[TenTec] Orion Encoder - An author's Rant

[Martin Ewing]

Rick - You're right that this shouldn't happen without the permission
of the author.  On the other hand, we all probably know that the
Internet is not a great respecter of copyrights.  Alas, hams often are
not, either.

At minimum, we need to make it clear what we (as authors) want people
to do or not do.  I.e., not to copy for redistribution.  And we can
put a copyright notice in the file or give an explicit Creative
Commons license - http://creativecommons.org/.

[BTW, I note that Ten-Tec does not claim copyright on my 2004 Orion
manual, or on firmware updates.  No licensing terms, either.  That's
unusual and perhaps naive these days.]

There are technical ways to make it more difficult for people to
download and republish your material.  Put it into a set of html
pages, for example, rather than a single .doc or .pdf file. You can
take legal action. There's no perfect answer.

73 Martin AA6E

On Wed, Aug 26, 2009 at 1:00 PM, Rick W<ve7tk at yahoo.ca> wrote:
> I decided to check out the file referenced in the current discussion.
> (http://www.w4ish.net/Manuals/pdf/Orion%20RIT%20Encoder%20Replacement.pdf)I
> was very surprised to find it is the document I assembled, with
> permission from John KE5C, in 2006.  (John provided the photos and description and I assembled it into a single document with a bit of editing.)   I checked the Properties >>
> Description and there's my name as the author.
>
> I have no problem
> with others linking to my site or using articles I've written or
> assembled.  Taking these and posting them to their own site happens.
> It kind of defeats the purpose of the internet but it happens.  Web
> authors put a lot of work into their sites and lifting original
> documents without permission or acknowledgment doesn't seem quite right.
>
> Recently I've found links to my Orion 9MHz mod all over
> the web and, I guess, I should be flattered.  However, in this
> particular case (Orion Encoder) it's a 3rd party's photos and
> documentation that have been lifted and I just hope that W4ISH at least
> asked John, KE5C, if he'd mind.
>
> In an attempt to show the
> document source I now put a footer on each page of ALL PDF documents on
> my site that I have originated.  It kind of clutters up the document
> but at least now if it is relocated some reference to the origin
> remains.
>
> [End of Rant]
>
> 73,
>
> Rick
>
> VE7TK
>
>
>
> Website:  http://www3.telus.net/ve7tk
>
>
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