Re: My Website Has Been Taken Down

["bill.martens@gmail.com" <bill.martens@gmail.com>]

On Jan 20, 9:23 am, Steven Lichter <diespamm...@ikillspammers.com>
wrote:
> bill.mart...@gmail.com wrote:
> > On Jan 20, 7:12 am, Polymorph <polymorp...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> >> On Jan 20, 12:08 am, "Bill Buckels" <bbuck...@mts.net> wrote:
>
> >>> "Polymorph" <polymo...@a2central.com.remove-snp-this> wrote:
> >>> This seems excessive. I am sorry you couldn't find time to edit the pages
> >>> that reference Mr. Cooper's literary work.
> >> It may be a bit excessive, but it was the easiest way of ensuring that
> >> anything "suspect" was no longer on offer. As I mentioned, I plan on
> >> putting my website back up, sans all the TML/Complete Pascal stuff. I
> >> may even translate some of my demo programs that were originally
> >> written under Complete Pascal into Orca/Pascal - which is a pretty
> >> trivial task, but I just need to find the time.
>
> >>> The manual should be excluded. Despite the fact that it is a derivative
> >>> work, it was produced for research and private study and the product could
> >>> not have been researched without it. Therefore it is a research paper and
> >>> has been published by you and belongs to you.
> >> I'm no lawyer, so I have chosen to "play it safe" for now.
>
> >>> Please provide the manual to me and I will put it on my Canadian Websitewww.appleoldies.ca
> >>> I will inform this gentleman that it has been placed there under MY RIGHTS
> >>> under International Copyright Laws and is excluded from his property rights
> >>> which do not outweigh the rights of the public.
> >>> I am not a lawyer of course but the fact is that we do not live in a feudal
> >>> society and we have rights as the public that local jurisdictions can not
> >>> enforce rulings against since they are bound by International Law.
> >>> If I get any flack from this guy I will ask the Canadian Law Society to
> >>> offer this from their website as well and I will tell him so.
> >> Thanks for your support, I may take you up on your offer.
>
> >> It is just a shame that if this is the real Vince M. Cooper that he
> >> chose to threaten legal action before requesting any TML/Complete
> >> Pascal links be removed. For someone who has not been heard from in
> >> the Apple II community for nearly 20 years, I think it was a bit over
> >> the top. I also remember trying to find contact details for Vince way
> >> back before placing anything on my website, but I turned up nothing.
>
> >> Anyway, please be patient and I'll try and get the site back up
> >> without any TML/Complete Pascal links...
>
> >> Cheers,
> >> Mike
>
> > Mike has it right.  As Abandon-ware, it is only Abandon-ware if no one
> > author can be truly found with a reasonable search or is dead or if
> > the author has specified that they are abandoning the program.  Vince
> > is well within his rights as the author in any country (Yes, even
> > Canada and China when the government decides to enforce the laws) to
> > claim his rights over his product.  In that respect, it is not abandon-
> > ware.  Although I use abandon-ware, I often wonder about this whole
> > thing as well.  Is is ever truly abandon-ware?  Our laws are being
> > written in the US so that you will have to maintain your copyright and
> > pay the government in order to keep it.  This will in effect cause any
> > program that was written in the 1980's to all but lost its copyrighted
> > status unless tha author maintains the copyright, but that could be
> > very costly.
>
> > However, if I remember the 1980 copyright law correctly, just putting
> > your name on the program means it is a copyrighted work, no matter
> > what year it is.  I have had to remove programs before because of this
> > and usually C&D compliance is the best idea. There are cases where it
> > doesnt come down to that, such as the case of Symantec choosing not to
> > go after the entire community on Copy II +.   After all they paid 60
> > million dollars for Central Point and then shut down the entire line.
> > So then the question comes, is it abandon-ware or still copyrighted
> > material.  Although most of us would say it is abandon-ware at that
> > point, under the law, Symantec could come along and say it is
> > copyrighted and remove it.
>
> > Personally, I dont think whether he threatened legal action or not is
> > the point.  The manual and the software is his product, thus it is his
> > copyright.  This is not the same as proving loss in a court of law.
> > It is only the copyright.  but that still means he can request that
> > you take it down and if you refuse, take you to court and then if a
> > judge is feeling good that day, give him and his legal team as much
> > damages as the judge feels it warrants. (pray you dont get one who is
> > an Apple II enthusiast who buys and sells on Ebay).  Copyrights cover
> > any written work that is original and if I am not mistaken, can even
> > be applied to emails and blogs and probably even our posts here.
> > LOL.
>
> > In the mean time, I have send an email to Vince since he was one of
> > our writers in the late 1980's asking him what his intentions are with
> > the program.  Hopefully, he will put up a site and make it available
> > in some form again so that we all can continue to enjoy the program
> > (and manual).
>
> > The one area I think needs to clarified.  Any standalone programs
> > written by you using his program are not copyrighted by him and cannot
> > be pursued.  This is because they are original works and not derived
> > works of his program.
>
> > JMHO
>
> > --billm--
>
> Bill you are right on the points brought up, but your last one when you
> write a program using a copyrighted program and it runs on it like GBBS
> segments that run on ACOS.  In order to use the program you would also
> net the  core program.  There were a lot of segments written for GBBS,
> and most were free, but some such as games and EXfer were commercial.
>
> I would be suspect on the writer unless he gave some way to reach him on
> the use of the program.
>
> I'm glad to see that ProTERM is no Free ware, but it still has a copyright.
>
> --
> The Only Good Spammer is a Dead one!! Have you hunted one down today?
> (c) 2009  I Kill Spammers, Inc. A Rot In Hell Co.

The writer is valid.   I know that because he was one of our writers
and there are very few people who would know the person he and I know
unless they had been there.

As for my last point, to clarify, Basic is copyrighted by the author.
if you write a standalone basic program, it is copyrighted by you just
as I wrote segs for GBBS in 1984-1989 that are copyrighted by me.  You
cant go after someone for writing a program and releasing it to the
public.  It is their original work and is not derived from the
original work.

--billm--