On Mon, 28 Oct 2002 11:11:33 -0600 Bobbye Davis <bobbye@microsped.com> wrote: > I asked my cousin who is a Certified > Genealogist about copy write. This her reply > > . Your research is copyright already when you > write it and sign your name as researcher. > > As that stupid person said, all records are > public. Public records, yes, > but not when you dig them out with hours of > your time invested and somebody > comes along and uses your exact wording for > their own write up. Hi, Bobby: There are two completely separate issues here. First, that you dug out the details investing hours of time (and perhaps incurring expenses). As unfair as it might sound, this gives you precisely *zero* rights to your conclusions. Ah, but you said, "uses your exact wording for their own write up". Now, that is a horse of a different color. Not only is it illegal, but it does not even require you signing your name to create your ownership of your own (creative) words. The moment you create them, they are yours. > Besides, you are the one with the > documentation. If any questions arise, > you are the one to give the answers. What > answers is he going to give if asked? He must > refer the question to you as the author of the > published piece. He cannot answer with > authority if he did not do the research. Why > would anyone want to put themselves in that > position? Now, this is an excellent point. In my opinion, someone who makes broad claims and cannot back them up will quickly lose credibility with those people who actually care about the truth. > The legal term for > this type of "stealing" is Plagiarism. > (copying, lifting, stealing, illegal > use, breach of copyright, bootlegging). Yes, as long as one is careful about what is, and is not, permitted. If I write, "Derrick Dutton SEVERANCE drove his horse-drawn wagon through a snow storm that crippled much of Vermont, to bring the doctor to the birth of Derrick Allen DUTTON, 5 January 1905" and someone takes my *exact* words as his own, then that *IS* plagiarism. If someone writes, based solely on my words, "Derrick DUTTON was born during a snowstorm 5 January 1905" then that is *NOT*. Whether it makes me happy is, in all honesty, irrelevant; it is the law (in the U.S.A.), and it protects us all from being told that we can't say anything unless we find it first. P.S. Derrick Allen DUTTON was in fact born in a Vermont snow storm in 1905. He married Ruth Alice WILLIAMS. They are my grandparents. Darrell darrellm@sprynet.com