Lord Reginald Smithers wrote:
Kevin,
It is not position that you need to obtain permission to republish
copyrighted material, it is the law.


1) There would be some doubt that putting an item on rec.boats
constitutes "publishing" anymore so than clipping an item from the
newspaper and posting it on the bulletin board in the company lunchroom
or handing out copies at a yacht club meeting. It's a lot like driving
71mph in a 70 mph zone. You might be in technical violation of the law,
but you aren't breaking the spirit of the law or violating the intent
of the law (to control the speed of traffic).

2) If the article is not altered but posted in it's entirety and if the
author is acknowledged, there has been no particular damage.

3) Copyright cases are often settled based with a fine based upon the
amount of money the "infringer" received by infringing the copyright.
Makes sense, of course, because if there was a set fine of say $100,000
people would routinely violate copyrights where they could make
considerably more than the amount of the fine by doing so and they
would simply consider the fine one of the "costs" of doing business.
Also makes sense because in cases like this, where the dubious
"violation" of a copyright produces absolutely *zero* economic benefit,
is restricted to a very small group, and was not intended for
commerical purposes there won't be a cottage industry consisting of a
bunch of hungry attorney's haunting newsgroups to find people to sue.


To be absolutely within the law, the proper approach would be to
provide a link to the article, and it is perfectly acceptable to lead
with some personal commentary or summarization.

Example:

In an article at the following site, a renown aeronautical engineer has
published a study of
airborne mammals. www.whenpigsfly.com

-or-


Check out www.whenpigsfly.com

I think the author is full of crap, and here's why............


-or-


In an article at www.whenpigsfly.com the author theorizes that pigs
once had wings, but that millenia of domestication have caused the
appendages to devolve.