Re: [overby@fig.cray.com (Glen Overby): Atlantis Internet CD-ROM]

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Tom_Lane@G.GP.CS.CMU.EDU
Mon, 14 Feb 94 17:12:30 EST

There's another important point, which has been covered in prior go-rounds
on this topic on the faq-maintainers list. Atlantis Internet was polite
enough to ask permission. Should we deny it to them? We all know
perfectly well that many other people are reusing or republishing our FAQs
without bothering to ask for permission. We also know (and so do they)
that we have no real recourse against such behavior; suing is expensive
and pointless if you have no monetary damage you can point to. In this
situation, denying permission to those who ask for it merely amounts to
penalizing the good guys and supporting the bad guys.

I already gave permission to Atlantis to use my FAQ. I routinely give it
to anyone who asks. I tell them to use the latest version they feasibly
can, and to leave in the credits and the pointer to where to get the
current version (ie, rtfm archive). I think that's about all I can hope
for.

I agree with Piero: make it clear to contributors that they are giving up
control of where their words appear, in case they were foolish enough to
think that's not true of *everything* posted on Usenet.

In short: get real, folks. A copyright notice on a Usenet posting is
nothing more than a waste of bandwidth. You can't (or at least, won't)
enforce it --- if it is even legally enforceable, which AFAIK is unproven
--- and the bad guys know this perfectly well.

regards, tom lane

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