Thank you for this succinct phrasing of a lesson I’m trying to teach my kids to ease their way in life. It may be a few years before I’m ready to explain this particular phrasing to them, but it’s still useful as a guide for what I’m trying to convey.

http://bloggasm.com/the-ethics-of-hate-mail-should-bloggers-post-email-correspondence-with out-permission

Ahem. To try and stay somewhat on-topic, I’m not sure how one can copyright a letter. I mean, sure, it’s strictly a /creation/ and the author immediate receives those rights under the Berne Convention (and the many Sons of Berne that have followed). I’m just not sure personal communication can be licensed in this manner without stepping on the rights of the receiver.

For example, most companies tell you that when you send them letters for whatever reason, those letters belong to them. They disclose this as a courtesy, I understand, and pretty much can do anything with your words without your permission except misrepresent them or profit directly from them.

Similarly, the modern notion of email means that most of us are free to do with incoming screeds as we see fit. Many web sites have a Going Postal section where they make fun of the angry emails they get. This does not contravene any international copyright law I am aware of.

Similarly, in most cases (i.e., there wasn’t a previous non-disclosure arrangement of some sort [unless the submission of a manuscript and subsequent responses constitute such an NDA]) any real letter I receive becomes mine to use, pretty much copyright-free.

Since copyright exists to balance the rights of authorship with the need to share, I suspect there is some legal balance here, the details of which I am ignorant of.

Still, it cannot be that a rejection letter is actually copyrighted material where only the most strict notions of fair-use could be claimed, if at all. If this were the case, we’d all be criminals.

In my case, I grant this might be more true than you know. But you guys? It’s unpossible.

But a major part of the legal framework of copyright infringement relates to monetary gain either on the part of the infringer, or lost profit on the part of the copyright owner – which generally does not exist in general in regards to letters. Getting a court to even be interested in this case is very difficult to imagine.

Even more interestingly, if someone felt that a received rejection letter had a broader public interest, showing its full contents may also fit into the fair use exemption, so as to provide the chance for a full record to be provided into the issue under public discussion. Reprinting the New Yorker cover while discussing its racist imagery is clearly fair use, even if the New Yorker or the cover’s creator was to vehemently object that they weren’t racists, and only people buying the magazine were entitled to a copy of the cover.

Copyright was never intended to be a muzzle, a truth that American courts have been quite clear on for decades.

Some jurisdictions would require me to inform you, or require you’re consent, but where I am I can do it silently if I wish.

You might want to check with a lawyer before assuming that. Your state may permit ‘one-person’ recording (i.e. only one person needs to know they’re being recorded), but if I’m calling you from a state that requires both parties’ consent, you may have a problem.

So says http://www.callcorder.com/phone-recording-law-america.htm (which I found via google). (Note that it doesn’t say you can’t… it just says that it’s unknown at this point, and so you shouldn’t count on being able to get away with it. But, that also means you shouldn’t count on being hauled away to jail :).)

If you phone me, I have the right to record it, and I then own the copyright on that recording. Some jurisdictions would require me to inform you, or require you’re consent, but where I am I can do it silently if I wish.

Ah, the latest Republican talking point. Obama’s inexperienced, he’s not doing as well as he should be. Oh, sigh! It’s kind of cute.

The point of quoting the above is that arguing that WV and KY are swing states is like arguing NY and CA are.