77 lines
3.4 KiB
Plaintext
77 lines
3.4 KiB
Plaintext
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The copyright situation regarding zmac is not totally clear.
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This is what Russell Marks had to say when I asked him:
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"
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> [...] I would
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> like to make double sure that zmac is indeed public domain and so
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> freely distributable and modifyable. Can you confirm this? Have the
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> various authors of zmac over the years agreed to give away their
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> copyright?
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This is a difficult area, partly because I'm not a lawyer. :-) None of
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them seemed to explicitly give away their copyright, but equally, none
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of them asserted it either. If you really want to be sure that it's
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all entirely public domain, the sort of thing that would definitely
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stand up in court, you'll have to try and contact all three previous
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contributors (my changes are definitely PD, you wouldn't have to worry
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about that). I have vague memories of seeing both Colin Kelley and
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John Providenza's names mentioned in more recent things than zmac, but
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I don't know any contact addresses for them (nor for Bruce Norskog).
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OTOH, if you're just after some general reassurance that it's ok to
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distribute a hacked version, I'd say it's fine - if nothing else,
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Colin Kelley posted it to comp.sources.unix in 1987, so he must have
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thought it freely distributable and modifiable (the latter because he
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made changes himself). I think an earlier version had featured in
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simtel's "UNIX-C" directory too.
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Also, this point from the copyright FAQ may be relevant:
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> 2.2) What is "public domain?"
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>
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> In contrast to copyright is "public domain." A work in the public domain
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> is one that can be freely used by anyone for any purpose.
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>
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> It used to be that if a work was published without notice, it lost all
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> copyright, and entered the public domain. That's no longer true, and now
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> public domain is more the exception than the rule.
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>
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> There are still a number of ways that a work may be public domain.
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[...]
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> - The copyright might have been forfeited. For example, the work
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> may have been published without notice prior to the change in
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> the law that eliminated the notice requirement (March 1, 1988,
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> the effective date of the Berne Convention Implementation Act,
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> PL 100-568, 102 Stat. 2853).
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zmac was published without a copyright notice in 1987 (and, one
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assumes, long before then as well). This is the main reason I describe
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zmac as public domain - the 1987 posting was published source with no
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copyright notice and no license being distributed for free by one of
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the authors. That smells of PD to me, even without the above. :-) I
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just don't see what else it could really be. But getting real,
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legally-sound confirmation of this would be a challenge.
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I know this isn't the "yep, no problem, and here are all the authors'
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current addresses so you can check for yourself" you may have been
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looking for, but there it is.
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FWIW, I distribute zmac with ZCN (my GPL'd CP/M-like OS for the
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Amstrad NC100). In case that contributes anything to this. :-)
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"
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[Needless to say, I too forfeit any copyright claim on my changes!]
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I am therefore assuming that zmac is public domain (note, however,
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that the Act above is probably an American one and different
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conditions may apply in e.g. the European Union). I am not a
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lawyer, though, and I would strongly suggest you don't abuse this.
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In particular, I wouldn't use zmac or portions thereof in any
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commercial product.
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If any of the authors of zmac requests so, I will immediately
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withdraw this release.
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Mark RISON, <mrison@hotmail.com>, 1999-07-19
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