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Сборник часто задаваемых вопросов (ЧАВО) конференции FIDONET.HISTORY; версия 23 от 11 марта 2005 г.

Кто и почему убрал копирайт Дженнингса из nodelist'а?

Группа : 6. Разное

A:

Mon 31 Mar 97  9:27
By: Ward Dossche
To: David Moufarrege
Re: Re: Copyright Notice
======================================================================
Hello David,

> What is the background of your dropping the Copyright Notice of the
> Z2-Nodelist?

Some time ago a person wanted to write non-commercially something
somewhere about Fido and kinda liked the art-work on the dog with the
diskette. (name of the person escapes me, but I seem to recall a
similar incident connected to the last Eurocon) So, truthfully
believing Tom Jennings holds a trademark on this (as was mentioned in
the nodelist and still is in Fidonews) he asks permission to use it,
which Tom flatly refused.

As I found this rather a strange reaction, out of curiosity I asked
some of our corporate lawyers to look into the copyright- and
trademark-issue of "Fido", "Fidonet" and the artwork of the dog-with-
diskette. (FYI, I'm Deputy-Director at the Belgian telco, employing
some 27,000 staff and we have acorporate-law-division who does nothing
else than copyright and trademark stuff)

As I so suspected for a long time, I received confirmation after
researching relevant trademark-bureaus that no references to the above
nor any trademark held by a Jennings Tom or Tom Jennings relating to
Fidonet or something similarly sounding exists.

Mark my words ... this covers the whole of Europe (east and west)
including Israel and Turkey. It says nothing about the USA.

We discovered however expired Fidonet-trademarks in the name of other
individuals residing in Europe.

A quick search was done for Japan (where ZC/6 resides) without any TJ-
trademark. Same thing in Argentina (homebase of ZC/4) where TJ holds
no rights but where, very puculiarly, another trademark called "Latin
Fido" is held by a local sysop (this is also reflected in the Z4-
nodelist).

So let me summarise :

There is _NO_ existing trademark in Europe in the name of Tom Jennings
nor Jennings Tom for "Fido", "Fidonet" nor the "dog-with-diskette"-
artwork.

Then why write it in the nodelist? I don't see one single reason.

Now let's not confuse "trademark" with "copyright".

If TJ wants to have a trademark on all those items then as far as I'm
concerned he can have it ... which means he must have his brand-names
registered in each and every country - for zone-2 this means 35-
countries to be precise - and agree to pay the periodical hefty sum on
that.  (worldwide 190+ ?)

This he has never done, nor will he do it, nor will anyone else
because it is just too expensive. "Control" over the nodelist can
never warrant such a high price nor can anyone ever expect a return on
that investment.

If anyone ever has any bright idea here to register the trademarks to
either "control" or "financially exploit" then I hereby post a claim
to be first in line to laugh that person straight in his/her face.

Less than a year ago there was the case of a company registering a
trademark on the wording "world wide web" and "www", which mind you
are nowhere legally protected. After initial astonishment by the
internet-community the "owners" were quickly reduced to the laughing
stock even while they followed correct legal procedures. They tried to
exercise a claim and finally gave up because it was reasonably un-
enforceable.

With Fidonet it is exactly the same thing.

Now one final word about "copyright". TJ does not participate in any
way in the production of any of the nodelists nor any of the segments
that comprise the nodelist. Hence there is not one square inch of
legal ground for him to claim copyright over it.

The NC's could have a copyright over net-segments, the RC's over
region-segments and the ZC's over zone-segments. Since the ZC's also
produce nodelists they could imo also post a copyright-notice for
their version of the nodelist although I think all these notices carry
little weight and are of little to no importance.

Anyone in zone-2 having problems with the nodelist without a TJ-
copyright/ trademark notification can always freq at this node the
elements it takes to produce their own nodelist.

Every current zone-2 region-segment can be freqqed here with the
magic-name REGIONxx where xx = regionnumber.

On top of that every zone-segment can be freqqed here following the
same logic : ZONEy where y = zonenumber.

It enables everyone who wants that to build his/her own customized
nodelist.

If a person e.g. only wants R24, R50 and Z3, then he/she freqs
REGION24, REGION50, ZONE3 and gives that to his/her nodelist-compiler.
How's that for openness, availability, service, whatever you wanna
call it?

If they want to include the original notice they can equally freq "TJ"
here so that bit of information is accessible as well although it
makes no difference.

As a sidenote, I already received threats for a court-case by one
Randy Bush, the same person when slamming the Fido-door shut behind
him stated it was nothing else but a litter-box reeking of cat-piss.

I understand some valid concerns about intentions and motives, but I
do have a more than full-time and well payed job so I don't need to
try to squeeze some extra pennies (at what cost?) out of some peoples
pockets. I believe it would be very difficult, if not impossible, for
any individual to grab control of the nodelist and make a buck out of
it.

If that happens then it is because the sysops allow it to happen,
personally I would just totally ignore such a person.

There's a lesson to be learned from our German friends who would never
take any shit like that. This they proved after some "grab control"-
exercises there.

I'm more worried about the censoring of Fidonews-worldwide by a ZC
which recently occured and nobody reacted upon it. Weren't you aware?

Thanks for writing. If there's more you want to ask, please do.

Take care,

  \x/ard Dossche
       ZC/2