Re: [dvd-discuss] Shrinkwrap Licenses....extending them

["Glendon M. Gross" <gross(at)xinetd.ath.cx>]

He says it's "Common Law Copyright", as opposed to federal copyright. 
I'm skeptical about it, but I am also watching a pending case he has as
an interested spectator.

He claims that under the system in the book, a person can become "the
owner of his straw man name" and therefore become the "secured party",
therefore
changing from the debtor to the creditor.  He files an affadavit with
the court, after which (he claims) he will be able to assume control of
all his creditor's assets.  I have yet to see the system work for him,
so I'm going to reserve judgment until I see some results.

Joshua Stratton wrote:
> 
> Well, federal copyright won't work for names, AFAIK. Maybe state
> copyrights would, but they were pretty largely preempted in 1976. And how
> are damages handled under whatever system he's using? At any rate, the
> people suing him sound like they're very nicely within fair use even if
> there is a copyright, which there probably isn't.
> 
> No offense, but your friend, or at least the book, sounds pretty full of
> crap to me.
> 
> On Thu, 1 May 2003, Glendon M. Gross wrote:
> 
> > There is someone out there who is doing something very similar using
> > common law copyright based on the U.C.C.   I have a friend who is
> > looking into it.  The book with the information on it is called
> > "Cracking the code."  You copyright your name and then charge people
> > extensive fees when
> > they use it to attempt to sue you.  (My friend is charging $500,000. per
> > use of his buisiness name, which he has copyrighted.) At that rate,
> > it could be very expensive for his creditors to sue him.
> >
> >
> > microlenz@earthlink.net wrote:
> > >
> > > Something I've been pondering as I slowly reconstitute my home computing after
> > > problems, upgrades, and the like (the old machine is going to LINUX with a boot
> > > manager...the data acq. board doesn't have a linux driver)...The whole idea of
> > > a shrinkwrap license is that I can dump it on your doorstep using the mail, UPS
> > > or through the market place or Internet and when you open it, click on it or
> > > whatever a CONTRACT suddenly appears where none existed before. A contract
> > > without negociation or a meeting of the minds and in the case of the small
> > > print ones prolifferating one with questionable legality.
> > >
> > > So...what other kinds of questionallby legal contracts can form from this
> > > perverted notion...
> > >
> > > Supppose I send a check to the Republican party in a box with a shrinkwrap
> > > contract saying "you agree that if you cash this check the Republican party
> > > platform will hence forth never mention the XXX issue and if you ever do you
> > > will pay damages of $1000M to me!"....
> > >
> > > What about donations to politicians?
> > >
> > > Or  Charities...
> > >
> > > Any other ideas?
> > >
> > > Realize this is a reductio ad absurdum sort of approach
> >