I just received the following message from the ISP where I had uploaded my "Cyberdog" web page.

Dear Mr Haines

It has been brought to my attention that material on your web site, hosted by madasafish, contains material which is in breach of copyright. Would you please remove this material immediately and desist from any future such practice. If the offending material is not removed, your site will be disabled and your madasafish account may be terminated.

Regards Kevin Melia

Also in my in box was an email which amongst other things contained the following:

There are attorneys in my family, Gavin. One of them is rich and he likes me quite well. If a truck runs over me tonight, they'll most likely still get you if you ever touch my book again--ever, in your lifetime.

The "book" in question was a help file for Cyberdog, which I had converted to HTML and included on my site.

As you are doubtless aware, Cyberdog is an obsolete program for the Macintosh which Apple now regard as Public Domain. Unknown to me, there are a group of people who were, (or are), developing for it, and who insist that it and associated materials are still copyright.

I now understand why Apple have removed their Cyberdog site from the net. I have had to follow suit.

What is Copyright?

Glad you asked. It is the right of an artist to veto the decision of another artist. For example, if one artist paints a picture of a vase of flowers and a second artist paints a picture of a living room with this painting of a vase of flowers hanging on the wall, then the first artist can demand that the second artist paints out the painting of the painting, which is in the second picture.

With the advent of electronic means of reproduction penalties for infringement have been made more severe. Although deleting the web site would destroy your project, it easier just to do this than to argue. If the manufacturer has discontinued the software and declared it public domain then there is probably nothing that third parties can legally do. But, if you argue, the people who are claiming copyright will continue to send offensive emails, which you will be forced to read and respond to.

There is a defence to "breach of copyright", (also known as "infringement"), known as "fair dealing". An important case concerned "Sony Corporation versus Universal Studios", (No 81-1687,52, USLW 4090). It was decided that the sale of video recorders to the public does not constitute infringement as, in the opinion of the judges, even unauthorised recording of programs for later viewing is a legitimate fair use. Libraries and educational institutions are similarly allowed to make a single archive copy. (This defence could be used in the case of "Commodore PET library" disks, but Xeroxing C64 manuals and OCRing constitutes infringement).

The Cyberdog site, which I had created, had only recorded 200 hits in the year that it had been up. Deleting it was no big deal. I have also deleted the "CyberdogHouse" mailing list and the "iMacChat" mailing list as these lists contained archives which contained many references to Cyberdog.

If you think of a web site project I would suggest you avoid anything subject to Copyright.

You need only put the words "converted to HTML by Who Ever" at the top for your file to constitute a "second work" and therefore an infringement. Note this absolutely crucial point: if you alter a file in anyway then it becomes a second work.

In the case of Commodore, note that another firm has bought the copyright. Now you might think that it does not matter a hang if you create a web page with a C64 logo on it. I thought this.

For example, if there is a link on your web page to the owner of Commodore's site to load the Commodore logo then that's okay. But, if you download their image and upload it to your site then that's infringement.

The reason for this is that once an image, (or any piece of copyright material), is on a server that you do not control, then you cannot withdraw it should there be a complaint about it. For example, if Paramount, (now also known as Viacom), upload a picture of Leonard Nimoy that makes him look like an alien and he complains that it is libellous they can withdraw it. But, if you make a copy of this picture and upload it to your site, then they cannot do so. So that's why there is such a fuss about Copyright.

The author of a work has had to have been dead for sixty years before the work is no longer copyright. So, (unless you are going back to Charles Babbage and Blaise Pascal), copyright can be claimed on all computer stuff.