What Is It With Florida?

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Max Maven
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What Is It With Florida?

Postby Max Maven » July 6th, 2016, 1:38 am

Recent court ruling regarding copyright issues, citing a particularly foolish decades-old case involving magic;

http://www.billboard.com/files/pdfs/Bul ... lletin.pdf

Rick Ruhl
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Re: What Is It With Florida?

Postby Rick Ruhl » July 7th, 2016, 12:07 am

It's a mess here. Remember you had appendicitis here, and I'm trying to get back to LA . Lol

It's the sun and the humidity, it's like 3000° Here and it fries peoples brains .

Ian Richards
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Re: What Is It With Florida?

Postby Ian Richards » July 7th, 2016, 10:14 am

Another musician ...

Jim Martin
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Re: What Is It With Florida?

Postby Jim Martin » July 7th, 2016, 10:40 am

This link to the full opinion issued by the court has more details on the 1943 "Think-A-Drink Hoffman" v. "Think-A-Drink Count Maurice" trial (pp. 6 - 10):
http://media.ca11.uscourts.gov/opinions ... 0.cert.pdf
Jim Martin
St. Louis MO

JordanB
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Re: What Is It With Florida?

Postby JordanB » July 7th, 2016, 12:46 pm

Wow. I have a headache from trying to read that. Thank God I'm not an attorney.

The real irony is that I was listening to the Turtles when I clicked on the link (true story). It only would have been better had it been on Sirius XM.

Curtis Kam
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Re: What Is It With Florida?

Postby Curtis Kam » July 7th, 2016, 4:55 pm

It truly is odd seeing a case involving magi cited in order to protect someone's intellectual property rights. The local common law rule they describe is something of a Catch 22: one could lose copyright protection through public showings? What good is copyright protection if it's only effective if you don't show anyone? If you don't show your ideas to the public, you don't need protection.

I'm not sure, but it seems that the Hoffman court was confusing "The first person ever to do this" with "The first person ever to do this in this manner". Either is a defensible definition of "originality" however, in my opinion, the former sets the bar too high.

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Richard Kaufman
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Re: What Is It With Florida?

Postby Richard Kaufman » July 7th, 2016, 5:15 pm

My lay opinion is that the settled law is that the only way to keep something secret is not to show it to anyone.
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John LeBlanc
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Re: What Is It With Florida?

Postby John LeBlanc » July 7th, 2016, 5:30 pm

This is another skirmish of a war ostinsibly fought since April 12, 1861.

John


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