Mail with Cordon Art
Cordon Art is the holder of the copyright on everything by Escher. This
page documents mail we exchanged an an attempt to come to an agreement
that would let me keep my Escher page on the web.
Cordon art asked me to remove all emails they sent from this page, since
they wrote them, own copyright to them, and do not want them displayed here.
So, I have summarized each of their letters to me. Please bear in mind that I
am biased against cordon art, and so my summaries may be a little biased
in my favor. If codron art dislikes the summaries, I will gladly replace them
with the original email's from them to me.
Comments?
The first message
Date: Mon, 11 Nov 1996 14:36:34 +0100
From: cordon art b.v.
To: Joseph Emmanuel Hess
Subject: m.c. escher copyright
Parts/attachments:
1 Shown 6 lines Text
2 13 KB Application
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This is the first email I recieved from Cordon art. As you can see, it's not
very easy to understand exactly what they are getting at, because they didn't
bother entering in any starndard email, they just sent me a MS Word file. But
since I don't own MS Word, or any other word processor, I had no way of reading
this file. In the end, I just took a look at it directly, without a word
processor to help me. Here's approximatly what I saw.
I seems obvious to me that whoever sent this knows little about proper use
of email, or internet etiquette. It is very bad form to just send someone
something like this out of the blue, if you don't even know they can read it.
My reply
Date: Mon, 11 Nov 1996 14:08:55 -0500 (EST)
From: Joey Hess
To: "Cordon Art b.v."
Subject: Re: m.c. escher copyright
So, is the 'press release.doc' that you sent me your oblique way of
asking me to shut down my M.C. Escher www site?
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"He. He. He." - - Herman Toothrot
The second message
Date: Thu, 14 Nov 1996 17:17:10 +0100
From: cordon art
To: joey@kite.preferred.com
Subject: M.C. Escher
Here cordon says that they arn't tying to shut me done, they just sent me
the press release to let me know that they own copyright to Escher's work.
They futher say that I can keep pictures on my web site, but I have to limit
the number of pictures there. They also give me a copyright notice that they
want displayed on all pages of my web site.
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My reply
Date: Thu, 14 Nov 1996 13:15:35 -0500 (EST)
From: Joey Hess
To: "Cordon Art b.v."
Subject: Re: M.C. Escher
Thank you!
I'm very pleased that you're not trying to shut down my website. You've
just made my day :-)
How limited? I currently have about 150 seperate pictures. Part of the
point of the page is that it is a reference source where people can easily
look up that Escher picture they remember seeing before, by typing in
keywords, etc. So I was hoping to eventually have a large portion of
Escher's work online.
However, anything is better than nothing, so I will comply with whatever
limitation you set.
I'll gladly add this copyright notice to my pages.
--
#!/usr/bin/perl -i\$q='$q',\$p='$p';eval\$q.\$\^I\n"# # jeh22@cornell.edu
$q='print"$p$^I\n',$p='#!/usr/bin/perl -i';eval$q.$^I # Joey Hess
"true - do nothing, successfully" - - true (1)
The third Message
This was submitted from a feedback form on my web page
Date: Thu, 19 Dec 1996 03:43:23 -0500 (EST)
From: nobody
To: joey@kite.ml.org
Subject: web page feedback
Web page feedback sent on Thu Dec 19 03:43:22 EST 1996
From: cordon art
Subject: M.C. Escher Copyright
Here Cordon art alleges that I have not added the copyright notice to my website
as they asked me to do. I have also not limited the number of pictures to 20,
and I have no responded to their above email. They are giving me one more
chance to do all this, and to remove the quotations by escher that I have on my
site, or they will sue me.
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My Reply
Date: Thu, 19 Dec 1996 12:06:52 -0500 (EST)
From: Joey Hess
To: m.c.escher@pi.net
Subject: Re: web page feedback
You seem to be in error. All of my escher web pages have the copyright
notice attached. I added that copyright to them the very day that you
asked me to do so.
As soon as I recieved your earlier email, I replied to it, indicating that
I would comply with what you asked. Didn't you get my reply? I attach it
here for you to read. Note that I sent you this message on November 14th.
I never recieved a reply.
I will limit myself to only 20 pictures if you insist, but I ask that you
read the following message that I sent you before and let my know of your
response to the points that I raise therin.
I must say, I am very confused and upset by all this. You have evidently
looked at my web page to know that I have quotes on it. But you evidently
managed to miss the copyright notices that I plastered all over the page
per your request.
I hope you will give me the benefit of the doubt until we can come to a
peacful resolution of this. For the time being, I have totally shut down
my escher page.
