[MR] A (Probably Ridiculous) Heraldic Suggestion

[WELENC,LUCINDA]

On Thu, 12 May 2005 14:51:08 -0400
  Gorm of Berra <gormofberra at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 5/12/05, C. Brian Towey <cbt at ib-ent.com> wrote:
>> a) As for scanning the whole library of registered 
>>emblazons, all it takes
>> is a sheet feeder and some determination.  With a little 
>>ingenuity, one
>> could use optical character recognition to read, say, a 
>>membership-number
>> sticker in one corner of the form, which would let the 
>>computer
>> cross-reference the picture to the person without a lot 
>>of keypunching.  I,
>> for one, make my living doing this sort of thing, and I 
>>bet there are
>> others.
> 
> UNfortunately, it's not that simple.
> 
> The single largest hurdle is Copyright.  The SCA, Inc 
>and it's
> subsidiary branches paid a lawyer to investigate the 
>matter and the
> current legal opinion is that the SCA does not have the 
>rights to
> create and distribute the images of people's Heraldic 
>forms.

In large part, because just who owns the copyright is 
sometimes majorly fuzzy.  I have created a set of 
templates for SCA submission forms.  Let's say that I have 
sold a set to Gorm.  Gorm then traces them to draw up a 
submission for Lord John the Smith.  Who holds the 
copyright to that image?  Do I?-- they were my drawings, 
after all.  Does Gorm, who actually drew the submission? 
 Lord John, whose submission it is?  The SCA College of 
Arms, as the legal entity whose responsibility it is?
  
> Yes, they can scan and archive (and in fact, they have 
>been, it's an
> ongoing process for many years, but that archive cannot be 
>significantly
> distributed.
> 
> Do I personally think that legal opinion is incorrect 
>from a common
> sense perspective?  Well, yeah, I do, but I'm not a 
>lawyer...so I'm
> probably wrong.

Then we're wrong together, Gorm... ;)
Alanna