In article <200512121013520860.18A48FB0 at 10.0.0.252>, "Chuck Guzis" <cclist at sydex.com> writes: You might enquire here about legitimate purchasable copies of old versions of DOS: <http://www.oldsoftware.com/email.html> I know he regularly seeks out copies of MS-DOS 6.22 for resale. He may have access to older versions as well. If he does, he will send you original media, etc., not a disk copy. -- "The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline"-- code samples, sample chapter, FAQ: <http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/> Pilgrimage: Utah's annual demoparty <http://pilgrimage.scene.org>

On Tue, 13 Dec 2005 08:49:41 +0000 Mark Firestone <pdp11_70 at retrobbs.org> wrote: Machines of that era did not necessarily 'come' with any version of DOS by default. My father's first IBM-PC could have been bought with just the cassette drive, or if you wanted to buy the floppy controller card and a drive or two, with CP/M-86, or PC-DOS. There wasn't the sort of 'bundling' arrangement that came into vogue later. My first copy of DOS (version 3.1) was one I paid $80 for, which I believe at the time was the going rate for IBM PC-DOS. I remember poreing over that manual from IBM as it was the only documentation I had at the time for the new system software I was learning. At that point in history you could NOT buy MS-DOS in a retail package, but that was the standard way to buy PC-DOS: as an optional add-on to the system. The PC-DOS 3.3 would be a seperate invoice item. Owning the hardware in no way implies the purchaser owned an OS to run on it.

On 12/12/2005 at 4:27 PM Jim Leonard wrote: Well, there is a difference. MS-DOS/PC-DOS can still be run on modern machines--there's no argument that "the hardware to run it doesn't exist any more". And both firms that can claim copyright (good for 95 years) are still around. I'd hate to get a letter from a Microsoft suit saying "cease and desist--and pay us $250,000". Not to put too fine a point on it, but I can't legally make copies and distribute an out-of-print literary work without permission, why is there a difference with software? Has anyone asked Microsoft or IBM if it would be okay? Or do we already know that the answer is going to be "no", so we might as well not ask and draw attention to things? Cheers, Chuck

On 12/12/2005 at 5:39 PM Jim Leonard wrote: Well, US Copyright Law and your father-in-law are in substantial disagreement about Fair Use. However, if you're certain about your legal position regarding Fair Use, why not drop a note to Microsoft and get their okay? If you don't want to read my ranting, you can stop reading right here. I confess right now that I've seen products arbitrarily classified as "abandonware" and distributed over the net without so much as a note to the owner saying "would it be okay if we did this?"--and it disturbs me greatly--and in some cases, makes my blood boil. This question comes up all the time on the music-oriented lists and the rationalizations are nothing short of amazing. 'Well, it's out of print, so I can copy it" Or "It's for use in a school, so it's fair use". Or "we're a 501(c)3 nonprofit, so we can copy things freely". Or (and I've got the correspondence to prove this one) "We're a church doing the Lord's work, so we shouldn't have to pay for music we use in worship services." US Copyright Law defines Fair Use rather narrowly and, contrary to your father-in-law's legal opinion, does not mandate that a copyright holder demonstrate financial loss or harm from an infringement as part of a claim. Neither does it require a copyright holder to vigorously defend a copyright. . Theft of copyright is a felony in the US, punishable by fine and imprisonment. Read all about it here: http://www.copyright.gov/title17/ It would not surprise me if IBM or MIcrosoft had a few OEM contracts still in force that enabled the OEM to make a copy of DOS 3.3 for use, provided a royalty is paid. What I'm saying here is for works authored after 1978. Prior to that time, there were additional requirements regarding registration and publication and the statement of copyright on the work. None of that is necessary for works created after 1978--thus, if you're not sure, it's safest to assume that a work is copyrighted. With apology, I'll step off the soapbox now. Cheers, Chuck

woodelf wrote: It's not really grey, it's just wrong :-) -- Jim Leonard (trixter at oldskool.org) http://www.oldskool.org/ Want to help an ambitious games project? http://www.mobygames.com/ Or check out some trippy MindCandy at http://www.mindcandydvd.com/

