Pin Map Link Disappeared !!

May 30, 2001

quote:
Originally posted by Sun _Tzu:

Plenty of people have the technical know-how, but it takes more than technical know-how. You need space and bandwidth, and that costs. That is the biggest reason for J.I.'s hard position on the copyright stuff. There is some real capital tied up in the geocaching.com presence, and I'm guessing he would like to get to a point where the investement will generate some revenue. I'm sure that if a majority of the users had serious complaints about his treatment of the situation, he would be more flexible. VIVA CAPITALISM!!!

actually that would be a direct violation of his stated disclaimer. that the site is run for personal and non commercial use only. i'm not implying whether making money or not making money from this is good or bad or whether i agree or disagree with it, simply what the site states as its purpose.

May 30, 2001

quote:
Originally posted by Iron Chef:

So, let's just calm down a bit and not mention that big nasty "C" word if at all necessary. Who knows maybe Nhouse's combat caching may catch on in a few years and we could all be playing this game in riot gear and armed to the teeth with paintball guns and sharp pointy teeth!

Whatever happens to geocaching, I'm sure it will be interesting.

and the only problem with that is the "C" word seems to be the central issue. That was the cause of the links being removed, and the website blocked from here, and the subsequent removal of the information from the other website.

To ignore the "C" word would be to ignore the entire issue that caused the situation.

May 30, 2001

There is one issue that looks like it has been overlooked here. Buxley's web pages did not DISPLAY any data that came from geocaching.com, other than the cache name. (And even that doesn't display in Netscape.) All Buxley did was USE the lat/log data to create his maps. You could NOT get the lat/lon info from the map. The only place the lat/log info was displayed was on geocaching.com.

Without getting back into whether DATA can be copyrighted, all Buxley's web page did was show a map that linked back to geocaching.com. Florian's map only shows names, no links. Both of these are unique creations that don't show any DATA, other than the cache names.

USING data, copyrighted or not, to create a unique and new creation is legal. Ever write a term paper?

Silver

May 30, 2001

quote:
Originally posted by Silver:
There is one issue that looks like it has been overlooked here. Buxley's web pages did not DISPLAY any data that came from geocaching.com, other than the cache name.

It's a nice question for copyright law whether a transformation of data from numerical to graphical sidesteps copyright violation. I doubt that translating a work from English to French is enough to sidestep copyright violation, so I doubt this argument would work here, either.

But it's a moot point anyway. Copyright law doesn't protect data. As much as I don't like the thought of Jeremy's hard work being unprotected by copyright, it remains a fact (to this observer untrained in the law) that he can't copyright the data itself, only his original organization and arrangment of the data on his Web site.

He needs to look to means other than copyright to protect his database of coordinate data. For example, registration with strict terms of use would create a binding contract. Or he can just continue to use threats of denial of service and possible legal action. Even with the law on my side, the prospect of me having to hire a lawyer to defend myself would be enough to dissuade me from using data from his site. ;-(

[This message has been edited by Scout (edited 30 May 2001).]

May 30, 2001

quote:
Originally posted by Scout:
But it's a moot point anyway. Copyright law doesn't protect data. As much as I don't like the thought of Jeremy's hard work being unprotected by copyright, it remains a fact (to this observer untrained in the law) that he can't copyright the data itself, only his original organization and arrangment of the data on his Web site.

You are absolutely correct.

I am a publisher of zip code maps. We can NOT copyright any of the data shown on our maps (Cities, streets, zip code boundaries, etc.) but we can copyright, the "look" of the map. Most map publishers put several "traps" on their maps to catch people who are trying to reproduce the maps. These are usually small streets or features with names we have made up. These traps are enough to prove in court that the map was copied.

[This message has been edited by c.mathis (edited 30 May 2001).]

May 30, 2001

rver untrained in the law) that he can't copyright the data itself, only his original organization and arrangment of the data on his Web site.

