The information below is taken from Boardwatch Magazine, Vol. IX, Issue 5, May 1995.
"Copyright protects expression. The Copyright Act of 1976 states that the
items of expression can include
literary, graphic, dramatic, and musical works; pantomimes and
choreography; pictorial, and sculptural works;
audio-visual works; sound recordings; and architectural works. An
original expression is eligible for copyright protection as soon as it
is fixed in a tangible form.
Consequently, almost any original expression that is fixed in a tangible
form is protected AS SOON AS IT IS EXPRESSED. For example, a graphic
created in Corel is protected as soon as the file is saved to disk. My
Web page was protected as soon as I stopped typing and saved the .html
file. As you can see, most of the
items that you are likely to encounter on the net are eligible for
copyright protection, including the text of
web pages, ASCII text documents, contents of email and Usenet messages,
sound files, graphics files, executable computer programs and computer
program listings.
Once I have put the following statement on my page I LEGALLY am
protected under the copyright act.
In the first use of the criminal copyright statute against a web page
owner, Richard Kenadek, sysop of "Davey
Jones Locker", was sentenced to 24 months probation and six months home
confinement. He was also required to forfeit all computer equipment
related to the operation of the web page. The case against Mr. Kenadek
was instigated by SPA, who monitored the web page for four months
collecting evidence of distribution of copyrighted programs and graphics
without permission of the publishers."
This page was migrated from the
original Web Guard site with minimal changes.
For more information on
this move and these changes, click here.
Over the next months
these pages will be reviewed and adapted.
If you would like to make comments or
suggestions, please email me, James S. Huggins.
You can also email the original
creator and Mother of Web Guard, Shena Delian O'Brien.
Shena remains the moderator of the
Web Guard mailing list
(ONElist, then eGroups, now YahooGroups).
This Site is Being Rebuilt
After much delay, this section of my site is being completely restructured.
