Re: Abandonware petition

[Roy Miller <millers@inebraska.com>]

Cturley2 wrote:

> <snip>
> ...It seems after reading and interpreting the contents of 'section 1204' the
> only possible action that can be taken would be civil liability if the
> copyright holder claims injury and decides to sue.
>
> By making such Apple II abandonware titles available from the above noted URL
> and folder I can't see how it would cause any copyright holder any injury in
> any way.

Mental anguish. Distress. Juries love those.

>
>
> Should any copyright holder of any of the 1000's of Apple II abandonware titles
> decide to take civil action -- such legal action would be an interesting case -
> that I'd look forward to being a party to.  Making such Apple II titled
> archived for public online access and downloads labeled as abandonware would
> make a very interesting civil liability legal test case.
>
> But, my being an individual with NO assets to take - such actions would most
> likely be dismissed by the court before ever going to trial.

Ahem. BUT, the assets of those who own the system you are on, the ISP you use,
well, Tom, they would be accessories. Should someone get a burr under their
saddle, it could get very expensive. Mind you, I doubt that it would happen, but
this is America, and we love to sue, and therefore we do all sorts of things to
minimize our exposure to suits. Like shut down sites where copy righted software
is available for download for free.

I'm neither complaining nor commending, just observing....

Roy

> It seems that
> some
> copyright law sections actually do work in favor of the needs of Apple II users
> online today - after all :)
>
> Cheers,
> Tom