Re: Official Apple II documentation?

[Michael J. Mahon <mjmahon@aol.com>]

"sfahey" <sfahey@a2central.com.remove-tpf-this> wrote:
> To: A little note for Google
>   Re: Re: Official Apple II documentation?
>   By: A little note for Google to comp.sys.apple2 on Wed Jun 30 2010
> 04:59 pm
> 
>  > And you, Dr. Ken,  still have Brian Wisers  Applied Engineering
> scans
>  > from http://ae.applearchives.com on your site even though you were
>  > asked multiple times to remove it.    (Yes, we know they are
> Brian's
>  > work because his signature is in them and he is the one who created
>  > all the brochures.)  So get with the program and quit taking our
>  > PDF's!
> 
> It's this kind of stuff that confuses me. I realize people went to the
> time and
> effort to scan the material and that represents *something* but the
> fact of the
> matter is -- those documents don't belong to anyone, except Applied
> Engineering
> or whomever ended up with their assets after they shut down.
> 
> How can you demand someone take down a scan of something you yourself
> don't own
> the rights to?
> 
> It sucks when you spend time making a really nice web site, scan
> content and go
> to the trouble of making it look nice -- and then someone comes along
> grabs it
> all, posts it somewhere else. It feels like they got a free ride on
> your all
> your hard work.
> 
> But I have to ask, what were your motives? What did you expect would
> happen?
> 
> If you put something on the 'net -- it's going to get downloaded. It
> might even
> get posted somewhere else. If that bothers you, don't do it.
> 
> We're at the point where retro site ops have to be content with the
> knowledge
> that they've helped their community, did the good deed or earned that
> rare
> donation -- if you're not content with warm fuzzies, you're more
> likely to get
> nothing out of it at all.
> 
> And what's the deal with getting 'exclusive' rights to distribute OLD
> material?
> I can understand it IF there is a commercial interest, with royalites
> or if it
> was the only way to make the content available (because the copyright
> holder
> had to be paid off). But if it's free, it shouldn't have any strings
> above and
> beyond it's existing copyright protections.
> 
> For those that care, I think a person's reputation and standing in the
> community -- the respect they've earned from being a contributor is a
> far more
> valuable commodity to cultivate. People are going to figure out on
> their own 
> who the producers are, and who are the leeches. Everyone knows Brian
> Wiser is a
> is a producer.
> 
> This concludes my rant. I realize I've just irked some of you -- but
> this is
> is how I feel on the matter.
> 
> Sean Fahey
> www.a2central.com
> bbs.a2central.com

Well said, Sean!

Websites come and go.  The best insurance against loss is replication. 

"Proprietary interest" is seldom appropriate in what is fundamentally a
non-commercial hobby at this point.
 
-michael  -  NadaNet 3.1:  http://home.comcast.net/~mjmahon