He needs to look to means other than copyright to protect his database of coordinate data. For example, registration with strict terms of use would create a binding contract. Or he can just continue to use threats of denial of service and possible legal action. Even with the law on my side, the prospect of me having to hire a lawyer to defend myself would be enough to dissuade me from using data from his site. ;-(

[This message has been edited by Scout (edited 30 May 2001).]

the only issue i have with this here is by continually referring to the data as "his" makes it sound like jeremy goes out and hides and posts every single cache that has been created and all we are doing is getting that information from him. the cache's aren't his. the information isn't his either. nothing of that is his.

protecting "his hard work" would mean protecting the layout of this webpage from being copied. that is his hard work. and yes it is hard work, i agree. i have nothing but appreciation for it. i hope i have not given the impression for otherwise. the site is exceedingly well done, and very feature rich for which i'm glad to have the use of and will never say otherwise. and if the case were that someone were stealing the work from this site and trying to pass antoher site of as their own in that manner, then i most defnintely would agree that jeremy would need to be protected, but i just do not see that as the case in this situation.

but those cache's arent his. never have been and never will be. that data isnt is so to keep saying that allowing buxley to display the information is somehow not protecting jeremy's hard work is misleading. if jeremy planted every cache on this website, that probably would be a different story, but my take on this issue is that he is trying to take credit and control of many many many other people's hard work. namely the hundreds or thousands (i really don't know the exact number) of other people out there doing the stashing. and that's just not right.

[This message has been edited by Farqhuarson (edited 30 May 2001).]

May 30, 2001

quote:
Originally posted by Scout:
It remains a fact (to this observer untrained in the law) that he can't copyright the data itself, only his original organization and arrangment of the data on his Web site.

So what you're saying is, although you've never been trained in law or are a lawyer and admit that fact, you have come to conclusion that, by quoting a case regarding phone books, that a collection of coordinates taken from my web site can not be considered copyrightable.

May 30, 2001

quote:
Originally posted by Scout:
It remains a fact (to this observer untrained in the law) that he can't copyright the data itself, only his original organization and arrangment of the data on his Web site.

So what you're saying is, although you've never been trained in law or are a lawyer and admit that fact, you have come to conclusion that, by quoting a case regarding phone books, that a collection of coordinates taken from my web site can not be considered copyrightable.

May 30, 2001

If i use a SQL database (or an Excel spreadsheet or a PowerPoint presentation) to organize and present data on say a collection of widgets, does Microsoft now own, or possess a copyright on, the collection of widget data? Anyone that can answer yes to that question, and back it with legal precedent, should contact Bill Gates ASAP.

-Florian

------------------

http://www.stargazer.org/geocaching/

May 30, 2001

quote:
Originally posted by Farqhuarson:
the only issue i have with this here is by continually referring to the data as "his" makes it sound like jeremy goes out and hides and posts every single cache that has been created and all we are doing is getting that information from him. the cache's aren't his. the information isn't his either. nothing of that is his.

Jeremy collected the data. Yes, each individual datum was created by another individual and submitted to jeremy. But the collection as a whole is Jeremy's database. And there are ways to legally protect it, only not by copyright.

An analogy would be a directory of, say, physicians. Someone might collect the names, addresses, and phone numbers of every physician in their city. No, the collector of this database would not thereby *own* the names, addresses and phone numbers of the doctors, but he would own the collection. But no matter how much time and effort he went to to create the collection, copyright law does not protect the collection from reuse.

Farqhuarson, I think this is the core of our difference. I think there is some injustice in that. If another wants to create his own directory with the same or similar data, he should have to collect it himself. Unfortunately, copyright law doesn't work like that. Copyright law lets someone sit back and let another do all the hard work, then reuse the results with no compensation.

May 30, 2001

quote:
Originally posted by Farqhuarson:
and the only problem with that is the "C" word seems to be the central issue. That was the cause of the links being removed, and the website blocked from here, and the subsequent removal of the information from the other website.

To ignore the "C" word would be to ignore the entire issue that caused the situation.

I was replying to Krepism and his post. *smacks head* Sorry.

May 30, 2001

upreme Court would consider themselves bound by that precedent in a geocaching case can only be determined by testing it, which I don't intend to do.

Believing I'm right and being willing to go to the trouble and expense of a court case are two entirely different things. GPS stashing is just a hobby. ;-)

May 30, 2001

Originally posted by Scout:

>Jeremy collected the data.

