New candidates for inclusion in Extras : udftools and starfighter-music

[Ralf Corsepius]

On Wed, 2005-02-09 at 20:02 -1000, Warren Togami wrote:
> Ralf Corsepius wrote:
> > 
> > I.e. even if you did not explicitly put a "Copyright (c)" notice on such
> > a piece of work it will be copyrighted by you. In Germany, all you only
> > can do is to give away "licenses to the public", and "express your will
> > not to enforce unauthorized copying/modifications", but you can not give
> > up any copyright.
> > 
> 
> You are correct, except I think it was the Berne Convention (along with 
> the past 2 or 3 copyright acts in the USA) that made registration of 
> copyrights in America optional.  If you write anything in America, it is 
> automatically protected by copyright even if you don't explicitly 
> include a copyright notice.  But it does help to have one, and register 
> the copyright to be able to prove ownership and possibly enforce it.
> 
> Anyhow, my only point is that it is supposed to be a global standard of 
> minimally 50 years without necessary notice or registration.  That isn't 
> limited to just Germany.
:) 

What I outlined above ("Freedom of Arts") is part of Germany's
constitution ("Grundgesetz").

I guess you can imagine the impact of this on "Copyright assignments",
like those RH wants to apply to Fedora Extras contributions and those
the FSF uses for SW they "own".

According to German laws, these "assignments" - in best case - are
bilateral "contracts"/"license agreements" or "expressions of will".
In "worst case" they are "just void", because a court could judge such
assignments as "immoral" and therefore the whole "contract" to be
invalid.

AFAICT, none of these has ever been challenged at a German court, but I
would not bet on the result. The crucial points probably would be
"whether the piece of work qualifies as 'free, substantial, creative
work'" and on whether "a 'German court' is in charge at all".

As far as pieces of music are concerned, I would not distribute any of
them unless their ownership is 100% bullet proof. In best case, not
before having received a written permission to ship them.

Ralf