Re: 1WSW-CA WWW site - Update Notice!

[joko@crl.com (Joe Kohn)]

Richard J Wifall (rwifall@nmsu.edu) wrote:

 >        When exactly did Photonix II get released into the public
 >domain?  This was a commercial product last I heard.

The following is from Brad Templeton's Copyright FAQ; the wording in the
first paragraph is quite specific. Although I am not an attorney, the
following seems to indicate to this layman that the only person who can
place something into the public domain is the person who holds the
copyright, and the copyright holder apparently needs to use very specific
wording when placing a copyrighted program into the public domain.

        Nothing is in the public domain anymore unless the
        owner explicitly puts it in the public domain(*).  Explicitly,
        as in you have a note from the author/owner saying, "I grant
        this to the public domain."  Those exact words or words very
        much like them.

        Some argue that posting to Usenet implicitly grants
        permission to everybody to copy the posting within fairly
        wide bounds, and others feel that Usenet is an automatic store and
        forward network where all the thousands of copies made are
        done at the command (rather than the consent) of the
        poster.  This is a matter of some debate, but even if the
        former is true (and in this writer's opinion we should all pray
        it isn't true) it simply would suggest posters are implicitly
        granting permissions "for the sort of copying one might expect
        when one posts to Usenet" and in no case is this a placement
        of material into the public domain.  Furthermore it is very
        difficult for an implicit licence to supersede an explicitly
        stated licence that the copier was aware of.

        Note that all this assumes the poster had the right to post
        the item in the first place.  If the poster didn't, then all
        the copies are pirate, and no implied licence or theoretical
        reduction of the copyright can take place.

        (*) Copyrights can expire after a long time, putting someting
        into the public domain, and there are some fine points on
        this issue regarder older copyright law versions.  However, none
        of this applies to an original article posted to USENET.

        Note that granting something to the public domain is a complete
        abandonment of all rights.  You can't make something "PD for
        non-commercial use."  If your work is PD, other people can even
        modify one byte and put their name on it.