As much as i admire and respect Jeremy and the Geocaching.com website, neither Jeremy nor Geocaching.com collected the data. (Let alone create it.) They provided a publicly accessible means by which cachers could enter and share caches. If Geocaching.com can claim ownership of such data, then i'd think Microsoft SQL would be equally justified in claiming ownership. (I'm using SQL as an example. I don't know what database is behind Geocaching.com but i'd wager that more time and man-hours went into developing the database server than went into designing Geocaching.com.)

-Florian

------------------

http://www.stargazer.org/geocaching/

May 30, 2001

Just in case nobody has thought of or heard of this, although it may be throwing liquid oxygen on the fire, it's definitely important.

For a lovely precedent of what can go wrong with user-submitted public databases, look up what Gracenote has done with CDDB. While CDDB was originally a free and open project (both the software and the database itself were distributed freely), Gracenote took them proprietary, patented the algorithm that CDDB uses (which shouldn't have been possible), started charging royalties, and is suing people who use FreeDB (which was forked from the free and open software version of CDDB).

I don't believe that anything like that is happening here, but it is a real-world example of the worst-case scenario actually being used, and it has made some people (myself included) extremely wary about what might happen to the data we enter in any free/open system.

May 30, 2001

quote:
Originally posted by jeremy:
So what you're saying is, although you've never been trained in law or are a lawyer and admit that fact, you have come to conclusion that, by quoting a case regarding phone books, that a collection of coordinates taken from my web site can not be considered copyrightable.

i take it that you are pretty much disregarding the contents of this thread and are totally unwilling to work with Buxley and reach any sort of compromise on the issue?

May 30, 2001

quote:
Originally posted by jeremy:
So what you're saying is, although you've never been trained in law or are a lawyer and admit that fact, you have come to conclusion that, by quoting a case regarding phone books, that a collection of coordinates taken from my web site can not be considered copyrightable.

i take it that you are pretty much disregarding the contents of this thread and are totally unwilling to work with Buxley and reach any sort of compromise on the issue?

May 30, 2001

quote:
Originally posted by Florian:
neither Jeremy nor Geocaching.com collected the data.

It's probably a question of semantics. By providing "a publicly accessible means by which cachers could enter and share caches" jeremy collected the data. I'm not sure what other verb you would use for his actions that resulted in the database his site uses.

And there's a difference between claiming a copyright for a database and claiming ownership of the individual data in it. Jeremy has claimed copyright. That's different from ownership.

Any relevance of the choice of tools used to collect the data (e.g., SQL) escapes me.

May 30, 2001

Anything dated prior to the 25th day of May of 2001. Otherwise, he has absolutely nothing that he can threaten Buxley with whatsoever, in a court of anything much less law.

So basically (be prepared people, im about get rude) because at this point I'm exceedingly annoyed by what i percieve as arrogance and total disdain for all of us that participate in activity who he has no authority over.

So jeremy please put up or shut up.

May 30, 2001

Originally posted by Scout:

>Any relevance of the choice of tools used to collect the data (e.g., SQL) escapes me.

I would class Geocaching.com as a "tool" for accessing cache data. Geocaching.com was/is the "tool" we are using to share cache data. (Well one of the tools... The database, the internet, my ISP, etc are all part of it.)

-Florian

------------------

http://www.stargazer.org/geocaching/

May 30, 2001

quote:
Originally posted by Farqhuarson:
yeah i would agree that the core of our differences are the view of Buxley's work as a whole, considering the amount of hours that he had to have put in to create the product, he far from just copied and reused information that someone else created.

I apologize to Ed Hall if I implied that he didn't also put in a lot of hard work on his site. It's obvious he did.

That said, he did use, in whole, the data that was in a database maintained by Jeremy. Ed did not independently gather this data. Ed did not set up the means for GPS stashers to submit the data to his site as well as Jeremy's. So, in that respect, Ed Hall's work is not "entirely" unique. In fact, without the data from Jeremy's database, Ed's maps would be empty.

