Quote from Veteran Official that's seen the most A-11 Games in the Nation

[BktBallRef]

He never gives up. I often wonder, if it's so legal, then why is he trying to convince us?

BTW, Mods, I'm pretty sure it's against forum rules to post copyrighted material.

[LDUB]

Originally Posted by BktBallRef

BTW, Mods, I'm pretty sure it's against forum rules to post copyrighted material.

People quote paragraphs from copyrighted rule books all the time. Why is this any different?

[BktBallRef]

Originally Posted by LDUB

People quote paragraphs from copyrighted rule books all the time. Why is this any different?

Having contact with the webmaster of NFHS.org, I know that they do not have a problem with references used in discussions. They do not, however, allow the rules to be posted in whole on websites.

[Robert Goodman]

Originally Posted by BktBallRef

Having contact with the webmaster of NFHS.org, I know that they do not have a problem with references used in discussions. They do not, however, allow the rules to be posted in whole on websites.

They wouldn't have a leg to stand on if they tried to sue for a violation of their copyright. All someone would have to do would to submit to the court an NCAA rule book, and show that the great majority of Fed's content is verbatim from there -- and that's before even getting at the legality of copyright on instructions.

If Fed then said they only meant to protect the provisions that were uniquely their own, the question to be asked would be, "Have you tried to protect those bits as trade secrets?"

The only thing Fed could do would be to sue for trademark infringement if someone published a "counterfeit" rule book saying it was authorized by Fed, like copies of designer clothes, etc. As long as it's not represented as a book printed for and sold or licensed by Fed, it's OK.

See the case of Affiliated Hospital Prods. versus Merdel Game Mfg.

Robert

Being from the academic world, any quote that is copied directly from a copyrighted work should be cited somehow, which I believe we do all the time by citing the rule number and which rule code we're citing from. You folks have nothing to worry about. Important thing is you give credit where credit is due (although the way FED writes their stuff....).

[GoodScout]

[jaybird]

Hey you California guys, is this for real?

This guy is a 50 year veteran official. That means he's probably in his 70's. Can he really even still effectively officiate and keep up? Kind of a "Johnny come lately" last minute witness for the defense or is it just some made up guy. Either way, not a very creditable testimony.

The biggest pressure really is on the wing men – the head linesman and the line judge – because they are the ones who determine who is eligible.

Duh! .. oh, what about the U.. er.. and the B ... oh well, never mind. Nice try. See ya grandpa!

[bisonlj]

With the discussion of copyrighting and shareing, I had a question to this body who seems fairly knowledgeable about this stuff. I offered to send a copy of the Part II quiz on a local HS site to allow people to see how well they would do. I was told by another official that I was not allowed to do that because the material had copyright protection. He said they had been warned previously by the NFHS for doing this.

Is this a similar issue in that technically I shouldn't forward it but if challenged in court I would probably win. I want to honor the spirit of the copyright so I'm not going to do it. I was just wondering if this was a similar issue.

I'll hang up now and listen to your answer.

[ajmc]

Originally Posted by jaybird

Hey you California guys, is this for real?

This guy is a 50 year veteran official. That means he's probably in his 70's. Can he really even still effectively officiate and keep up? Kind of a "Johnny come lately" last minute witness for the defense or is it just some made up guy. Either way, not a very creditable testimony.

The biggest pressure really is on the wing men – the head linesman and the line judge – because they are the ones who determine who is eligible.

Duh! .. oh, what about the U.. er.. and the B ... oh well, never mind. Nice try. See ya grandpa!

I had hoped once the Presidential election was over, the lunatic fringe would crawl back into their hole and all the vile chatracter assassination BS would melt away. I guess not.

Apparently JayBird, you don't even know if this official exists or anything about him, but you are quick and eager to trash him and 50 years of service to football. You should be embarrassed, but I doubt you have enough class to know why.

Let's add some more smoke about the evils of copyright infringement. The way these discussions are spiraling, I think hyenas might have a legitimate gripe.

[Robert Goodman]

Originally Posted by LDUB

People quote paragraphs from copyrighted rule books all the time.

Those copyrights on rule books (except those of proprietary games like Monopoly) are bogus, and would never stand up legally. That's because copyright is not meant to protect utilitarian writing such as instructions. And they know it, which is why Fed & NFL copied freely from NCAA's language, most of which can be traced back even further, and why minor leagues that write their own copy freely from the above as well, as other pro leagues did from NFL's -- and then had the cheek to put on their own copyright notices! I know of at least one long verbatim passage that was in common between the Canadian Rugby Union and NCAA, going back to before NCAA was founded. There exists a tiny bit of remaining inherited shared wording between the International Rugby Football Board and North American football governing bodies, in the definitions of the kicks.

The only possible intellectual property protection a football organiz'n could have on the details of its rules would be a patent, such as the one Arena Football had on the method of use of the rebounding screen. They can trademark their properties, and copyright authorized accounts of games played within the organiz'n (though not the facts of the results themselves, which are news -- unless they played the games in secret), but not have a meaningful copyright on the wording of their rules, regardless of any notices claimed to that effect.

Robert