[alicebot-archcomm] copyright on mailing list messages

[ccallen]

Because of the legal nature of this matter, I feel that any final decisions
on this matter be made by the principal of the corporation (i.e. autorized
officer or the board). I am not a legal professional and none of this is
meant as legal advise. For actual advise on legal matters you should talk
with a licensed legal professional.

Unless there are legal professionals among us, option 1 might be safest: By
default, everything is public domain, it is the poster responsibilty to
apply thier own copywrite notice and exercise their own judgement before
posting confidential material to an internet news group.

Option 2 could be interpreted as AIF is go to prosecute copyright violators,
thus giving a false sense of security and lead to someone making a decision
to post thier sensitive, propriatary information to the news group which
could lead to financial damages


Also:
Creating contracts that will hold up in court are tricky. And if an actual
legal dispute broke out between the people on the list, it is possible that
option 2 could get the orginization (and those responsible for the creation
and interpretation of the contract(s)) drug into it middle of it. And
because this is a corporation, someone who is licensed to practice law must
be hired to represent the corporation (very expensive and a complete waste
of money). Also, some of the activities revolving around the creation of
legally binding contracts could be construed as practicing law.

Consider:
If A decided to sue B based upon A's interpretation of AIF's contracts, and
A lost the case because AIF's contracts were flawed, could A obtain a legal
judgement against the person / persons responsible for drafting the flawed
contracts?

Dont laugh, this kind of thing happens. There are a lot of people who have
sunk a lot of time (and possibly money) into their AIML efforts, emotions
are involved, people are afraid of getting hurt. Legal battles are typically
very ugly, I for one would not want to put myself in the middle this kind of
thing.

Just being a member of a committee does no make one an employees, officer,
or director and will not be indemnified by AIF in the case of a legal
troubles (AIF does not have a large legal defense fund to begin with).
Dabbling in the legal world is very expensive and it's all comes out of
someones pocket. I say let AIF make the actual decision.

Conan

----- Original Message -----
From: "Anne Kootstra" <anne@aiml.info>
To: <alicebot-archcomm@list.alicebot.org>
Sent: Saturday, February 22, 2003 10:15 AM
Subject: RE: [alicebot-archcomm] copyright on mailing list messages


> These are indeed good basic rules and I think most people on this
particular
> mailing list are aware of them. However, this doesn't cover the current
> archived AIML examples that were posted on the mailing list(s).
>
> Some of these examples have been used in AIML knowledgebases that were
> developed for commercial purposes. The implications of applying the GPL to
> the archive(s) is therefore very large for these firms. In extreme cases
> this means that the commercial value of an KB could be severely affected.
>
> Now, this may be solved by good setting up elaborate contracts. However,
and
> this is something I'm more worried about, it may actually prevent people
> from sharing *any* code with others. This may be an overkill reaction, but
> an understandable from a programmer point of view. One who is not sure of
> the legal status of his or her post will most likely be more careful with
> sharing (parts of) an innovative idea.
>
> The academic licence you mentioned is certainly an option. One that may be
> of use to a lot of people, but again what may be the real world effect of
> this? Applying it to complete AIML files would certainly create a more
fair
> environment for the original author. However, I have some doubts regarding
> the usefulness of this licence for the current mail archive.
>
> Many code examples have found their way to files that may, or may not, be
> used in commercial AIML files (assuming they exist). In the case the/an
> academic licence is applied to the archive (and future posts) it will mean
> people will have to go over their code to see whether or not there's any
> code there that came from the mailing list. Again a situation that is not
> desirable and should be avoided, whenever possible.
>
> Maybe it would be a good idea to have a preliminary vote on this. From my
> view there are roughly two systems we can apply here.
>
> 1.
> Action:
> We consider the archive and future posts to be public domain.
>
> Effect:
> - No licences need to be adapted.
> - Education of the community of the consequences of this decision.
>
> 2.
> Action:
> We apply a commercial restrictive licence. (GPL, Academic, etc)
>
> Effect:
> - commercial licences need to be altered.
> - existing contracts may need altering.
> - number of code examples may be reduced.
> - education of the community
>
> In the case that option 2 is preferred we could discuss the several
> licences. Otherwise this would not be needed.
>
> --Anne
>
>
> > -----Oorspronkelijk bericht-----
> > Van: alicebot-archcomm-admin@list.alicebot.org
> > [mailto:alicebot-archcomm-admin@list.alicebot.org] Namens ccallen
> > Verzonden: vrijdag 21 februari 2003 19:51
> > Aan: alicebot-archcomm@list.alicebot.org
> > Onderwerp: Re: [alicebot-archcomm] copyright on mailing list messages
> >
> >
> > A general rule of thumb is if you have ideas for building
> > your own commercial system, dont blast them out onto an
> > internet mailing list. Dont use GPL'ed code, or other
> > people's protected code. Translate your ideas into a design
> > and write your code from scrtatch. And once you start to
> > generate interesting code, dont post it to a news group.
> >
> > A second rule is that the world is a competitive place full
> > of highly skilled people looking for fresh ideas. If you have
> > a cool idea, chances are someone else has had that same idea
> > and may actually be working on it. If you do have an orginal
> > idea, once you've blasted it to a news group you can pretty
> > much kiss it good bye.
> >
> > Has anyone ever considered a different kind of licensing? The
> > GPL seems to be geared more toward the commercial world. An
> > Achedemic type license might be a better fit for AimlBot. One
> > where it says you are free to use the code for non-commercial
> > use only and if you intend to use the code in a commercial
> > system you must negotiate a license (usually with some royalties
> > involved) with the holders to the rights to the code. This
> > leads to the question, who holds the rights to the code? Is
> > it AIF, Richard Wallace, the individuals who wrote the code?
> >
> > Conan
>
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