Re: Implied vs. explicit copyright
bts@alum.mit.edu (Brian T. Sniffen) writes:
> tb@becket.net (Thomas Bushnell, BSG) writes:
>
> > Drew Scott Daniels <umdanie8@cc.UManitoba.CA> writes:
> >
> >> Is the an implied copyright notification (I.e. "code added by person")
> >> sufficient in the debian/copyright or is it necessary to say
> >> explicitly say "year copyright person"?
> >
> > There is no such thing as "implied copyright".
>
> But he didn't say there was. He said there was an (implied (copyright
> notification)), which there is.
>
> In the USA, setting down a form of art is sufficient to grant
> copyright. So writing "Extra Foo added by Brian Sniffen" is enough
> to make readers aware that I own the copyright on the Extra Foo bits.
> In some places, the incantation "Copyright (c) 2003 Brian Sniffen" has
> legal meaning. Even in the US, it's illegal to falsely place such a
> notice.
The only legal form of a copyright notice is the word Copyright, and a
C-in-a-circle. The "(c)" version does *not* count as a C-in-a-circle,
so it's just meaningless extra stuff. The word Copyright is fully
sufficient without C-in-a-circle as well.
The Pan-American Copyright Convention requires the words "All rights
reserved", so it is common to include those, which would get you
coverage in any signatory to that convention who isn't part of the
Berne convention.
But there is no such thing as an "implied copyright notification"
either; there is either a copyright notification or there isn't. The
Berne Convention and US law say that you are covered even if you don't
put a notification, but that's a different beast.
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