[sdiy] OTA book on eBay

[Tim Daugard]

To All;

After rereading what I wrote: I AM NOT AN ATTORNEY, I MAKE NO
ASSERTIONS TO THE LEGALITY OF ANYTHING INCLUDED HERE. I am only
expressining my opinion of my current understanding based on what
I know of the laws. Consult a qualified proffessional.

I have held my toungue too long. First, talking about Mark Twain.
Wasn't it Twain who said (I paraphrase, I haven't got hte quote")
"A person who only can spell a word one way doesn't have much of
an imagination." It's good that you can get Twains stuff now. But
Twain, Homer et.al. would probabily be aways available. Look at
Hemingway. His writings continue to be available through his
estate. As long as they can add a new story, fragment of story,
or a letter to the volume, they can keep the copyright going for
(effectively) forever.

Stephen King may turn out to be the same way. I suspect his stuff
will be available forever. One thing he wrote is only available
from his local newspaper. The paper will sell you a copy of the
article. Again an ownership of rights issue.

The New York Times also makes money by selling copies of
articles.

> > Is that a legitimate reason for generating copies? Possibly
not, but I
> > can damn well understand people who distribute or buy copies
of stuff
> > not being sold anymore.

Now the second issue is copying items not available. Copyright
law allows you to make reasonable copies for personel use. Even
the TV and Movie companies lost that one. It's okay to tape a
song off the radio - the radio statio pays the royalties, so the
author is paid. It's not okay to sell copies. Libraries have copy
machines for the convience of the customers. The larger libraries
even have microfiche copiers for articles and such. I had
problems with one. The librarian carefully showed me where to put
the money to make my copy. A librarian WILL NOT take your coin,
but it in a machine, press the copy button, and then hand you the
copy. That is selling a copy and not legal. It surprised me at
the time (it was either for me or for my mother - doesn't matter
I was there.) Thecnically I can't make copies for my mother - not
my personal use.

So you can generate all the copies you want. When you are done
with them, you should destroy them. I have no idea of what the
legalities are if you die and leave copies behind you.

If the book has been published and copyrighted in the USA, there
has to be copies somewhere, even if only in the library of
congress. If you can find a copy - used, library, or borrowed,
you can copy parts for your use.

> Also consider all the schematics of dead products posted on the
web - all
> useful stuff to have and otherwise unavailable.

Now schematics is a different matter. Schematics are two things.
A piece of art and a represenation of a circuit. There is no
copyright available on the circuit, the copyright is on the
drawing. Take your favorite circuit, redraw it, do what you want.
Once you have made a new drawing, the drawing is yours. You can
do what you want with the drawing . . . publish it, sell it, put
it on the internet, whatever. Scaning the orginal drawing is a no
no. That is why I have lots of redrawn circuits in my file.

In fact a drawing, in the Philbrick website from the EBay auction
looks a lot like a drawing from one of my modules. THere is
rarely anything new in the world, and copyright is not going to
protect the circuit.

Could Dave Smith come beat
> up on people who post Prophet VS schematics? Probably. Would he
do such a

If they are scans of drawings he owns the rights to, he should.
Will he? I don't know, as in everything the problem is cost.

> Mark Glinsky does a fantastic service for the community by
providing
> copies, at cost, of his vast library of manuals. No one is
saying he
> should stop doing that, eh?

I am. I officially take the position that what he is doing is
unlawful, a violation of any copyright notices, moral, and
unprofitable.

-===-
. . . hang in there the point is here!
-===-

This discussion is on a written work - the OTA manual. I haven't
seen the work. Is there any information that is not available
through manufacturers data sheets, ElectroNotes, online, or other
sources? Is the book long and comprehensive? Any one on this list
can write, post, create web sites, of publish anything he can
afford. (Don't try to get a publisher to do it, probabily won't
happen.) As long as you don't copy the book, you are fine.
Technical information is technical information.

If the book is less than 32 pages, send me a used copy. I can but
something together if someone wants to provide the web space. I
think the latest should be HTML books anyway, even though I don't
want to give away anything I've written.

Tim Daugard
AG4GZ 30.4078N 86.6227W Alt: 12 feet above MSL
http://home.sprintmail.com/~daugard/synth.htm

As an ARTIST most of my life, I do realize that most art has no
value. When I sat at art shows, 100 people would walk by before
one would stop. If I didn't SELL, 100 people would look before
one would buy. And I was more successful than most of the other
artists there. I learened to sell. I learned to destroy bad work.
And I learened sometimes, you might just as well give up and
trade a work for someone elses work, give it to a kid, or sell it
to some one for the price of lunch on a whim. At leat you don't
have to carry it home.

and a final note to a way to long post. I got into music,
because, once the performance is over, no mater how bad, it's
gone. You don't have to pick the performance home and live with
it. Life's too short, and we are too few for bickering. Lets
solve the problems.

Good job on spoting and enforcing copyright violations. Artists
(of all types - good engineering is an art) need all the help we
can get.