Re: Modification of reference material

[John Hasler <john@dhh.gt.org>]

Arnoud writes:
> And if you want to use a small portion of our text, you're citing from
> our work, so that's already covered in copyright law (you must give us
> credit, not cite more than necessary, etc).

Under "fair use" I can quote from your text for critical or educational
purposes, but I can't use your material in the sense of substituting a
small portion of your work for work I would otherwise have written myself.

Example: you write a novel that contains a 300 word description of Whitefish
Bay as seen from the Iroquois Point lighthouse on a stormy November day.  I
can I can quote you to prove you wrong: "As you can see in the photo in
fig. 55, Arnoud's description is quite inaccurate...".  I can quote you to
analyze your sentence structure" "Arnaud's sentences tend to become quite
ornate when he is setting the scene..."  I can use your work as an example:
"Arnaud's Iroquois Point novel is a fine example of the 'dark and stormy
night' genre..."  I cannot, however, insert the description into my own
novel to save myself the trouble of writing it.
-- 
John Hasler
john@dhh.gt.org (John Hasler)
Dancing Horse Hill
Elmwood, WI