Dick Seabrook <dick.seabr...@gmail.com> writes: > Perhaps we need a "graffiti law" -- that anything written in a public place > or on > someone else's property becomes the property of the public, or owner > respectively. > Otherwise what right do owners have to clean graffiti off their buildings?
You are confusing ownership of the medium with copyright over the content. Cleaning graffiti off a building is exercising control over the medium in your possession. Selling postcards of your building prominently featuring the graffiti is creating copies of the content: that would be problematic since it is solely the privilege of the copyright holder. Breaking the wall into pieces of graffiti you sell is "first sale": lawfully disposing of the medium containing the "legally" acquired authorized copy (the author chose to put it there, and you did not commit any illegal act for getting it there I assume, like holding a gun to their head) in your possession. -- David Kastrup
