IP: copyrighting a URL *link*??!!

[Dave Farber <farber@cis.upenn.edu>]

X-Sender: jwarren@mail.well.com
Date: Sun, 2 Aug 1998 13:27:16 -0800
To: farber@cis.upenn.edu (Dave Farber), love@essential.org
From: Jim Warren <jwarren@well.com>
Subject: copyrighting a URL *link*??!!


I just got this note from a long-time friend and former reporter and editor
in Palo Alto, Californica <sic>.  GEEZ! -- what *will* the bucks-hustlers
and control-freaques think of next?!


--jim-in-disgust; jwarren@well.com
Jim Warren, sometime columnist, political irritant, hedonist wannabe


===


>There's a minor flap going on in Palo Alto about whether someone can
>copyright a URL *link* to a sub-page of a Web site -- thus being able to
>limit who links to their pages. On one hand, the URL is a unique appendage
>created as part of the copyrighted page, and thus might be included in the
>copyright protection. On the other hand, it's like a street address, not
>copyright-able.
>
>I also raised the question whether being able to include a URL that is just
>in the text, with no link, is a freedom-of-speech matter -- vs. making it
>a link to the page, and if there is any legal distinction between the two.
>To which Harry Saal added that his e-mail program automatically makes
>anything that resembles a URL into a link if it connects to something.
>
>I noted that the ability to link is one of the basics of the efficient flow
>of information on the Internet, whereas copying text from a copyrighted Web
>site and distributing it via another Web site or via e-mail/listserv
>probably is a copyright violation.