On 12/12/2005 at 7:25 PM woodelf wrote: Well, if you used as your model Rodin's circa-1900 piece "The Thinker", you're probably on safe ground as the work is in the public domain. However, if you used as your pattern someone's 1980 interpretation of Rodin's work, you'd likely be infringing. Most of my dealing with copyright is in printed music, and it's a minefield controlled by not very many large multinational firms. Suppose I wanted to produce an arrangement of Gershwin's "Rhapsody in Blue" for kazoo sextet. First, I'd research the work and discover that it was published in 1924, which puts it just past the magic October 1923 non-extension date for public domain works. So, it's still under copyright. I could wait until 2019 for the copyright to expire and hope that Congress didn't pass another extension(extremely unlikely), but I suspect my enthusiasm for the project will have waned by then. On the other hand, I could move to one of the EU countries and wait until 2007, when the copyright on the work would expire there. But I couldn't publish my arrangement in the USA without permission until 2019. So, I decide that I still want to write my arrangement and remain here in cold soggy Oregon. I locate the copyright owner, which (fortunately) is still the Gershwin trust, whose rights to the work are (unfortunately) administered by Hal Leonard/Warner Brothers, which is a division of Disney (some of the most difficult people you can imagine dealing with). I describe what I want to do, and await terms. Most likely, I'll end up paying a one-time fee of less than $1,000 to Disney, given the limited scope of my audience. That is, if they agree to allow me to do it--they're under no legal obligation and may in fact, not like the idea of six kazoos playing George's magnum opus. They will ask me if I've done any sketches or preliminary versions of the arrangement; if I say that I have, they may direct me to send them what I've got, destroy any copies or notes that I've made and never darken their door again. You see, the law says that doing an arrangement without permission is an infringement, even if it's unpublished. (Trust me--it's happened to folks I know). I'm still not home free. I must now find a copy of Rhapsody in Blue that's a facsimile of the original, not someone's edition. You see--corrections or alterations are also protected by copyright and I won't want to pay TWO people licensing fees. Then I can actually do what I want and go through with getting it published and sold. I hope it's a hit. There is yet another twist of copyright law that accompanies the fall of the old Soviet Union. Works that once were public domain in the USA because Warsaw Pact copyrights weren't recognized can be in the same class as "toothpaste back into the tube"--that is, they can have their copyrights "restored". This can lead to some interesting side effects. For example, orchestral musicians often use summaries of instrumental parts called "excerpts' as reference material (after all, who wants to wade through the whole score of Dvorak's New World Symphony just to know that there are only 13 notes played by the tuba?). Many of these that were quite legal prior to 1990 (e.g. the works of Dimitri Shostakovich) are now on the "restored" list and no longer published. Used copies of these now fetch several times their original price. At least Congress didn't mandate that we had to burn the old copies. Cheers, Chuck

On 12/12/2005 at 9:16 PM woodelf wrote: Believe it or not, the kazoo is a very valuable teaching tool for brass instruments. I used to run 811A's in the modulator of my transmitter many years ago. The final was 813's. Cheers, Chuck

On Tue, 13 Dec 2005 00:24:53 -0500 9000 VAX <vax9000 at gmail.com> wrote: Some of the software was licensed to exactly whomever installed it or who an IT person installed it for. It's a 'grey area' without referring to a specific (version of a) package. There are large bodies of old software which legally cannot exist and which, if we are going to follow the law down to the letter, must be obliterated any time a copy of said software is discovered. There's a big difference between being a conservator and going around spreading warez, though.

On Tue, 13 Dec 2005 07:52:28 -0600 John Foust <jfoust at threedee.com> wrote: There is an ethical basis for what is called 'living in the civilized world.' Not all of ethics is codified in law. Lawyers can only dream that this is the case. If I'm wrong in this then it's time for someone to draw up a list of all the old software that needs to cease to exist. There is a lot of it, in fact literally tons of media to throw in the bonfire. It would probably be a good thing to encourage the people and entities who insist on this 'burning' to step out and have their say. So the rest of us can learn who they are early enough to deal with them.

