Re: More on copyright

[dewar@gnat.com (Robert Dewar)]

Jeffrey Carter <jrcarter@acm.org> wrote in message news:<3CDC0FB7.8A1793BD@acm.org>...

> If you sell the derived work, that is clearly a violation. But if I take
> my legal copy of Titanic and create a version with Jar Jar Binks edited
> out for my personal enjoyment, that's clearly fair use.

Well your example is a bit peculiar, I don't think the owners of Titanic
can complain if you bleep out Jar Jar Binks from Titanic :-) :-)

But when anyone says "that's clearly fair use" I suggest you immediately
raise your skepticism shields to full strength, since such statements almost
always mean "I think that from a common sense point of view, this should
be fair use", rather than "the statute or court case bla makes this fair
use". Note that even a court case often creates a precedent only for the
circuit involved, unless it is appealed. Even Altai vs Computer Associates
is not the law of the land, but only of the particular circuit (though other
circuits do tend to follow this particular ruling, which incidentally I
strongly recommend all computer people read).