But, legally, it is Ed's right to use the data from Jeremy's database. If the only protection Jeremy asserts over the data on his site is copyright, Jeremy will lose any court test he brings (in the opinion of this non-lawyer, I must always remind you).

As for Jeremy's motives, that requires armchair psychology. I make an even worse psychologist than I do a lawyer. ;-)

May 30, 2001

quote:
Originally posted by Florian:
I would class Geocaching.com as a "tool" for accessing cache data.

The reason that Jeremy owns this collection of data is not because he used geocaching.com to collect it. It's because HE collected it. The tool used to collect it or store it is irrelevant.

But just as Jeremy was free to reuse data submitted by GPS stashers to his Web site, others are free to reuse the data from Jeremy's Web site. The original GPS stashers can't copyright the coordinates to their stashes and neither can Jeremy.

May 30, 2001

Originally posted by Scout:

>The reason that Jeremy owns this collection of data is not because he used geocaching.com to collect it. It's because HE collected it. The tool used to collect it or store it is irrelevant.

We're arguing semantics and i don't know who will decide these definitions. I don't see that Geocaching.com "collected" the information any more than SQL (or whatever database stores the information) collected the information. That these tools made the collection possible, yes. (Just as the internet and my computer make access possible.) But they, Geocaching.com or SQL, did not actively collect the data. They only offered a means to share the information.

>But just as Jeremy was free to reuse data submitted by GPS stashers to his Web site, others are free to reuse the data from Jeremy's Web site. The original GPS stashers can't copyright the coordinates to their stashes and neither can Jeremy.

This i agree with wholeheartedly. (Yay!)

-Florian

------------------

http://www.stargazer.org/geocaching/

May 30, 2001

>But just as Jeremy was free to reuse data submitted by GPS stashers to his Web site, others are free to reuse the data from Jeremy's Web site. The original GPS stashers can't copyright the coordinates to their stashes and neither can Jeremy.

This i agree with wholeheartedly. (Yay!)

[/b]

i'll chime in and say that i too am of that same opinion.

May 30, 2001

Unlike anyone else here I am an Intellectual Property Attorney who commutes between Seattle and the Bay Area. People pay around $300/hr. for my opinions on this sort of thing. The topic is not simple, there has been a lot of misinformation posted here but I am not about to give a detailed analysis of the whole matter.

Geocaching is a fun way to get outdoors and play with our toys. The surest way to kill it is to try to convert it into a commercial operation and start engaging in meaningless turf wars. The object is to have fun and engage in spirited competition. Both you guys should just chill and keep in mind the object of the game. The vast majority of people here just want this to end and things return to normalcy. I am afraid we are headed down a path that will only harm the sport.

May 30, 2001

being fought out in the court system as we debate this here. While Geocaching.com has not done what Gracenote has done to the data that people (myself included) entered into the CDDB system, this entire thread seems to be circling around that hypothetical.

If you haven't heard anything of the whole CDDB, Gracenote, Roxio, GPL, copyright, patent, and so on story, I can dig up the articles and post a summary if need be, but please at least take note of what is happening in another case before you say that you have no idea what any of our situations could mean. (I may be a newbie to geocaching and the like, but the CDDB stuff is fairly well known to me.)

May 30, 2001

this is long, sorry.

[non-lawyer's opinion] The way I see it, the database created by Jeremy belongs to Jeremy. Jeremy provides access to others to use under the Geocaching policies/rules. Users create caches of their own free will, and provide the coordinates to Geocaching of their own free will. Cache owners have every right to provide their cache coordinates to anyone they want to. It's their cache, they can advertise it. Just as your home address is not copyrightable, a collection of home addresses may be copyrightable, or is at the very least, a trade secret. Businesses are built on trade secrets.

However, Jeremy could implement a policy where he requires exclusive use (or joint ownership) of cache coordinate submissions. Then, should the cache owner submit the coordinates to his cache to multiple hosts, Jeremy could refuse to list the cache. It might be bad for business, but it would be his right.

