Bernd Walter <ti...@cicely7.cicely.de> writes: > There is no copyright in Germany.
Yes, there is. Germany is signatory to the Berne convention. > I'm not a lawyer, but there are many differences to copyright and I > think the main one is that the German system automatically protects > without the need to explicitly declare copyright. So does copyright. > E.g. there is not need to add copyright lines in sourcecode to prohibit > others to republish your code in Germany. It is not necessary anywhere in the world. It is still a good idea, just like it's a good idea to mark your laptop with indelible ink, even though stealing it is just as illegal if you don't. > Another difference (to my knowledge) is that the author never looses his > right (though there are a few rules about age and inheritage) - no > matter how much it is spread. The same goes for copyright (author's lifetime + 70 years) > The author can't even sell it, all he can do is sell the right to use it. I'm pretty sure there are provisions for "work for hire". > You can easily loose copyright and trademarks if you don't care about > it, but you don't loose your author rights. You can *not* lose copyright through dilution, only trademarks. At worst, you might lose an infringement suit if the defendant can show that you knew about *that particular case* long before you filed suit, but it would not invalidate your copyright, nor would it diminish your standing in other suits against other infringers. DES -- Dag-Erling Smørgrav - d...@des.no _______________________________________________ freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-hackers To unsubscribe, send any mail to "freebsd-hackers-unsubscr...@freebsd.org"
