netmouse: (Default)
netmouse ([personal profile] netmouse) wrote2007-09-02 09:27 am

Tobias summarizes a topic very well. :)

If anyone interested in the SFWA DMCA abuse story has not read Tobias Buckell's summary, with quotes from many people including a Coda from the SFWA president, I recommend you do.

(Long story short: SFWA used a DMCA-based request to pull copywrited material from document sharing site Scribd; their list was flawed, and the site pulled material from authors SFWA was not authorized to represent -- material the authors actually wanted to have up there. Many authors railed about the abuse of authority and posted more public material just to demo that it's all right (a win for the public, IMHO). SFWA promises it will not happen again.)

ETA: Steven Silver points to what he says is an even better write-up on Scalzi's blog
ckd: (music)

[personal profile] ckd 2007-09-02 09:32 pm (UTC)(link)
You can sing "Happy Birthday", but not publicly perform it; that's a fairly major distinction. (This is why some restaurants have their own birthday songs, incidentally.)

You could also hum it, since the music was originally published as "Good Morning to All" in 1893 and is therefore out of copyright.