[Nettime-bold] Re: <nettime> Dialectizer closes; a victim of the Corporate NapsterBandwagon?

[Amy Alexander <plagiari@plagiarist.org>]

On Thu, 18 May 2000, Benjamin Geer wrote:

> On Thu, May 18, 2000 at 12:50:42PM -0400, DLOska@aol.com wrote:
> > Does anybody know the specifics to how ordinary translations
> > (e.g. an English translation of a Spanish novel, etc.) are
> > understood under copyright law?
> 
> It seems to me that copyright notices often say that the work's
> copyright covers translation as well as ordinary copying.

What are the current laws regarding selective enforcement then? I'm able
to do an English to French translation of Bank of America's web page using
Babelfish, so presumably, B of A hasn't threatened litigation against the
Babelfish/Altavista people to prevent them from translating B of A's
pages.

My understanding about US copyright enforcement is that copyright holders
are obligated to go after anyone they know about who is infringing on
their copyright, or risk losing it. (Or is that just for trademarks?) If
that's right, then it would be difficult to believe that B of A heard
about Dialectizer but never heard of Babelfish.

Anyone know of a legal reason why enforcement wouldn't apply to both? 

Seems to me, Dialectizer, which is non-commerical and is a parody,
would fall more under "Fair Use" than translation, where Babelfish is
simply a translation and is commercial (they sell ads.)

-amy



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