Re: CDF ?

[John Hasler <john@dhh.gt.org>]

Joseph Carter writes:
> In the case of NASA, being US government, I think that license may be a
> poorly worded "this work is Public Domain"...

Not exactly.  The US copyright law says that the US Government may not use
the copyright law to enforce a copyright owned by it.  This means that you
can infringe a US Goverment copyright with impunity.  Unfortunately, it
also means that most works of the US Government are published with no
copyright license at all since the authors erroneously believe that they
are in the public domain.

I see two problems with this.  I see no reason why Congress could not
change the law retroactively and let the administration start demanding
royalties for stuff that has long been believed to be free, and I also see
no reason why the Government could not take legal action to enforce its
copyrights in the courts of other nations.

> If I'm wrong, there is not permission to distribute, though you should
> thwack some people because they clearly MEANT to provide that permission
> but we aren't allowed to assume it.

In the past I believe that we have accepted works of the US Government as
free.
-- 
John Hasler                This posting is in the public domain.
john@dhh.gt.org            Do with it what you will.
Dancing Horse Hill         Make money from it if you can; I don't mind.
Elmwood, Wisconsin         Do not send email advertisements to this address.