> > I don't understand something (maybe an easy one for you) looking at
> > the bottom of the page:
> > 
> > "Please note:
> > All contents on this site remain the property of myself.
> > Please feel free to use the information found here in "one off",
> > personal, hobbiest type projects.
> > No permission is granted for using the information on this site in
> > commercial type projects.
> > Please contact me at webmaster@farcite.net about using any of the
> > contents on this site in a commercial application"
> > 
> > My questions are just two:
> > -how could be a web page content being your property as long is
> > published for free access on the web?
> 
> Well, similar to most IP, the act of publishing something only makes it
> public domain if you don't say it's copyright (or something like that?).
> I don't know the details but I have heard that there is implied
> copyright (or something like that), but to put the notice makes it more
> "clear"? I'm sure someone here is more familiar with the details.

If the US no copyright notice is needed to protect the form of the page. The
copyright notice is nice, though.

However, all that protects is the exact wording.

Again, I believe that US patent law requires you to file for a patent
within a year of being published. I don't know if normal web pages are
considered published, but the wording of your license indicates that
*you* do which would probably be considered. And it would be a patent
that protects your idea, not a copyright.

So if you're in the US and not going to patent it, then why bother?

Basically your wording may make things worse for you. After reading this
thread I won't even look at your site. One problem is that if I, as a
writer, decide to write an article that may even look like it infringes
on your idea, you (remember, I don't know you except that you are
fanatically trying to protect ideas) you might sue if you thought I got
the ideas from your web site.

If I were in a similar business, I would avoid your site for similar
reasons.

> >  It's like you've plant a flower in the center of your city,
> > feed it every day with water and saying to everyone is looking to it
> > and smells it
> > (and sometimes brake it) : "This is my flower, it's my property!"
> 
> IP, being something non physical, is a much different beast.

Yes, trying to hold it down is even worse. I've seen *many* home automation
schemes (I gather this is what your page is about from the discussion)
and I doubt that you have anything more than incremental improvements,
if even that.

> > -how would you know if any information from this site would be used in
> > any commercial projects, if you'll don't receive feedbacks from the
> > owners of those?
> 
> I wouldn't, plain and simple. Protecting IP is a HUGE issue these days,

Right. If you wouldn't know that anybody infringed, then why bother trying
to stop them?

> > There are so antagonistic relations between you nice project description
> > and your foot note, so I've just let you know.
> 
> Please don't see it as antagonistic. All I'm trying to do with that is
> make it clear that if you don't make money off it, I have no problem
> with you doing what you want with the information.

Why? If you can't make any money off of it, why would you try to prevent
somebody else from doing so? And there is always the chance that a company
that wants to do this might hire you to do it. Your notice makes that
extremely difficult for the reasons I mentioned earlier.

> It's actually a pretty common type clause in much work made available on
> the net.

And my comments are applicable there also. I see more open licenses all
the time, plus the venerable GPL. I prefer a more open licence and am
moving my software to this. I haven't done it because I haven't had
time for text changes recently. :)
-- 
D. Jay Newman           ! Author of:
jay@sprucegrove.com     ! _Linux Robotics: Building Smarter Robots_
http://enerd.ws/robots/ ! (Now I can get back to building robots.)
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