In <199505120716.IAA02035@oberon.gmrc.gecm.com>, Paul Johnson
<paul.johnson@gmrc.gecm.com> wrote:
> > This is I noticed a new book titled "Best of the Net" "by" Seth Grodin
> > (sp?) in the stores. It seemed to consist of two page spreads on
> > various topic interests, with a few paragraphs of original text, but
> > the bulk being material taken directly from FAQs (at least in my case
> > for Comics).
> This strikes me as seriously illegal. They have exerpted material
> without permission and given no real credit. With the CD-ROM there
> was a good argument that archival of that sort was part of the normal
> Usenet distribution. This argument does not apply to a book where the
> "best" bits have been exerpted.
> Was the sci.skeptic FAQ there? If so, what sections?
> What is the publisher's name and address?
> Should we take collective action over this?
Has anyone any suggestions how his might be done. There is a "naughty
advertisers' list" on the inet. Is this a good model to start with to keep
an eye on the situation?
> > It's not as strong a matter as a CD-ROM including the entire text of a
> > FAQ; one could probably make a case under fair use for the amount of
> > text from any single FAQ included.
> Depends. I gather that "fair use" tends to be decided by a bunch of
> precedents rather than any firm rules. They might try to sneak it in
> under the "for review" concept, but if they have quoted substantial
> chunks, and especially if they have added little themselves, then I
> would not have thought that would work.
No body would mind being quoted for review or study. But his involves (I
would think) an assessment text indicative of a critique. Wholesale quotes
does not seem to be the same thing.
It seems to me to be a good time to start some monitoring of what is
happening before it gets out of hand. There is a lot of discussion
periodically over misuse of copyright material in comp.infosystem.www.*
Print and CDROM collections might be the best (easiest?) place to start.
It is certainly worth considering further.
Robert
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