Subject: Re: One the Mark Kantrowitz copyright From: Erik Naggum <cl@naggum.no> Date: 1998/05/10 Newsgroups: comp.lang.lisp Message-ID: <3103790822367859@naggum.no> * Marco Antoniotti | OTOH, it seems that "adding" the DEFSYSTEM code to a "product" without | asking for a fee specifically for this reason, would not really infringe | the copyright. I have hesitated to bring up a legal point because I'm not at all certain about its application in this case, but during a course in U.S. contract law given by the U.S. Embassy in Oslo a few years back, a fairly strong warning was issued to us that contracts that in any way would require one party to lose money by performing the requirements of the contract would be unenforceable at law, and could land us in real trouble defending the _rest_ of the contract in a hostile court. several obvious examples were given that were tantamount to fraud. if I understood this principle right, the "permission" to reproduce could be construed to require that whoever is stupid enough to obey the letter of the contract would run the high risk of having to pay for the whole shebang at other people's unlimited request were the license enforceable, but Mark Kantrowitz is in no legal position to require such a loss from his grantees. my understanding from said course was that a friendly court could rule "without fee or compensation" to mean "above and beyond recovery of costs pertaining to execution of license" to avoid declaring the restrictions invalid and essentially grant an _unlimited_ license to use, copy, and access the material provided by Mark, which is an option. my experience with this part of contract law is non-existing as I've done my best to stay away from problematic areas, so I may have misapplied this principle or not understood its ramifications. if anyone _knows_ what I'm hinting at, I'd appreciate corrections and comments. in any case, were I to want to reproduce his works in part of a (physical) package that I would charge some fee for producing, but _not_ require secondary payment from those who would reproduce further copies (which would clearly fall under the restrictions Mark wants exercised), I would talk to a lawyer about it. #:Erik -- Support organized crime: use Microsoft products!