John Norman's Chronicles of Gor - Copyright [Posting Guidelines and Moderator's Notes]

Hi folks,

I'd like to remind everyone that all material on this site is copyrighted unless specifically stated otherwise. In particular, John Norman retains copyright to all his letters published on this site. It is both a breach of our <a href="http://gorchronicles.com/modules/wfch ... ?pagenum=2">Terms of Service</a>, and also illegal, to copy them to any other site, even if a link back to this site is provided, without permission to do so. Without that permission it's fine to post links to the letters, and to post quotes from them, but that's all. I would ask anyone who has copied any letter from this site to either remove it or to ensure that they obtain copyright permission. I found a copy of one letter posted on another site earlier on and I may well be contacting them to specifically request they remove the article in question.

Here at CoG we operate a very strict policy where copyright is concerned, and we never publish anything without permission. Over the past year I've contacted a number of people to request permission to publish their material and so far nobody has refused. Amongst that material are articles by David Alexander Smith, Jeffrey M. Elliott and most recently Steven Saylor (who even added a link on his own site to his article on this site). Having to get permission to post material written by others may seem like a pain, but usually all that is required is a simple email. It may also seem like a risk, as there's a chance the copyright holder might say no, but in my experience that's a risk well worth taking.

I've found that copyright holders very much appreciate it when people respect their rights, and hence they tend to grant the permission requested. On the other hand they can get rather annoyed if they find their articles copied illegally. As an example of what can happen if copyright is not properly respected it may be worth reading <a href="http://www.ursulakleguin.com/Note-OpenLetter.html">an open letter by Ursula K. Le Guin</a> regarding the illegal posting of an article she had written. As the infringer involved there found, copyright infringement can damange your reputation, but in some respects he escaped quite lightly. Had Ms Le Guin issued a formal Notice of Infringement to his web hosts the infringement might have cost him his site.

The moral of all this is that asking permission will only enhance your reputation and you will usually find permission is granted, whereas posting something by someone else without permission will only damage your reputation, if you're lucky, and may cost you your site if you're not.

Simon

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