As for the ability to copyright the data on Geocaching.com, I feel Jeremy is within his rights. Although the data is provided by users and individual entries are listed on individual web pages, Geocaching.com is still a database, a collection of data, a trade secret. If someone copies that database (perhaps developing a method of linking directly to Geocaching.com and extracting the data), then they may very well be in violation of some law, perhaps a trade secret law.

Example: the bank I work at has a large database of customers with seed names & addresses. We outsourced the printing & mailing of some advertisements. The company that did the mailing used our customer list (complete with seed names), to create a mailing that was not authorized by our bank. We sued, we won. Our customer list is vital to the survival of our business.

Similarly, it is rumored that map companies add non-existant streams, roads, or other features to maps so they can track down copyright violations.

So, Jeremy could, in theory, include seed caches so he could prove the data came from his database. Of course, cache hunters might get upset when they discover they are hunting non-existant caches. Perhaps there is another solution for Jeremy to make his list unique.

As for the coordinates, a simple solution would be for someone to create a moderated mailing list with a standard format, and cache owners would post the coordinates, names, and descriptions of their caches. Then, any business/web site could extract the data out and put it on their own web site. And any web site/business could sniff the data and exclude caches that they didn't have exclusive rights to.

Heck Jeremy, Ed, and whomever could monitor the mailing list for new caches and put them on their sites. If someone wanted to, they could submit their cache to Geocaching.com to be listed *exclusively* on Geocaching.com. Jeremy could highlight these caches in some way, maybe only list exclusive caches in the weekly "new cache in your area" notifications.

Bottom line, it's Jeremy's database, he does have the right to control how the data is used. If you want Ed to have the data, send it to Ed directly.

[/opinion]

May 30, 2001

"a friend" has the most intelligent perspective...

For the VAST MAJORITY OF THE PARTICIPANTS, the whole system is working quite well!

3 or 5 loudmouths shouldn't (and WON'T) ruin the game for the thousand or more geocachers... Everyone wants a piece, I guess...

You're not required to geocache according to Jeremy's, or any other person's rules... If you want to splinter off into a geocaching faction, go ahead... If you want more people in your game, and they agree with you, you'll get em... If not, they'll stay here...

I wager that 99% of geocachers will stick with geocaching.com...

May 30, 2001

>CDDB, Gracenote, Roxio, GPL

Clay, can you tell us what some of these terms mean? I've no idea.

-Florian

------------------

http://www.stargazer.org/geocaching/

May 30, 2001

ok the site down.

Stop being childish please and simply stand up and say either yes or no that you have that proof or not. Because if you don't, then it was your own fault that you were asking someone to do something that you had no right to ask.

And so don't blame me or these other "loudmouths" for presenting facts and arguments. We aren't ruining anything. We are just trying to clarify what the actual truth is.

Which until further proof is shown to me, i think i already know the answer.

[This message has been edited by Farqhuarson (edited 30 May 2001).]

May 30, 2001

quote:
Originally posted by Mike_Teague:
"a friend" has the most intelligent perspective...

For the VAST MAJORITY OF THE PARTICIPANTS, the whole system is working quite well!

3 or 5 loudmouths shouldn't (and WON'T) ruin the game for the thousand or more geocachers... Everyone wants a piece, I guess...

You're not required to geocache according to Jeremy's, or any other person's rules... If you want to splinter off into a geocaching faction, go ahead... If you want more people in your game, and they agree with you, you'll get em... If not, they'll stay here...

I wager that 99% of geocachers will stick with geocaching.com...

and the point wasn't ever if the current system worked or not. Or whether or not we liked the system here. The point always has been and will be for me anyways, he has no right to tell any of us what we can have and cannot have on our websites. Or demand that we remove information or add anykind of copyright notice.

and he has yet to provide any indication or proof that he HAS a copyright other than a little html page that says so. And anyone can create one of those, but that means nothing. I can scribble one on a piece of paper with a crayon that has as much value as that. that issue has COMPLETELY AND TOTALLY BEEN IGNORED, yet it was under that premise that he banned Ed Hall and forced him to shut off his maps. So all im asking for is PROOF.

not to mention his little privacy policy disclaimer that he was adding to the site a few minutes ago when i initially tried to log back in and thought i had been banned, was a DIRECT RESULT of this "loudmouth" which he's going to use to try an enforce a non existant copyright.

