🚀 go-pugleaf

(Note cross-post and Followup-To.  This has little to do with news
administration.)

In article <1992Nov2.030035.22597@Happy-Man.com> irving@Happy-Man.com (Irving_Wolfe) writes:

   Well, that's awfully silly of you!  If there's no explicit
   agreement regarding non-disclosure, received e-mail is the property
   of the recipient to do with as he wishes.

   ...

   It is beyond question that the recipient of unsolicited mail has
   the right to let others know what he has received.

Actually, that is not "beyond question."  Some netters think that the
information in the E-mail is copyrighted by the author, and therefore
cannot be quoted verbatim without the author's permission.  Some
netters think otherwise.  There is legal precedent to support both
beliefs, and it's never really been tested in court, so there is no
firm legal doctrine about this.

However, the issue is not really what's *legally* permissible (Do you
really want the courts deciding what's OK on the Usenet?), but rather
what is generally considered polite on the Usenet.

This issue is addresses in question 32 of the "Answers to Frequently
Asked Questions about Usenet" posting in news.announce.newusers and
news.answers (news.answers archive name "usenet-faq/part1"):

>32.  Are there any restrictions on posting e-mail someone sends to me?
>
>     At a minimum, it is only polite for you to contact the author of
>     the letter and secure her or his permission to post it to the net.
>
>     On a more serious note, it can be argued that posting someone's
>     e-mail to the net without their permission is a violation of
>     copyright law.  Under that law, even though a letter was
>     addressed to you, it does not grant you the right to publish the
>     contents, as that is the work of the author and the author
>     retains copyright (even if no explicit copyright mark appears).
>
>     Basically, your letters are your intellectual property.  If
>     someone publishes your letters they are violating your copyright.
>     This principle is well-founded in "paper media," and while
>     untested in electronic forums such as Usenet, the same would
>     probably apply if tested in court.

In this particular case, I consider John De Armond's actions
"net-abusive" enough that he does not deserve the modicum of
politeness that requires others to ask permission before posting mail
from him on this topic.  He has posted mail from me and from others to
the net without permission.  He has done this both before and after he
announced in alt.sources that all mail to him about this would be
reposted there, so he cannot claim to have given prior warning.  His
wasteful use of alt.sources and the net in general is abusing the
entire Usenet, and that abuse is intentional and with prior knowledge.
If he then chooses to send E-mail to someone, flaming because they
have asked him to cease and desist from perpetuating that abuse, I do
not see why they cannot post that E-mail.  Espeically if said E-mail
is abusive.

-- 
Jonathan Kamens                                         jik@MIT.Edu
MIT Information Systems/Athena              Moderator, news.answers