On 12/13/05, Jim Leonard <trixter at oldskool.org> wrote: Internet Archive Gets DMCA Exemption To Help Archive Vintage Software In 2003 the Internet Archive, as part of research into vintage software archiving, discovered possible archiving issues involving the Digital Millenium Copyright Act. This could make it impossible to legally archive early computer software and games, even for accredited institutions wishing to store limited amounts of non-distributable, archival images. It's vital to make proper archival copies of these artefacts, because the life of magnetic media such as floppy discs has been estimated at 10 to 30 years. Time is running out to properly archive much of this large body of work for safekeeping, to ensure it lives out its term of copyright and is available ( in the short-term, under suitable copyright-constrained means) for posterity. The Copyright Office holds a rulemaking proceeding<http://www.copyright.gov/1201/>every 3 years to: *"determine whether there are particular classes of works as to which users are, or are likely to be, adversely affected in their ability to make noninfringing uses due to the prohibition on circumvention of access controls."* As part of this rulemaking process, the Internet Archive submitted an initial comment <http://www.copyright.gov/1201/2003/comments/025.pdf> in early 2003, and followed this up with a reply comment<http://www.copyright.gov/1201/2003/reply/015.pdf>giving further examples of classic software that might be lost if access controls could not be circumvented. Following deliberation, the Copyright Office ruled in late October 2003 that four exemptions should be added<http://www.copyright.gov/1201/docs/librarian_statement_01.html>… the anti-circumvention clause of the DMCA, to be valid until the next Copyright Office rulemaking in 2006, including two that are related to the Internet Archive's original comments: * Computer programs protected by dongles that prevent access due to malfunction or damage and which are obsolete. Computer programs and video games distributed in formats that have become obsolete and which require the original media or hardware as a condition of access.* With the aid of these exemptions, the Internet Archive is continuing its work with institutional and technical partners to research and archive this at-risk software <http://www.archive.org/about/dmca/copyrightoffice.ppt>, and would like to thank all those who worked hard to help us achieve our goal

On 12/12/05, Chuck Guzis <cclist at sydex.com> wrote: In the US, the doctrine of first sale states that whether the EULA allows transfer or not, the item may be transfered. (Of course this likely means that since the transferee did not agree to the EULA, the EULA doesn't bind the transferee. I don't know whether this has been tested in court.) Of course, the doctrine of first sale can be read to only allow sale of the original copy, not the copy on the hard disk. This may or may not depend upon whether the original copy still exists. (Again I don't know whether this has been tested, either.) But regardless of what the EULA says, you can resell or give away the original media, so long any you destroy any copies you may have.

On 12/12/2005 at 6:09 PM woodelf wrote: long. has happend in Current copyright for most works after 1978 is 95 years. Before that, copyright was extended to 75 years. Yes, this is a far cry from the old 28+28 rule, but this is our Congress at work as well as the WTO (the 1978 revision is part of the Uruguay Round Sessions of GATT). What this means that after the prescribed period, works enter the public domain. Activity has nothing to do with copyright, nor has it ever had anything to do with copyright. For example, music published before October 1923 is now in the public domain. However, because of the Sonny Bono (he was already dead when it was passed) Copyright Extension Act, music published in 1924 will not enter the public domain until 2019. Mary Bono publicly stated that Sonny wanted perpetual copyright, but that appears to be unconstitutional. This is the way things are and the extensions have survived a Supreme Court challenge. If you want them changed, lobby your lawmakers. BTW, this has nothing to do with that other bit of legislation, the Digital Millenium Copyright Act (DMCA) which adds further restrictions as to what can be done with copyrighted material. Cheers, Chuck

Chuck Guzis wrote: I don't usually like disagreeing with people I admire and look up to, but I suggest you actually read the Fair Use clause: PER TITLE 17 - UNITED STATES CODE - SECTION 107 ? 107. Limitations on exclusive rights: Fair use Notwithstanding the provisions of sections 106 and 106A, the fair use of a copyrighted work, including such use by reproduction in copies or phonorecords or by any other means specified by that section, for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use), scholarship, or research, is not an infringement of copyright. In determining whether the use made of a work in any particular case is a fair use the factors to be considered shall include ? (1) the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes; (2) the nature of the copyrighted work; (3) the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and (4) the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work. The whole point is that you don't need to. False. Depends on context, but mostly true. "...teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use)...nonprofit educational purposes..." False. Now that one is just twisted :-) and obviously false. Obviously, but that doesn't mean they'd have a case. You're certainly entitled :-) But please see my valid points above. -- Jim Leonard (trixter at oldskool.org) http://www.oldskool.org/ Want to help an ambitious games project? http://www.mobygames.com/ Or check out some trippy MindCandy at http://www.mindcandydvd.com/

On 12/12/2005 at 8:01 PM Jim Leonard wrote: Jim, as much as we'd all like to believe that Congress makes the law, it's not strictly true. The courts do. I've read the Fair Use Clause and also know that it's the source of incredible bounty for copyright lawyers. The LOC has a section on Fair Use (http://www.copyright.gov/fls/fl102.html) which essentially says that the scope of Fair Use has been considerably narrowed by legislation and the courts, to the extent that the LOC states: "The distinction between ?fair use? and infringement may be unclear and not easily defined. There is no specific number of words, lines, or notes that may safely be taken without permission. Acknowledging the source of the copyrighted material does not substitute for obtaining permission." "The safest course is always to get permission from the copyright owner before using copyrighted material. The Copyright Office cannot give this permission. When it is impracticable to obtain permission, use of copyrighted material should be avoided unless the doctrine of ?fair use? would clearly apply to the situation. The Copyright Office can neither determine if a certain use may be considered ?fair? nor advise on possible copyright violations. If there is any doubt, it is advisable to consult an attorney." Stanford has a good summary of Fair Use guidelines at http://fairuse.stanford.edu/Copyright_and_Fair_Use_Overview/chapter9/9-a.htm l As you can see, it's not as simple a matter as section 107 would seem to imply. You can't simply use copyrighted material for educational use without limit for educational use, for example; else why purchase textbooks (or operating systems)? Universities have lost piles of cash and teachers, jobs because of too-liberal interpretation of Fair Use. The LOC has it right: Ask first. Cheers, Chuck