So that "improvement" to the site was direct result of this conversation. So those of you on that side of the conversation should be GLAD that it happened because now you have even a small something backing you (although it really doesnt apply to a couple thousand cache information submitted without the privacy disclaimer).

and the so called "friend" claimed misleading information. But he never pointed out what that information was. I provided direct quotes from the information that was found, and posted them to provide facts for the situation. If any of that is "misleading" i would like for him to go through it and show me why. Until then i'm going to be hard pressed to believe someone that simply says, "oh its misleading". I apologize if that sounds offensive, its not meaning to be, but for a couple people this entire thread has been completely devoid of information to back people's position. Nearly every post i have made had the quote or url to the information that i was refrencing.

So you'll have to excuse me if at the moment i'm more than a little pissed at being ignored and having someone thumb his nose at me.

May 30, 2001

johnny, some comments:

The geocaching.com database cannot be a trade secret because it fails the most important test: it's not secret. The data is publicly available.

As far as I can tell, Jeremy provides access to it under no policies or rules at all. The Web site offers assurances that it will respect your privacy, but it puts no restrictions on the user that I remember. There is only a copyright notice, whose reach is at the heart of the dispute about the data. I agree that Jeremy could require registration to the site which would include terms of service, but it's not set up that way currently.

A collection of home addresses is NOT copyrightable. Seeding the collection with errors can prove that the collection was copied, but so what? Copying freely available data is not a violation of copyright law.

In your bank example, I assume that the bank's mailing list was provided to the printing company under some contract that denied permission to reuse it. The printing company violated a contract, not a copyright. I do not recall seeing any such contract, real or implied, in using the geocaching.com Web site.

Bottom line, it's Jeremy's database, but he loses the right to control how the data is used when he posts it in a public place on the Internet with no contractual terms for accessing it. Data is NOT copyrightable.

By now, everyone knows I am NOT a lawyer. I just play one on the Internet for entertainment value. ;-)

May 30, 2001

quote:
Originally posted by Farqhuarson:
and he has yet to provide any indication or proof that he HAS a copyright other than a little html page that says so.

Actually, that's good enough. You don't have to register a copyright with the government to have one. It's just easier to prove that you copyrighted the expression if it goes to court if you register it. But you can win a court case without registration if you have strong evidence that the material in question was marked with a copyright claim.

None of this changes the fact that you can't copyright data, even if you do have some kind of registration to show.

But, again, I'm just spouting off, as I have no legal training. So do you own research and consult your own attorney.

May 30, 2001

be that to use Jeremy's collection of data to produce a map does violate the copyright law.

[This message has been edited by c.mathis (edited 30 May 2001).]

May 30, 2001

I was riding home on the bus today (public transportation makes me think about wierd stuff) and for some reason my attention shifted to Google.com and the way that they cache pages. So once I got home I put my idea to the test by searching for one of my caches on google and the first result was the geocaching page:

quote:
Originally on google.com
www.geocaching.com/seek/cache_details.asp?ID=1981 - 16k - Cached - Similar pages

and sure enough the second result was my own page for my cache on my website:

quote:
Originally on google.com
www.agefive.com/geocache/My_Caches/G-NX-003/g-nx-003.html - 13k - Cached - Similar pages

It just made me wonder how this is ok while what Buxley was doing was not in Jeremy's opinion. Google doesn't have just a map of the locations, but all of the actual pages (those Google bots are busy critters). Then it gets tricky because if Jeremy is claiming that geocaching.com is a value-added service then google.com seems like it is the Walmart of value-added-goodness.

------------------

-Iron Chef

_ _ _________________ _ _

agefive.com/geocache/

"But a big booming voice from the sky is exactly what you have found..."

-Contact

[This message has been edited by Iron Chef (edited 30 May 2001).]

May 31, 2001

This thread takes too long to open on my slow connection. I say we retire it.

