ebon Mists Productions. Reproduction or use, in
> part or whole, without express written permission of the author will bring 
> about severe legal action.
> 
> You mean to tell me that by me typing that, if anyone quotes parts of this
> message back to the list without my permission, I have the right to sue, and
> WOULD win? I think any court in the United States would laugh that case
> right out the door.
> +-----------------------------------------------------------+
> | Ensure that you have read the CircleMUD Mailing List FAQ: |
> |   http://cspo.queensu.ca/~fletcher/Circle/list_faq.html   |
> +-----------------------------------------------------------+
> 
+-----------------------------------------------------------+
| Ensure that you have read the CircleMUD Mailing List FAQ: |
|   http://cspo.queensu.ca/~fletcher/Circle/list_faq.html   |
+-----------------------------------------------------------+



This archive was generated by hypermail 2b30 : 12/18/00 PST