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[tst]

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@shoneill wrote:

So what's the legal status of all my posts before this terms of use came into force??

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I don't think anything has changed. That document has been around for a very long time. They may have changed some stuff recently, but the only basic difference is that now there is a link to it in each page of the forums.

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@cs42 wrote:

Actually I don't think this clause is valid anyway. At least not here in Germany...

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While a great deal of my family are lawyers, I'm not even close to that, but I seriously doubt that what German law states is valid in this case since the servers are probably in Austin and as far as I know, the law which applies is the one of the country where the server is. Trust the lawyers to write stuff that's probably legally defendable.

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I doubt that such a general TOS (I even do not sign!)...

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That's probably one of the reasons the link was put in each page. That way you can't say you weren't given a chance to see the terms.

[cs42]

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While a great deal of my family are lawyers, I'm not even close to that, but I seriously doubt that what German law states is valid in this case since the servers are probably in Austin and as far as I know, the law which applies is the one of the country where the server is. Trust the lawyers to write stuff that's probably legally defendable.

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That may depend. As NI is doing business in Germany they have to respect German laws here in Germany. I suppose this includes copyright questions for products sold in Germany. But I'm not a lawyer either. Anyway, I think these TOS are just too rigously and everyone reading them will consider, what's shareable in future. One point against closed and very propertiary software again...

[tst]

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@cs42 wrote:

I suppose this includes copyright questions for products sold in Germany...

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The TOU does not refer to products, but only to things you write\post in the forums. Assuming the server is in the US, German law simply doesn't apply. It's not a matter of respecting it, since there is no obligation to. In any case, I wouldn't be surprised if the German law allowed a German company with a public forum system to take anything posted to those forums and use it elsewhere.

I will say this again, I don't have a problem with what I write being used, since this place is public. I would just prefer that such use would be accompanied with a link to the source.

[shoneill]

I think it's important to again stress the problem with this.

I've no problem with anyone using what I've said or posted on this forum as long as credit is given, at very least to the fact that the source is the discussion forum.  I mean, I don't expoect to be named personally for anything I've said or done here, the contributions I've made are simply not worthy of that.  However, it would be nice if a coding challenge entry was used in future (As either a good or bad example ;)) that the author would at least be recognised (For good examples at least).

I think the uncertainty here is what exactly NI plans to do with all this information.  If they go and compile a book or tutorials and use this to make money or in marketing, I'd appreciate acknowledgement that it's not all NI's work.  Anything else is plain cheeky.

It's not the use I object to, it's the lack of (any) recognition.

Shane.

PS Can I have another mug?  

[tst]

Yes, I would also basically like just a reference or a link to the source.

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@shoneill wrote:
...use this to make money or in marketing, I'd appreciate acknowledgement that it's not all NI's work

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Unfortunately, that doesn't seem to be the case. As I mentioned, if I remember correctly, according to Rolf (I think it was on LAVA, which is down at the moment) the ZIP VIs used in LV 8 do not have any credit appearing anywhere, even though the ZIP algorithm is not NI's.

[Ben]

I like Jim Krings method of dealing with this situation.

This signature

"

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| OpenG | LAVA | Champion | Commander | Builder | Weblog | JKI |
Copyright © 2006 Jim Kring. Some Rights Reserved.
This posting is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 License.

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"

Can be found in this thread

http://forums.ni.com/ni/board/message?board.id=JobPost&message.id=367#M367

Ben

[daijoubu]

Would that help?  By posting it on NIs website, you've already agreed to NIs terms of service. 

[Ben]

In my own non-legal mind it seems to.

The wording of IP property statements always seem to ack all other intelectual property claims and requirements.

But....

If I add a ( properperly attributed ) copy of Jim's signature to me signature, will that apply to my posting from 2001?

Ben

[tst]

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@Ben wrote:

In my own non-legal mind it seems to.

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After looking at the reader's digest version of the creative commons LA I have to agree with daijoubu (couldn't you find an easier name to spell? ). Even if the line Any of these conditions can be waived if you get permission from the copyright holder, which appears in the agreement, would be subsituted with You can't use this under any circumstances, once you use the site, you have agreed to the terms of use. This is NI's site and they're the ones making the rules, not us.

[JeanPierre]

tst wrote: This is NI's site and they're the ones making the rules, not us.

Except that the LabVIEW forum is the mirror of the usenet group comp.lang.labview and users who post there might have no idea they *agreed unwillingly* to a TOU.
My opinion is that the LabVIEW forum has enough momentum by itself to stop hacking comp.lang.labview. I doubt that they'd be allowed to do that with Info-LabVIEW...