On Sat, 10 Aug 1996 15:04:04 -0400, Joan Korenman wrote:
>On Sat, 10 Aug 1996, Murph Sewall wrote:
>> Suppose instead, the students buy a single sheet with detailed instructions
>> of how to retrieve the desired messages from the logfiles.
>
> I appreciate the suggestion, but I see several problems with it.
Oops. I think my point got missed. I pointed out that it is POSSIBLE
(though wasteful) for students to obtain the messages the professor would
like them to read over the net. Therefore, nit picking over the niceties
of copyright law seems a bit much.
It strikes me that there's a reason why everyone avoids actually testing
the legal hair splitting in court (in the first place if I, in the U.S.,
wish to object to a Canadian using a text I posted to a list in Europe, WHO
has jurisdiction?). It seems to me that a court *might* offer copyright
protection to messages posted to subscription *by owner* lists with private
logfiles. On the other hand, if logfiles are public, or subscription is
"open" which has the effect of making the logfiles public, then a common
sense judge *might* well rule that the content of those publicly available
files are in the public domain. Now, I know there are lots of lawyers who
can advance arguments as to why I'm completely wrong, but if lawyers really
knew, we wouldn't need courts and judges would we?
So, forget the law--it doesn't really help. However, if academics aren't
sensitive to the issue of intellectual property rights then we are spitting
up wind. It seems to me that both ethics and common courtesy REQUIRE a
reasonable effort to contact all the authors involved (posting a form
permission request to 30 email addresses using the LISTSERV DISTribute
facility requires very little effort). Possibly a few of the addresses are
no longer valid, but that's a prospect to deal with when it actually comes
up.
/s Murphy A. Sewall <[log in to unmask]> (860) 486-2489 voice
Professor of Marketing (860) 456-7725 fax
http://mktg.sba.uconn.edu/MKT/Faculty/Sewall.html
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