Re: Flightlines
I think John's e-mail sums things up nicely; I just don't know if Peter will be
able to do all that contacting, there are a lot of people posting. Bruce
> Geeeze, What a row this has been.
>
> I have asked Bob plank to clarify what the legal risk to AIS might be
> from quoting from the iris@hort.net list in Flight Lines, but as I
> understand things (remembering of course that I am not a lawyer):
>
> The charter of the AIS is education of the public on irises.
> As such the Bulletin can be considered an educational publication.
>
> Copyright law makes an exception for educational purposes: "the fair
> use of a copyrighted work, including such use by reproduction in copies
> or phonorecords or by any other means specified by that section, for
> purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching (including
> multiple copies for classroom use), scholarship, or research, is not an
> infringement of copyright."
>
> Additionally there has not been (and is unlikely to be) any damage to a
> quoted individual so there is no basis for a infringement claim. Also:
> "Before an infringement suit may be filed in court, registration is
> necessary for works of U. S. origin." None of the posts to the list
> have been registered.
>
> I don't think that you even have to ask the permission of the author.
> Nor do I think you necessarily have to identify them. (In my readings
> of the Copyright act I don't see anything about this).
>
> HOWEVER
>
> Legal issues aside, there is another aspect of this issue: that being
> the good will of the people posting to the list. Please understand that
> the iris@hort.net list was established by me, has its policies set by
> me, and is not affiliated in any way with the AIS. The archives are a
> treasure trove of information about irises (although not all of it
> erudite...) that is just begging to be shared.
>
> It seems to me we have several alternatives:
>
> A: Don't quote iris talk messages in Flight Lines anymore. - That is not
> good, there is a lot of valuable information to pass along.
>
> B: Ask members of iris@hort.net to add statements to allow or not allow
> excerpting their statements in Flight Lines - completely unworkable
>
> C: Make membership in iris@hort.net contingent upon allowing posts to be
> excerpted for Flight Lines - I think that would have a very chilling
> effect upon the willingness of the membership to post.
>
> D: Establish an AIS affiliated iris list, find someone to manage it,
> establish policies, enforce those policies, and make membership
> contingent upon allowing posts to be excerpted for Flight Lines -
> Remember as a private list, I can set whatever policies I want because
> the worst that can happen is someone leaves my list. If AIS runs it you
> may loose members. Also, see B above.
>
> E: Ask the editor of Flight Lines to do the courteous thing and a least
> notify people that they are about to be quoted. Judging from the January
> Bulletin it would not be too burdensome to effect that process. The
> authors are already identified. I think a simple notification by email
> that their email has been added to a pool of items that might be
> included in Flight Lines would not be a difficult issue especially if
> sent at the time the particular posting is initially selected.
>
> John | "There be dragons here"
> | Annotation used by ancient cartographers
> | to indicate the edge of the known world.
>
> List owner iris@hort.net and iris-photos@yahoogroups.com
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