May 31, 2001

OK, back to copyright. You can NOT copyright data. You CAN copyright a "collection" of data. But the "collection" has to pass three tests. Without listing the all the qualifications that a collection must pass, here is a link to the Supreme Court opinion on copyrighting facts: (See paragraphs 35 & 36)

http://www.law.cornell.edu/copyright/cases/499_US_340.htm

No, this is not the only issue about copyrights that might be relevant here, but at least it gives some perspective on the issue.

Silver

May 31, 2001

No matter how many discussions take place I hope the Buxley maps get restored soon. I feel lost without them as they were extremely helpful. Thanks Ed for taking the time to produce such a great asset to this sport. Your hard work has not gone unnoticed!

May 31, 2001

quote:
Originally posted by bunkerdave:
This thread takes too long to open on my slow connection. I say we retire it.

I agree! I have had enough of Farqhuarson et al. spouting on and on with their self righteous babble . You guys will have to simply agree to disagree and get over it. Just leave it to Ed and Jeremy to work out between themselves (and I hope they can). I think there are more important things we could be doing with our time. In fact, I think I will get up and start putting together some new stashes...right now.

Cheers,

Donovan.

May 31, 2001

quote:
Originally posted by bunkerdave:
This thread takes too long to open on my slow connection. I say we retire it.

I agree! I have had enough of Farqhuarson et al. spouting on and on with their self righteous babble . You guys will have to simply agree to disagree and get over it. Just leave it to Ed and Jeremy to work out between themselves (and I hope they can). I think there are more important things we could be doing with our time. In fact, I think I will get up and start putting together some new stashes...right now.

Cheers,

Donovan.

May 31, 2001

I don't understand what the problem is. Jeremy is upset that Buxley didn't ad a copyright back to Geocaching. But what about the reverse? It is clear that ed was the first with that type of mapping software for Geocaching and it is also clear that Jeremy is a bit fame hungry and is upset that the attention was pushed to Ed and his maps. so let me ask you! Is Jeremy jumping on Ed's copyright of the mapping he has? I think ed should threaten Jeremy with a lawsuit like Jeremy did to him.

It seems to me that this is like a toy to Jeremy, and if nobody plays the way he wants, he's gonna take it and go home.

I came in to look at the maps and they were gone, thats why I am upset. Do the right thing and swallow your pride Jeremy, put the maps back on and move on.

May 31, 2001

a compilation . . . extends only to the material contributed by the author of such work, as distinguished from the preexisting material employed in the work, and does not imply any exclusive right in the preexisting material." § 103(.

[43] As § 103 makes clear, copyright is not a tool by which a compilation author may keep others from using the facts or data he or she has collected. ... Rather, the facts contained in existing works may be freely copied because copyright protects only the elements that owe their origin to the compiler -- the selection, coordination, and arrangement of facts.

FEIST PUBLICATIONS, INC. v. RURAL TELEPHONE SERVICE CO., 499 U.S. 340 (1991)

I don't think it could be made clearer than that.

P.S. The quote above was taken from a majority opinion written by Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor. She should meet Jeremy's "actual lawyer" test.

[This message has been edited by Scout (edited 31 May 2001).]

May 31, 2001

Jeremy Irish says:

quote:
Feel free to contact an actual lawyer and have them quote some sort of fact regarding copyright on this site if you like. Otherwise folks should consider the conversation uninformed and moot.

What makes anyone think an "actual lawyer" has a monopoly on what is right and what is wrong? About half of the "actual" lawyer's who go to court everyday wind up loosing their case which means of course that they were wrong.

I find some of the arguements presented by the several 'non-lawyers' in this discussion very intreging and compelling. Especially where they are quoting case law and you and your lawyer are not.

Anyway, to get back on topic. I don't really care who claims what as far as "intellectual property" rights are concerned. I will just continue to make use of what is available. If another site comes up where I can get information on caches and can post my caches, I'll make use of it as well. And it is going to happen; count on it!

If someone can make some money on this, it's also fine by me.

The problem with only having one location to post and find caches is very evident from this discussion. Do you think that if there were 4 or 5 or 15 websites that we could take advantage of for our hobby we would be worried about what Jeremy claims to be his? Of course not.