On 12/13/2005 at 10:18 AM Eric J Korpela wrote: other ...and on some "abandonware" web sites that I can point you to, the poster knows darned well that the owner is still around and reachable via a simple email and doesn't ask because he (or she) knows what the answer will be. That's what makes my blood boil. And what the heck, if the web site's in Belgium and the owner's here in the US, what do they have to fear? If you're going to toss copyrighted software around, do your best to locate the owner (Google is a wonderful tool) and then ASK. If the owner refuses, respect his/her/its/their wishes. So, if you want to toss around MS-DOS 3.3, why not drop a note to Microsoft for permission? If they say "no", you don't do it. If you don't like the current state of copyright law, talk to your Congressional representatives as I have. I'm in favor of a 14-14 year period comparable to patent law, where copyrights must be explicitly renewed for a fee. After 28 years, it's available for anyone's use. Here's a quiz--how much do you think the old song "Happy Birthday to You" is worth? Bet you thought it was PD. http://www.snopes.com/music/songs/birthday.asp Cheers, Chuck

Jules Richardson wrote: You can't view them directly, but if you click on Reply To Author it does get the email to them. -- Jim Leonard (trixter at oldskool.org) http://www.oldskool.org/ Want to help an ambitious games project? http://www.mobygames.com/ Or check out some trippy MindCandy at http://www.mindcandydvd.com/

Jules Richardson wrote: Google at least put time and effort (and probably money) into preserving the stuff so that at least you know exactly why you want to get in touch with So-and-So. And you can use Google to try and track this person down. As far as I know, they have no monopoly on Usenet news. Anyone else can go back and gather up data from as many tape archives as they can persuade people to part with. They must have been deluged with complaints from people who were having their email address harvested by bots! Antonio -- Antonio carlini arcarlini at iee.org

On Tuesday 13 December 2005 18:33, Jules Richardson wrote: I'm pretty sure it's #3: 3) Prevent spammers from acquiring email addresses from the google usenet archive. Would you rather have absolutely none of the old posts that they now have indexed and freely available, or deal with not having email addresses available? Personally, I find the content of usenet posts generally to be more useful than the From: address on them... Pat -- Purdue University Research Computing --- http://www.rcac.purdue.edu/ The Computer Refuge --- http://computer-refuge.org

On Wed, 14 Dec 2005 00:06:09 +0000 Jules Richardson <julesrichardsonuk at yahoo.co.uk> wrote: And in the process, turns Usenet into another proprietary AOL-type newsgroup service. Unless the feeds from 'Google News' are freely distributed to other news hosts, which of course defeats their whole mechanism for 'hidden email addresses.' So a tidy rationale for Google to privatize the news feed emerges. It's essentially the same thing as trusting MSN or AOL to permanently archive public discussions. Or Yahoo groups. It's a private reserve, like the 'commons' area of a shopping mall, and administraton of it is at the discretion of whomever happens to be the owner. Right now the 'commons' is owned by Google, who some view as an enlightened despot. Who will 'own' it in ten years has not been determined. It's a terrible degradation of the old way. Which can be blamed on 'spammers' or, perhaps, on the pathological fear and loathing of 'spam' and the way we allow said loathing to change how we behave.

