ADMIN: Possible Changes to the Main List Settings

[Tom Wall]

I (Tom) wrote:
If I understand the copyright regulations accurately,
then unless permission to use a member's work has been
received - and ostensibly in an explicit (and not
loophole-esque) way - by the Admin/FAQ team, then I'm
afraid that we may already be *currently* in
violation, should someone choose to complain about it.

My alliterated interlocutor Przemyslaw 'Pshemekan' Plaskowicki 
replied:
No. Ideas themselves are NOT copyrightable, but the expression of 
those ideas IS. As far as I know, Fantastic Posts uses other listees 
ideas not their expression of them.

To which I (Tom) respond:
I'm not sure that I see your reasoning here, Przemyslaw, and think 
that you may be confusing a person's actual *posts* with the *ideas* 
that those posts represent or attempt to articulate. 

For instance, using your example:

The *idea* that Snape is a vampire is not copyrightable. Okay. 
*That* I can see, and agree with. In a similar light, none of the 
hypotheses, i.e. "That Snape Might Have Loved Lily," or "That There 
is Something *Up* with Trevor the Toad" - included in "Hypothetic 
Alley"  *themselves* are copyrightable. But there is a big 
difference between talking generally about the idea, and using 
members' personal expressions of that idea to elucidate the 
argument. "That Snape Might Have Loved Lily," as an idea, is not a 
copyrightable thing. But again, *Tabouli's* personal take on the 
matter, and her posts and expressions discussing it, are. 

In other words, *my* personal take on this idea, and *my* 
formulations for and expression of that idea *are* copyrightable. 
And therefore, the use of *my* posts to express that idea without my 
permission would fall completely into your own distinction for what 
is copyrightable.

Therefore, according to your line of reasoning, "Fantastic Posts and 
Where to Find Them" would not be in violation for pointing out that 
there is the idea that Snape may be a vampire. It wouldn't even be 
in violation for claiming that many members of the list support the 
idea. It *would* possibly be in violation for using - without the 
author's prior permission - that person's idiosyncratic expression 
of the issue as an example for others to read publically and off the 
lists. 

You can make any *idea* you want public. You can't make *my* 
expression of that idea public unless I grant permission.

-Tom