Re: Softdisk

[cturley2@aol.com (Cturley2)]

Jeff Blakeney replied with the following to with I comment on:

"Freeware is still copyrighted by the author and can be reclassified
whenever they see fit."

Valid point that I'll certainly not dispute. As I've seen it done often.

"If MiniPaint was released as freeware and SoftDisks wanted to include it on
one of their disks then the author had every right to ask for monetary
compensation to allow SoftDisk to do so.  The author also had the right to
reclassify the freeware as commmercial as well if they really wanted and this
might have been a requirement of the agreement they made with SoftDisk."

'If' <- would certainly be the keyword to this issued speculation.   Perhaps
somebody would like to research the version of the freeware release of
MiniPaint currently avilable from all of our Apple2 ftp sites and see if the
MiniPaint that was on the SoftDisk issue is the same version or has been given
some change with another version number and classification.  Again I fully
agree with your outline on the rest, as you expressed above.

"After all, why would SoftDisk want to pay for a program that to include on
their disks that anyone could download for free?"

Exactly!  Very good question.  I wonder why too!  Especially after it had been
available as a freeware archive for  public access and download  from several
Apple2 ftp sites - long before it was presented on the SoftDisk issue it was
in.  Perhaps, they didn't pay for it.  Perhaps it was simply given to them for
inclusion for their subscribers that didn't have the means to download it from
the Apple2 ftp sites.  Then again, perhaps it was sold to SoftDisk and
reclassified as a commercial program.  Clarifying this with proof and facts to
validate all this speculation would be an interesting research project for
somebody to undertake.

"As nice as it is to hope that SoftDisk will release its magazine on
disks as freeware, I doubt it will happen because of all the stuff
that they used which was created by others and who still own the
rights to.  For example, ShiftyList was published on SoftDiskGS but
Sheppy still owns the rights to it and is now selling a newer version
of it as shareware.

Yes indeed. some of the contents might well still be owned by their authors or
outright owned by SoftDisk. They did make it clear to me that the disks, their
contents and their legal status of content ownership needed to be researched
before any of them could be released in the status of freeware.  Certainly it's
very clear to us all that the issue with ShiftyList would not be within their
abilities to release it as a freeware.  Perhaps other issues would also fall
into that state - which would not allow SoftDisk to relase them as freeware.

Final thoughts on all this ->; we shall wait, we shall wonder and we shall see.

Cheers,
Tom