After this, I attached my reply to their second message
Well, I'm confused. Are you?
Cordon's reply
They wish me a happy new year.
The person at cordon who I was corresponding with says he has been gone for
2.5 weeks, that's why he hasn't been answering his email. He agrees that I
in fact did have the copyright notices up, and it must be his server (sic)
that was in error, and he apologizes for the misunderstanding.
He explains the reason they want to limit the number of pictures on my
web site: they have a CD coming out with Escher stuff on it, and their
licencing agreement with the CD publisher requires them to cut down on amount
of Escher stuff available on the web so it doesn't comptete with the cd sales.
If they don't, _they_ will get sued.
They reiterate that I should limit the site to 20 to 25 images, I can change
the available images weekly if I wish.
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The straw that broke the camel's back?
At this point, I sent Cordon Art a mail asking them if I could leave up
the small icons for pictures, and if I could rotate images more frequently than
weekly. I recieved this peice of bad news in reply:
Date: Mon, 06 Jan 1997 11:09:58 +0100
From: cordon art
To: joey@kite.ml.org
Subject: m.c. escher
They say that I can't have the icons, or limit my pictures more frequently than
weekly.
They also say that they have someone who is doing a Escher screen saver, and
that that person dislikes the "wallppaper" group of images I have on my site,
and they ask me to remove that group of images.
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My first response to this was to think that this was the last straw, Cordon
Art seems bent on whitling away at the site until it's gone completely. I waited
for 2 days to simmer down a bit, and then removed the icons, and sent them this
reply:
Fine. I've removed the icons.
Fine. I only suggested it because the demand that I rotate pictures more
frequently has been quite high. I've gotten over 80 requests for new
pictures in the past week. But I will just rotate the pictures weekly.
Do you object to the section, ie, the grouping together of 11 pictures
which tile well to make wallpaper on the computer screen, or do you object
to the inclusion of these 11 pictures in my site at all? Of course, very
few of the 11 pictures will be available at any one time since I
am limited to 25 pictures in all (currently only 2 are available).
Cordon's Reply
They say that they have licenced with someone to make an Escher screen saver.
They say that screen savers and wallpaper are equivilant. Therefore, they
don't want any wallpaper on my site.
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My Reply
Well, you haven't answered my question. Do you object to:
a. The existence of pictures that can be used as wallpaper onmy site, in
my judgement, this includes all pictures on the site, as any image can be
used as wallpaper.
b. The classification of a certian group of these images as "wallpaper".
Final word from Cordon
Date: Fri, 10 Jan 1997 11:52:37 +0100
From: cordon art
To: joey@kite.ml.org
Subject: (no subject)
They reply that they don't want images classified as wallpaper on my site, and
that I can't even use the word wallpaper on my site.
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At this point, disgusted with it all, I shut the whole site down.
Who gives Cordon the right to limit my use of the word "wallpaper", anyway?
Let the Flamefest Begin
I'm sorry about this next bit where it get truely ugly. I was upset. I was
leaving this bit off to spare this page a pg-13 rating, but cordon nagged me to
include it:
Date: Sun, 12 Jan 1997 15:52:30 -0500 (EST)
From: Joey Hess
To: cordon art
Subject: Re: (no subject)
Well, fuck you. I've shut the site down.
Cordon's reply
They say that maybe I am the one who doesn't know how to use email, not them,
based on my last message. They say it is a "pity" that I do not include my last
email to them on the web site so people can see how I reacted to them.
Then they list some demands and threats:
1. They take issue with what I say on the main page, that they shut the site
down. In fact, they say, it was my decision to shut it down. They say I reacted
childishly.
2. If I leave the main page as it is, saying that they shut me down, I will
be contacted by their attourneys, and I won't like it.
3. They own the copyright to the letters that appear on this page, and I must
remove them from the page.
They welcome any replies that don't contain profanity.
My reply
Date: Mon, 13 Jan 1997 12:57:17 -0500 (EST)
From: Joey Hess
To: "Cordon Art b.v."
Subject: Re: m.c. escher
I've added it to the collection. Enjoy. This is known as flaming; email is
a conversational medium and people will often react this way when you
attempt to limit their freedom of speech.
> 1.
> 2.
In my opinion, you waged a war of attrition with me to shut this web site
down. That's my opinion, and I feel that I have a right to express it if I
wish on my web site.
> 3.
I will remove them, and replace them with summaries of the letters
rephrased in my own words. I feel that the public has a right to know why
the site was shut down. I will leave your "press release" on the web site,
as this is a public document.