At 11:59 PM 9/2/99 EDT, HudsonK@aol.com wrote: >I have been contacted by one of my lookups. They forwarded this from a >mailing list they are on. I am sure copyright laws will be changed due to the >internet. But can someone tell me if there are problems with doing the >lookups. > ><<<A person offering lookups from a book he purchased was contacted by the >publisher specifically Hearthstone Books and told not to perform lookups as >this was a violation of the copyright laws. Has anyone been contacted >concerning >lookups? We do quite a few lookups for people from books we've purchased and >I'd like to know what everyone thinks about the above incident.>>> This is an excellent area for discussion here on the list. I do *NOT* want to cut off discussion on this topic, but I do want to make sure we are all aware of all the issues involved. Firstly, as USGenWeb volunteers, we should all be aware of the official policy on Copyrights and Lookups. (Do you CCs know this? Have you asked lookup volunteers to read and comply?) From http://www.usgenweb.org/volunteers/copyright.html "The USGenWeb Project will not tolerate any copyright violations. Lookup requests should be limited to one name, or perhaps two if it is a married couple. Information given should be minimal, for example: * If it is a cemetery lookup, the information should be the name of the cemetery and the dates on the headstone. * If someone asks for "everybody with XX surname" or an entire family group, or for hardcopies to be mailed, please advise that The USGenWeb Project volunteers have been asked not to comply with such requests. Lookups can extend to searching copyrighted material to determine if the material would be helpful to the requester in their research. Should the copyrighted material prove useful, the volunteer can provide the author's address and ordering information. The USGenWeb Project will endeavor to get a WRITTEN statement from each copyright holder which stipulates which books may be used for lookups. See Lookup Permission Statement." A list of authors who have refused to allow lookups is maintained on this web page: http://www.usgenweb.org/volunteers/authorno.html A list of authors who have explicitly granted permission for lookups is maintained on this web page: http://www.usgenweb.org/volunteers/authoryes.html Obviously, if Hearthstone Books owns the copyright to the books they publish, and they want to refuse permission for lookups, they have that right. Their name should be added to the list of those refusing permission. Regards, Leigh