Re: Mecc titles

[<Use-Author-Address-Header@[127.1]>]

In message <19990928011416.16737.00002970@ng-fj1.aol.com>
supertimer@aol.com (Supertimer) writes:

>kragen@dnaco.net (Kragen Sitaker) wrote:
<snip>
>>I am quite certain that American copyright law gives you the right to
>>modify software; it does not prohibit modification of any copyrighted
>>work.  (It would be a bad world if a publishing company could keep me
>>from writing notes in the margin of a book I bought from them!)  What
>>it restricts is the right to make copies, public performances, etc., of
>>the copyrighted work -- modified or unmodified -- or works derived from
>>it.

>That does not seem quite right.  If I buy some sheet music,
>I can play the music in public.  If I buy a music album, I
>can play it to my friends.  If I by a painting or photo, I can
>display it in my (hypothetical) museum.

Actually we are talking apples and oranges here.  Books (printed
word) is dealt with in a different part of (U.S.) copyright law than is
music (performance), which is a different section from painting or software.
A couple of things to note:

If you buy a book you can write in the margins regardless of what
any publishing company says because although they own the
copyright to the intellectual property (the content of the book) it
is you who own the physical pages and you can scribble whatever
you like on them.

If you buy the sheet music you cannot make copies of it and distribute it
without permission. You can perform the music whenever and as often
as you like but if you charge people to listen to your performance you
owe royalties to the author (this goes for recordings as well as sheet music)
or if you broadcast it (broadcasting  is dealt with in (U.S.) copyright law and
has its own rules/restrictions). You can alter the music for your performance,
claim the alterered work as your own but you STILL owe the author royalties
for the parts of the original work that are in your performance. This is in part

what the 2 Live Crew landmark copyright case was about, IIRC (not the bulk
of the case, but certainly a small part).

Altering software for which you have purchased a license I believe is ok
for your own use, but with the recent and pending changes to (U.S.)
copyright laws I am not _as_ sure on this, yet. You certainly can't alter it and
sell it or give it away, but I believe you can still write a patch program that
alters the software.

--
Eric <chippys@nospam.earthlink.net>