[or-roots] Find a Grave - Copyright violations

[cklooster at aol.com]

Les Chapman wrote: "I had received a note from Mr. Tipton which essentially stated that since
the information on the original headstones was public record, the fact that
someone spent however much time and effort recording, organizing and posting
on web site said information didn't give them any rights to that
information."

I am not an attorney and I realize that many times the legal system lacks basic common sense, but I think Mr. Tipton's opinion is legally wrong.??Public records and facts themselves?can't be copyrighted, but their organization?and expression can.? Every history book published (well, at least the factual ones) are based on matters of public record.? It isn't the record itself that is in question here; it's the compiling and publishing of those records as a discrete, individual effort.? An analogy would be to say that since Mt. Hood is a mountain in the public domain, any picture taken of Mt. Hood is also in the public domain and can be copied and used by the public in any way they see fit.? We all know this is not true.? A photograph is the property of the photographer and the rights to use are controlled by the photographer.? Publishing?photos or?information?on a website for public viewing does not make?them? public records nor does it give any individual the right to copy the information without permission.? Many websites state that clearly or outline what use may be made of portions of the record.?But?the absence of a copyright statement on a website does not mean that the laws do not apply.

Having?said that, I know?that?I've copied bits of information from a variety of?sources for my own records and haven't been diligent in citing sources...or requesting permission from the owner to copy the information.? However, this incident?compels me to?take a hard look at how the online genealogy community works.? In my own case, I sent a copy of my original research via FTW file to a distant relative.? That relative tacked my file onto his family tree and later shared his tree with another distant relative who put the file together with his own badly researched and erroneous data and sent it to Ancestry.com. This is irksome to me primarily because of the errors in the tree as published.? It's also irksome because the subscription cost for Ancestry is so?high that many people cannot afford it, and while much of what is available on Ancestry are public record data bases, there is also a big chunk that consists of those user submitted family trees.

What happened in Stephenie's case goes far beyond what happened to me.? Her work is published in a compiled and organized format.? Further, she didn't give a file to someone, nor did she give anyone permission to electronically capture those files.?I wonder how Mr. Tipton would react if someone copied his website and?began selling?"his" data from a different domain??

This is?more than a matter of simply?citing sources or giving credit or recognition to the?author.? This is more than simple plagarism or fair use. I have no doubt that a court would find this a copyright violation if it were ever taken that far.? Here is a link to a website that discusses copyright in easy to understand terms:

http://www.templetons.com/brad/copymyths.html

Carla



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