Genealogical discussion lists often include messages from members who own published works offering to do look-ups for other members who don't own a particular book. Do any of you know of any legal risk in such? Does an author with a copyright on that work have a valid legal objection? It's certainly obvious that the author is going to lose sales of the book from that form of sharing.? My instincts tells me there could be problem. Thanks, Michael Allison

Michael, I understand what you are saying, but how is that really different from reading a book in a library? Books are very expensive. I wouldn't want to buy one that turned out to be of no use to me. I might buy one based on the results of a "lookup." Margaret Michael Allison wrote: > > Genealogical discussion lists often include messages from members who > own published works offering to do look-ups for other members who don't > own a particular book. Do any of you know of any legal risk in such? > Does an author with a copyright on that work have a valid legal > objection? It's certainly obvious that the author is going to lose sales > of the book from that form of sharing.? My instincts tells me there > could be problem. > Thanks, > Michael Allison > > ==== COPYRIGHT Mailing List ==== > Searchable archives at > http://listsearches.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/listsearch.pl?list=copyright > > ============================== > Visit Ancestry's Library - The best collection of family history > learning and how-to articles on the Internet. > http://www.ancestry.com/learn/library