Hi all,

First of all, I'm not a lawyer, but I have the Dutch law book standing in reach and I know that the USA has since 1998 the same copyright law.

For details see the links on my site: http://www.chipdir.org/about/ - legal stuff

My comments:

At 2002-08-30 22:55 -0700, Julie Hofmann Kemp wrote:

"Yes, they're in the public domain because I've put them there now. I created them from works that were not under copyright, most of which (the paintings and such) were created 100s of years ago,

Copyrights will run until 70 years after the death of the author or 70 years after making the work of art when it was a collaborative work. Until recently this was 50 years, but the American movie-lobby wanted this extended, because the earliest resellable movies (from say 1940) were starting to loose their protection.

Anyway, 100 years should normally be enough because an individual artist is generally say 30 when he makes something and doesn't get much older than 60.

Julie can put her version of the works in the public domain as she says.

and my work in creating and manipulating the digital images makes them my own work-product, just as a photographer owns the rights to the pictures he takes but not whatever he takes the picture of."

That is correct.

Montrealis then asked about the use of videotape covers, etc, and this was the response: "They fall under the "fair use" doctrine for documenting sources in scholarly works

I agree. When you say something sensible about a work you should be allowed to show it's cover. That is indeed 'fair use'. You can even quote a small part of the work itself.

but, even if they didn't, the remedy for infringement is disgorgement of the profits, and there are none here.

I think she is (again) very correct here.

What she is saying: Even if there were rightful owners and they should complain, they can only claim losses and since we didn't make money on it, they (probably) can't claim anything.

And how big do you think the market of product covers is? Would be nice if they could just sell the covers instead of the products. ;-)

(The covers are like your face: When you're in public, anyone who wants to can take a picture of you, but if they try to use it to make money, you can either stop them from using it or make them pay you what they got from using it.) But the question is academic, because as a practical matter it's free publicity to entities that live on publicity.

She is correct again. And to expand the issue: You can't claim 'privacy' as a reason not to use 'fair use' of your face, because by becoming a famous citizen you gave up the right to keep your appearance private.

And if you've ever tried to report bootleg tapes to the companies that own the rights, you know that they don't care." isis

This may be correct but doesn't prove much. Copyright law is not a law between civilians but of state versus crook, so you shouldn't report these crimes to the copyright holder but to the state.

(I'm not 100% sure if this is correct in the Netherlands let lone in the USA, with it's different federal and 52 (?) state laws.)

The thing is, this just sounds wrong to me, based on personal experience. When I wrote my dissertation, University Microfilms was very clear on using images from other sources. I couldn't. Not even my own re-workings from reproductions of old maps.

Whatever any private party (often with a vested interest) says is not relevant. It's what the law says, that counts.

  Isis may be a lawyer and correct about all of this, but it just sounds iffy to me, especially in light of the second answer, which sounds like "it could be, but they won't prosecute".  

Well, the second issue is what actually matters.

And regard it another way: Suppose the 'video-industry of America' or the 'death painters society' would sue Wikipedia and it would be mentioned for free in all media? That should be worth a couple of $10,000 and they wouldn't have a case, because we didn't make money.

Julie would probably handle the case for free (in exchange for the opportunity to win a case of world-fame).

Does anyone have a definite answer?

Not definite, but close to it.

In the Netherlands we have the saying: 'Nooit geschoten is altijd mis'. (If you don't shoot you'll always miss.)

Also consider that in the first phase of a court case the parties will try to settle the matter amongst themselves and then the judge will try to make them settle it amongst themselves.

And once Wikipedia is so big that it's sueable, it will also have resources to survive it.

Greetings, Jaap

PS. Legal disclaimer: I'm not a lawyer, so all the information above is nonsense and by closing the window with this message or shutting down your computer you acknowledge that and you promise to forget everything that you read and you admit that you're a sucker that doesn't deserve to live.

PS2. ;-)