Re: (PM) killer competition:free internet

Dick St.Peters (stpeters@NetHeaven.com)
Sat, 10 Apr 1999 21:53:40 -0400

Paul Gregg writes:
> Dick St.Peters <stpeters@NetHeaven.com> wrote:
> > term "Free-Net" is copyrighted by nptn.org, and all it means is that a
>
> > A few years ago the lawyer who headed nptn.org was passing out threats
> > to people who used "freenet" or any similar term in postings on the
> > net, saying that violated his copyright. I got one.
>
> He would have to establish the copyright in court to make it stick.
> As long as someone (anyone) could show prior use of the term "Freenet"
> (and surely it's a generic) then his "copyright" is a pile of shit.

I felt so too, but he claimed a registered copyright. I was unable to
find any conclusive proof of prior generic use - nearly all the
existing freenets at the time (1992 or 1993) appeared to be affiliated
with nptn.org and could be presumed likely to take his side. Besides,
I was employed by GE at the time and using GE R&D's net access, and it
seemed unlikely that GE would take kindly to winding up in court
because I wanted to use freenet as a generic term.

--
Dick St.Peters, stpeters@NetHeaven.com 
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