Murph Sewall <[log in to unmask]> said:
 
>The LONG STANDING tradition of the Internet is that unless you go to
>extraordinary means to insure otherwise ANYTHING posted to ANY list is in
>the PUBLIC DOMAIN (so far as I know, this one has never been subjected to a
>court test; if you have deep pockets and desire LOTS of publicity, maybe
>you could take it on).
 
Perhaps the "tradition of the Internet" has been to widely repost messages.
But that has little effect on their copyright status.  Having seen a number of
such discussions on various library-related lists, I'm fairly sure that an
email message is a copyrightable work.  Under the current law, then, even if
there is no copyright symbol or mention of "copyright by..." every email posting
is a copyrighted work.  Like this one.
 
Bob Kosovsky
Student, PhD Program in Music                   Librarian
Graduate Center                                 Music Division
City University of New York                     The New York Public Library
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