Jules Richardson wrote: All I know is that I was able to spend 4 minutes tracking down someone based on the email they used in a 1997 USENET posting and they replied (somewhat surprised). It can be done. Then Google revealing the address wouldn't help you anyway. Your point again? Don't blame google, blame spammers who ruined it for everyone. The google USENET archive isn't useful or functional? You seriously think that? As for being "the only game in town", they expanded their USENET archive at considerable expense above and beyond the old dejanews archives: http://groups.google.com/group/google.public.support.general/msg/d88f36fb3e… -- Jim Leonard (trixter at oldskool.org) http://www.oldskool.org/ Want to help an ambitious games project? http://www.mobygames.com/ Or check out some trippy MindCandy at http://www.mindcandydvd.com/

Jules Richardson wrote: Still, you can go ahead and try to email them anyway using the Reply link, and when the email inevitably bounces, you can see the address that bounced. I agree with you there. With the AJAX (hate that word) fad currently in vogue, you'd think Google's Usenet interface would be much more developed than it currently is. -- Jim Leonard (trixter at oldskool.org) http://www.oldskool.org/ Want to help an ambitious games project? http://www.mobygames.com/ Or check out some trippy MindCandy at http://www.mindcandydvd.com/

Chuck Guzis wrote: I'm curious, what is it that makes your blood boil more? The distribution of the software itself, or the hypocrasy of not even trying to ask for permission? -- Jim Leonard (trixter at oldskool.org) http://www.oldskool.org/ Want to help an ambitious games project? http://www.mobygames.com/ Or check out some trippy MindCandy at http://www.mindcandydvd.com/

Chuck Guzis wrote: I like the above MUCH more than any single-sentence answer you could have given me. You, sir, are awesome :-) -- Jim Leonard (trixter at oldskool.org) http://www.oldskool.org/ Want to help an ambitious games project? http://www.mobygames.com/ Or check out some trippy MindCandy at http://www.mindcandydvd.com/

On 12/13/2005 at 11:15 PM Jules Richardson wrote: whether they used it And what if it's software (or a book or a song) that you wrote yourself? After all, a book doesn't deteriorate by someone else using it or by being copied and, thanks to modern technology, I can digitize said book and distribute it over the web, thereby saving some poor trees and cutting down on greenhouse gases. Wonder what would happen if I posted the latest Harry Potter book on the web as a public service? I'm sure Ms. Rowling wouldn't mind, so I don't need to ask her, right? When you copy and use software without the author's permission, you are denying him/her/them/it any opportunity for compensation for his/her/their hard work and expense in creating the software. You are stealing. If an author makes the decision to forgo compensation and offers his work for free, that's fine--but it's the author's call, not yours. There was a time in my life when I didn't own a car, but part of my apartment lease included a labeled reserved secure parking space. A neighbor, knowing that I didn't have a vehicle decided that it would be okay to park his girlfriend's car in my space. He didn't ask, probably using the same logic as "it's not inconveniencing you in any way". I confronted the neighbor, and he gave pretty much that same reasoning. I noted that I was paying for the space as a line item in my lease and that I'd be happy to sublet the space to him--and that, had he asked me first, I might have even agreed to some limited use of the space gratis (After all, I did have guests and wanted them to be able to use the space if they needed to). He became angry, called me a name and walked off. Of course, the next time his girlfriend parked in my space, I had her car towed, as was my right. Always ask permission. You just might get it. That's all I'm going to say on this topic. I'm not going to convert the sinners by sermonizing. Maybe it's a sign of the times. My apologies for bringing the subject up. Cheers, Chuck

Chuck Guzis wrote: Ahhh, I was merely pointing out that the car analogy didn't stack up, nothing more :) I agree with you totally, and personally I'd ask permission first in the software case. Problem is in a lot of cases software comes from big companies, and big company mentality gets in the way. Assuming the company even bothers to reply - which doesn't always happen - the answer's invariably no. I think this often stems out of a belief that if the software no longer benefits the company then it shouldn't be put in a position where it could possibly benefit anyone else. That and someone invariably gets in a tizz about support issues (although pointing out up front that you expect no support whatsoever seems to help, although they generally still don't entirely believe you) IME, smaller companies and individuals* tend to be much more flexible, thankfully. *that's regular-sized individuals, not smaller ones ;) cheers Jules

----- Original Message ----- From: "Chuck Guzis" <cclist at sydex.com> To: <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Sent: Tuesday, December 13, 2005 5:36 PM Subject: Re: PC-DOS 3.3 distribution neighbor If I broke into your house while you were on a business trip and made copies of every application CD you own and used it would you even know about it? Physically taking something and just digitally copying it (while leaving the original in place) is not the same thing. One is theft, the other is a copyright infringement.

Chuck Guzis wrote: If he made a digital (or analogue!) copy, none of them would bother me, unless I owned an interest in the car manufacturer. Antonio -- Antonio carlini arcarlini at iee.org

a.carlini at ntlworld.com wrote: Although the latest push from the music industry seems to be to kill off lyrics websites. How someone can go around trying to stop people from writing down what even the most tone deaf person can comprehend is beyond me. If you don't want people to listen to your music, don't produce it in the first place - it really is that simple. They'll be trying to ban ears next...