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In lugnet.publish, Tobias Möller writes:
> Do you need permission to put those things online?
Yes. Not doing so is stealing.
> I thoguht that writing "Copyright ####### 19nn" was enough, but I'm not
> an expert.
Nope. All that does is identify who the copyright owner is. These days, such a
notice is not required to assert copyright ownership.
> AFAIK, all the scans of lego sets/catalogues have been published without
> asking TLC first, right?
Well, I think people may have tried to ask. They are being put on line under
the assumption that TLC's "fair use" document that they publish on-line seems
to allow posting at least older sets and all consumer catalogs. Brickshelf
seems to be ok in that TLC clearly knows of its existance and has not asked
Kevin to remove any material.
There is no apparent permission for the Family Circus comic, so putting it
online can only be assumed to be violating King Features Syndicate copyright
ownership. This does not amount to a "limited excerpt" which might be allowed
under Copyright law. It is also not a parody (now had the text been modified to
say "LEGO" instead if something else, AND the comic was clearly presented as a
parody, it might have been legitimate under that guise).
Note that IANAL but I've looked at Copyright law enough to understand that it
lays out pretty limited circumstances under which you can use someone else's
copyrighted material, and it is quite clear to me that KFS could not possibly
want people to post its comics on the web without their permission (remember,
the newspaper this was copied from paid good money for the right to print that
comic, what gives you the right to publish it for anyone on the web to see
without KFS derriving any income from such publishing?).
So, to be blunt, this looks like a clear cut case of theft to me.
Please also note that Kevin's publishing of LEGO set instructions and catalogs
on Brickshelf is not being done under any sort of formal license, and TLC may
change their policy at any time, and ask Kevin to remove everything. I doubt
they will do that (even if they created their own on-line instruction library,
I think they understand the ill will which would be generated by such a move).
In fact, Kevin is not even really protected from potentially huge penalties. If
TLC decided to publish a CD of their instructions, they could attempt to
collect damagages from Kevin based on the number of people who used Brickshelf
to view instructions (and thus would presumably not buy the CD). Now TLC would
have a hard time winning much in court if Kevin immediately took the
instructions down when asked by TLC since he can pretty clearly show that TLC
has known about his site for years, and has made no complaint (but you don't
lose a copyright just because you don't protect it, it's just going to be hard
proving damages from someone who you knew was violating your copyright that you
chose not to pursue). The fragility of Kevin's position though is just why we
need to be very carefull to not violate TLC's copyrights and other IP.
FUT: lugnet.off-topic.debate
Frank
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Message is in Reply To:
 | | Re: Look what I found in the comics section!
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| Do you need permission to put those things online? I thoguht that writing "Copyright ####### 19nn" was enough, but I'm not an expert. AFAIK, all the scans of lego sets/catalogues have been published without asking TLC first, right? Funny comic, BTW! (...) (24 years ago, 2-Oct-00, to lugnet.publish)
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