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From: dee@cca.UUCP (Donald Eastlake)
Newsgroups: net.legal,net.sources
Subject: (C)
Message-ID: <3299@cca.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 12-Jul-85 23:32:32 EDT
Article-I.D.: cca.3299
Posted: Fri Jul 12 23:32:32 1985
Date-Received: Thu, 15-Aug-85 15:52:59 EDT
Distribution: na
Organization: Computer Corp. of America, Cambridge
Lines: 23
Xref: cca net.legal:1742 net.sources:2901

I am not a lawyer but I have read a fair amount on intellectual property
law and legal aspects of computer software protection.  As far as I can
remember, nothing that I have ever read gives any credance to the
obviously widely held theory that "(C)" or "(c)" are valid marks to
indicate a copyright.  The only valid marks I ever see listed are

	1.  "Copyright"

	2.  "Copr."

	3.  The letter C completely enclosed in a circle.

A particularly common place to see just "(C)" with a year and a name is
in source code.  Presumably "Copyright" would work if it was in all caps
or all lower case since they are "close enough" to the originally
required notice.  Is that the theory with a "C" in parenthesis, that it
is "close enough" to being in a circle?  Is there any case law on this?

Of course many people say "Copyright (C) ..." which should work fine.

-- 
	+1 617-492-8860		Donald E. Eastlake, III
	ARPA:  dee@CCA-UNIX	usenet:	{decvax,linus}!cca!dee