On Thu, 6 Dec 2001, Peter Suber <peters_at_EARLHAM.EDU> wrote:
>
> .... The preprint is not covered by the transfer of copyright of the
> refereed final draft. ...
As I mentioned before in this discussion group, this statement is not
wholly correct. It all depends on how the agreement, contract, or any
legal document is written. It could cover preprint; it could exclude
preprint. Moreover, there is no legal basis for your general
statement.
> .... Then authors will
> be at liberty to put their refereed postprints in public archives, free for
> all.
Don't be too sure. The copyright will last for 70 years after the death
of author and the estate of the author may impose the control over the
access to the author's articles. The estate of Martin Luther King, Jr.
is a living proof.
> In short, I want a legal basis to oppose plagiarists, who would put
> their name on my work, and for-profit aggregators, who would bundle it in a
> package for sale. For more details, see the statement to which I link just
> below my copyright declaration (http://www.earlham.edu/~peters/copyrite.htm).
How are you going to enforce it? Your newsletter mentioned LOCKSS which
stands for "Lots of Copies Keeps Stuff Safe". A bad guy can copy your
newsletter (or any of your works), make some changes here and there,
replace your name with his pseudonym, and quietly post the newly altered
copy to some newsgroups and web servers. By the time you find out the
violation of your copyright, many copies of the unauthorized derivative
work are already saved at many places in the Internet.
Joseph Pietro Riolo
<riolo_at_voicenet.com>
Public domain notice: I put all of my expressions in this
post in the public domain.
Received on Sat Dec 08 2001 - 01:49:29 GMT