And to anyone who is thinking of starting another website, I'll be looking for it. Not so I can ditch GeoCaching.com, but so I'll have another place to post and find caches. GeoCaching.com may be the 'Kleenex' of the GPS treasure hunt world, but someday soon we'll have plenty of 'tissues' to choose from.

May 31, 2001

quote:
Originally posted by echosgold:
No matter how many discussions take place I hope the Buxley maps get restored soon. I feel lost without them as they were extremely helpful. Thanks Ed for taking the time to produce such a great asset to this sport. Your hard work has not gone unnoticed!

thats ok because jeremey isnt actually going to listen to anyone in here. he really doesnt give a dadgum about anyone's concerns but his own.

May 31, 2001

quote:
Originally posted by Scout:
I don't think it could be made clearer than that.

P.S. The quote above was taken from a majority opinion written by Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor. She should meet Jeremy's "actual lawyer" test.

[This message has been edited by Scout (edited 31 May 2001).]

well obviously not since you posted the link originally, and i posted a direct quote, both he either did not read (i'm voting the did not read since he said he had no clue as to why a phone book case had any bearing on this discussion, it is only the leading case in regards to this type of copyright question at the moment as relayed to me by an indivuidual in the law profession) or chose to completely disregard.

May 31, 2001

quote:
Originally posted by Florian:
>CDDB, Gracenote, Roxio, GPL

Clay, can you tell us what some of these terms mean? I've no idea.

Here's a link to the Gracenote stories on Slashdot.org. Take a short look around the handful that show up, and you should be able to come quickly up to speed. (I'd post a more thorough explanation, but I'm working on a principal's computer right now, so it wouldn't be professional.)

http://slashdot.org/search.pl?query=gracenote

May 31, 2001

quote:
Originally posted by ClayJar:
Here's a link to the Gracenote stories on Slashdot.org.

Gracenote sued Roxio, alleging patent and trademark infringement, as well as breach of contract. Copyright violation, which is at the heart of the geocaching.com dispute, is not the issue Gracenote is depending on to win its case. So this lawsuit does not seem to have much relevance to our little soap opera.

May 31, 2001

Gracenote is making all their allegations solely based on software and data that was created and entered by the public. The only piece we're (thankfully) missing is somebody filing and receiving a patent on the Geocaching database. (This is like trying to catch someone up to the third season of Babylon 5... it never seems to get the gist across.)

May 31, 2001

erdana, Arial">quote:

Originally posted by Sun _Tzu:

quote:
Originally posted by WJJagfan:
Hey, why doesn't someone else start another website where I can post my cache as well. I wouldn't mind posting my cache to three or four different sites. What happens to this 'sport' if one day Mr. Irish decides to bag it or if some other unforeseen problem arises with 'geocaching.com'?

Try www.geotreasures.com

If I had the technical know-how, I would certainly consider it. If indeed the game is important to Mr. Irish, I would think he would be in favor of such a proposition.

Plenty of people have the technical know-how, but it takes more than technical know-how. You need space and bandwidth, and that costs. That is the biggest reason for J.I.'s hard position on the copyright stuff. There is some real capital tied up in the geocaching.com presence, and I'm guessing he would like to get to a point where the investement will generate some revenue. I'm sure that if a majority of the users had serious complaints about his treatment of the situation, he would be more flexible. VIVA CAPITALISM!!!

May 31, 2001

quote:
Originally posted by Mike_Teague:
"a friend" has the most intelligent perspective...

For the VAST MAJORITY OF THE PARTICIPANTS, the whole system is working quite well!

3 or 5 loudmouths shouldn't (and WON'T) ruin the game for the thousand or more geocachers... Everyone wants a piece, I guess...

You're not required to geocache according to Jeremy's, or any other person's rules... If you want to splinter off into a geocaching faction, go ahead... If you want more people in your game, and they agree with you, you'll get em... If not, they'll stay here...

I wager that 99% of geocachers will stick with geocaching.com...

if that is the case please visit www.geotreasures.com

May 31, 2001

Closing this due to its length. You can continue discussions here -

http://forums.Groundspeak.com/ubb/Forum2/HTML/000321.html

Pin Map Link Disappeared !!

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