Don Armstrong <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > On Mon, 21 Jul 2003, Thomas Bushnell, BSG wrote: > > That's a nonofficial source. But a brief web search will show you > > that the same thing is repeated a gillion times. > > Everything I've read so far has claimed that (c) has no force of law, > whereas c-in-a-circle does. However, I'm unaware of a court decision > saying so one way or another. Non-legislative interpretations are > nice, but it doesn't have weight like judicial precedent.
Of course, but the point is that the law is already very clear. I think the onus is one someone else to prove the contrary, given the clear text of the law and the history of anal-retentive interpretations of this particular sort of thing. And anyhow, it's easy enough to just put "Copright" there. > Futhermore, in the US, the only thing such an omission would do is > effectively remove the copyright statement, not invalidate the > copyright itself. Right, but if there is no copyright statement, then there has been no notice of copyright. > I would not be surprised if you could make the claim that in systems > where there is no equivalent of a c-in-a-circle, (c) fulfills the same > role. I'd be genuinely surprised if most US courts didn't buy that > argument as well. [I can't speak for other court systems, however.] In general, such claims don't work, because of the whole point of the statement: to have a single, unambiguous, bright-line test for what is a valid copyright notice, so that no interpretation, guesswork, or the like is necessary. > But as far as no notice goes, it still doesn't invalidate the > copyright; it just means that a defendant in such a case can claim > that they weren't aware of the copyright and avoid whatever the > appropriate escalation of damages is. Right. > Now that we've gone through that, when you're copyrighting something, > the smart money is on doing _both_. Use Copyright (c) 1997 Foo Bar > Baz. Blah Blah Blah. Unless I've totally missunderstood the situtation > at worst, (c) will be interpreted as a no-op, and the copyright > statement will still control. At best, (c) will be equivalent to > c-in-a-circle, and you're still at the same situation. There is no harm for putting (c) down. Just always say "Copyright". > Although I still wonder whether ascii art c-in-a-circle symbols are ok. > ___ > / \ > | C | 1997 Foo Bar Baz. No Rights Reserved. > \___/ Now, *that* might meet the terms of the statute. Except that "No Rights Reserved" would, in Pan-American-Copyright-Treaty cases, void your copyright. Thomas
