2010-09-29

Copyright

Pondering things that I post on here I think it is time I posted a more formal copyright statement on here, so this is it.

Everything on here, unless otherwise stated, is my copyright, and dated as per the blog posting itself. This means I have rights, and can reserve all sorts of rights to what I say which cover copying and distributing some or all of the postings. I can even reserve the rights covering the download of the blog posts in the first place including this one! The catch is there is a sort of implied right to download a web page and until you see the copyright notice you can't be expected to understand a variation on those implied rights. This is why this is linked in to the title of the blog now.

So, lets get to the point - what rights am I granting and to whom?

In summary:
I want people to read, enjoy, quote, use and like my blog.
However I do not want anything I say to be used against me!

In short I am trying to use copyright law to provide freedom of speech.

1. You have an implied right to access the main page and read what I have said on here up until you see the banner at the top with the link to the copyright. Anything you do after that is subject to the copyright notice here. I consider that implied right enough to read the page only, not to make any further copy or print of the page in any way. All rights are then reserved unless I grant them below, including rights to look at the page in the future having looked at it once and seen a copyright link on the page. You are allowed to read this one post on copyright as much as you like.

2. Anyone I would consider a friend is allowed to download, copy, reference, quote and use what I post on here as much as they like in any way they like. I politely ask that when quoting me you provide a link to the posting and acknowledge who wrote this. If I link to anything external, then check their copyright - I can only grant rights to what I make.

3. You only have the above rights as long as I would consider you a friend, and on condition that if that status ever changes you shall delete all copies and indemnify me against any consequence of your non compliance, or payment of appropriate licence fees.

4. This leaves the definition of those I would consider a friend. By default I would consider anyone reading my blog to be a friend. However, if you are planning, or starting any legal (criminal or civil) action against me, my family or my companies you are not a friend. If you are making any threats of such action, you are not a friend. If you are representing any such person, you are not a friend. If you are identified in and are the adverse subject of any of my blog posts, you are not a friend. If I tell you you are not a friend, you are not a friend. This means that such people have rights to read my blog main page once as an implied right which is then immediately withdrawn and they have no right to save, print, copy or use anything from the site (apart from this one post stating the copyright). That includes using the content in any civil or legal cases.

5. If you not not follow the above rules, and do use a copy, then you must pay a licence fee for your usage. This is not a fine or a penalty, its a licence fee. This is likely to be just slightly more than the amount of damages you have claimed from me or my costs in any action you take. I can make up the fee as I see fit and advise you of it later.

6. (not a copyright issue as such). Anything I say post about any person or company is, unless otherwise stated, only my personal opinion and view at the time.

7. Obviously, if I give you a separate notice saying that you have no rights to access anything on my blog, then doing so, even the first time after you get that notice, is a breach of copyright.

I am not a lawyer, and I require these terms to be read and interpreted such that any doubt on the legal wording is considered in my best interests.

I welcome comments on my posts - you grant me permission to publish your comment when you make the comment. I am more than happy to hear legal discussion and comment on this copyright statement.

11 comments:

  1. OK, it's comment on my own posting. I have no idea if copyright can be uses in this way, but it is hell worth a try!

    ReplyDelete
  2. There are other examples of similar licenses. In particular there are some free software licenses that include patent clauses whereby if you sue the originator of software for software idea patent violation then you lose the right to use the software. Sometimes this is restricted to suing for infringement within the software that the plaintiff downloaded and used, but in others it's any software patent infringement suit against any upstream contributor to the code. None of this has been yet tested in court.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Doesn't really help when one doesn't look at the website and just reads the RSS feed.

    Especially when the article fed out says "Place holder - I'll edit in a minute".

    ReplyDelete
  4. Interesting comment, though one presumably saw the copyright notice when going to the web site to find the rss feed (in future) and in this case I would hope the rss feed sent out the update too.

    ReplyDelete
  5. But what if the URL for the feed was just passed on? Certainly there's no reason why somebody has to go to a website and therefore it can't be assumed that they have. Perhaps you should put the copyright statement at the bottom of every blog post ;-)

    I don't know about other RSS readers, but Thunderbird didn't update the article.

    ReplyDelete
  6. IANAL, but clause 5 strikes me as being unworkable. To license something, presumably you need a contract, and saying you can vary the T&Cs of a contract unilaterally at any time in the future seems to me to be likely to fall foul of the unfair contract laws.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Well, the granting of rights is a contract - you agree my terms in return for me allowing you to do things the copyright prevents you doing without a licence. This is not a variation of the terms - it is part of the terms. It is a contingent clause - if you do this it will have these consequences.

    ReplyDelete
  8. I'll get the child that clicks on my EULA's and opens my shrink-wrap media to read out your posts out to me and provide me with copies should i need them :P

    As to varying the T&C's of a contract unilaterally. I thought firms like mobile companies and Sky did this all the time?

    ReplyDelete
  9. Hi Adrian,

    I hope that you are well.

    I need some help to remove some content from www.nba.me.uk. Is that domain related somehow to you?

    I look forward to hearing from you.

    Kindest regards

    Javier

    ReplyDelete

Comments are moderated purely to filter out obvious spam, but it means they may not show immediately.

Hot tubbing...

I have a hot tub, it came with the house over 3 years ago. Managing a hot tub is complicated, and expensive. The expensive part is the power...