I'm pretty sure you have violated copyright law, but I'm not an expert. Most articles like this can be copied for personal use, but not distributed.....not sure if this sort of electronic distribution is OK or not...easy enough to ask permission from the publisher since they hold copyright not the author :o) Dan

Very easy to check. The journal will almost certainly include a copyright statement. I don't have one to hand, but inside the front cover is a likely place. It will almost certainly state that unauthorised reproduction is not permitted. For this type of journal, copyright will often remain with the author and many authors are happy for their articles to receive a wider circulation, especially if some time has passed since the initial publication. The rule is always to ask. Any organisation which receives payment for its publications could quite easily sue you for damages for losses that it might demonstrate to a judge. Fancy having to shell out the price of 100 copies of Aloe? 1,000? Plus costs? So ... if you're going to violate copyright, do it against people who aren't getting any money from their publications, they could still sue you out of spite but damages would be very limited since you wouldn't be costing them anything ;)

well, being that this is the internet, and we are rather anonymous, they have no way of finding out who I am without a lot of investigation.

I checked the journal and there is no mention of copyright so no harm done. Enjoy.

Gerhard Marx has passed away several years ago. Norma

they have no way of finding out who I am without a lot of investigation.

Many people who thought that are now in jail, or very much poorer than they were ;)

Just to give you an idea, a letter from a court to Verizon and they would have your name in a week. Scary thought! But really nobody should ever think they are anonymous on the internet unless they go to a huge technical lengths to cover their tracks.

In a few weeks time Googleing" Gerhard Marx in ALOE, the journal of the Succ Society of S Africa" or different variations of your title post and you might be surprised how popular your little anonymous thread is.

I found a photo of mine being used without permission by an innocent Google search looking for something entirely different.

I've printed and distributed others writings in the past in newsletters and never had a problem getting permission from the people who had copyright.

I think that for the most part, digital footprints are found on the users computer, and these are not easily deleted. There are unique time-stamps created each time a user logs on the net. An entire hard-drive would need to be erased. I think this can be done by reinstalling the OS, then overwrite all available hard disk space with dummy files. Or dip the hard drive into a corrosive solution if you intend on replacing it.

As far as the conversations that transpire on this forum...I believe most home users do not have static IP addresses so it would be extremely difficult to trace, certainly not worthwhile for copyrights on an article about succulents...users from work or utilizing servers, well that's a different story, they are easier to track even behind a firewall.

But this is really a subject for another forum :-)

My link that I posted to the article can be traced very easily because it is hosted on a university domain. But there aren't any published copyright restrictions.

It is disconcerting in many ways that even on the net, one cannot really be anonymous. Oh well, back to the plants.

x

Just for public knowledge!
Opposite to Norma's statement Gerhard Marx is still alive and in good health living in South Africa.

Jordi

Good to hear it, Jordi. I thought he was alive but didn't have any personal proof of recent good health :)

You sited the source by putting in the full article which list the name of the orignal writer and the date and the sources that he used in writing this article.

You are not using this article and saying that it is your work, your just passing on information. If this article can be googled then it's out to everyone. I wouldn't worry about the Copywrite Lawyers here. Next time just be aware that there are those out there who will not see your good intentions and try to jam you up because their minds think like that.

Thanks for the article I'll read it tonight.

Interesting about the picture noted above. There have been many conversations about this on the aroid-l via the International Aroid Society. There is a professional photographer there who knows the law very well and has sued various people for using his pics and won significant claims......apparently, as soon as the shutter closes copyright is attached which can be further enhanced by sending a copy of the photo to the Govt. Some people take this all very seriously and a lawsuit will track you down. As for me, I could care less about my photos.

I have published 40 or so articles, but these are in scientific journals where copyright is transferred from me to the journal so I am not sure how this journal works or if it is a public access journal (something many are moving toward in this age of the internet).

I wouldn't worry either, but it is an interesting topic and I suppose we should all be more aware of the potential consequences just in case we step on the wrong toes :o) Dan

There are a lot of myths out there about copyright, some are repeated here. Often there is this assumption that because you can google something, or find it for free on the internet, that you can reproduce it for your own purposes. Or that you can copy an entire article without permission if you credit the original author. You can't. Or rather you can if you want, but sooner or later you'll find yourself in court. For example, I have a lot of time on my hands at the moment and I find suing people for even small amounts of money is rather amusing ;) eBay is a good place to look for stolen images. They try to make it difficult for copyright owners to enforce their rights but at the end of the day they know they will lose and always give way. The US is a particularly good jurisdiction for small copyright claims because the copyright owner can elect (in cases where the for statutory damages of "a sum of not less than $750 or more than $30,000 as the court considers just" (source: The United States Copyright Office). Where the infringement is considered to be "committed wilfully", the court may increase statutory damages to $150,000.

What you can do is to quote small extracts from any source for certain limited purposes (see the relevant provisions for "fair use" in US copyright law, not always allowed in other countries). Or link to information elsewhere on the internet. Hotlinking (such as including an actual image from a different website in your own, rather than just providing a link) is still little tested in the courts, but hotlinkers have lost in a few high profile cases, although the specific circumstances don't seem to set a simple and complete precedent. And hotlinkers have been known to replace the stolen image with something you wouldn't want to appear in your name. Or of course, you could behave like an adult human being and simply ask the owner for permission :)

shurbs n bulbs,

How do you get around Ebay? I've read that they try to make it difficult for you to get to their copyright breakers.