>> Regardless of whether you think it's naive or not, forwarding a posting as written and without permission does constitute a copyright infringment, according to US Law. For further documentation, please see "C" RIghts in "E" Mail by Ivan Hoffman, B.A., J.D. at this url: http://home.earthlink.net/~ivanlove/rights.html I quote him on the issues relevant to this discussion: "Thus, the moment the writer creates the email a copyright begins. And the United States statute provides the following rights to literary works, which includes e-mail:" The rights are listed at the above URL. Furthermore, Hoffman states, "It is no longer required that there be affixed to the writing any copyright notice at all. And the fact that the email is 'published' to another person, to a group of people, on a listserve, news group or otherwise does not make the email available for reposting, copying, or other use--not without the express and written consent of the writer." >> ************************************************************************** * Hoffman's comments are in part about the reposting of e-mail sent to an individual rather than a group. But he also posits the following questions, which I think are equally relevant, and for which he has no definitive answers: "What if the posting were made available originally to the group or list as a whole? Does this make the poster a public person for the purposes of invasion of privacy? And can the posting be used in order that it be commented upon as in the statutory exceptions called "fair use" for purposes of commentary? And can the posting be "flamed" and claim exemption as parody? And how much of the posting is permissible under this doctrine of "fair use" even if it is not for commentary or parody?" For my part, considering that I don't know who is receiving my comments, either now or in the future through the archive, I have always thought of them as being public, rather than private, in nature, and if someone reposts an opinion of mine that I would rather not go farther, then it's my fault for having posted it in the first place. Chuck Holst *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List Submissions: paddlewise_at_lists.intelenet.net Subscriptions: paddlewise-request_at_lists.intelenet.net Website: http://www.gasp-seakayak.net/paddlewise/ ***************************************************************************
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.4.0 : Thu Aug 21 2025 - 16:32:53 PDT