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Subject: legal nalimov egtb status

Author: Vincent Diepeveen

Date: 07:13:08 06/07/04

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On June 06, 2004 at 05:41:03, GuyHaworth wrote:

>
>A richer context for your question would be informative:
>
>a)  What do the German Police say in their letter?
>    A good translation into English would be helpful

basically the police says they want eye witness reports whether someone managed
to obtain via ebay a chessproduct called 'nalimov egtb's'.

they do as if it is a 'chessproduct'.

this where we all know it's a collection of EGTB files.

>b)  What is the 'relationship' between the 11 Tablebase CDs you bought ...
>    ... and Chessbase offerings.

the relationship is that not chessbase earned on these cdroms but others, so
they file a complaint.

>    [ I am assuming that the concern is related to Chessbase here. ]
>
>
>The national and international nuances of the law here are something I should
>know more about.  There are, I believe, international initiatives to harmonise

it is very simple, if nalimov says there is no copyrights on his EGTBs and
everybody can copy them for free, then you can do so, and free software
distributors can charge small copy costs for the egtbs.

if nalimov says there is authorship on his egtb's and only chessbase has the
right to sell it, it means that if he can prove he has not done statements
before that say something else, that the person in question offering them
'systematically' at ebay will go to jail.

It's not chessbase sueing, it's the police who investigates whether someone has
sold illegal cdroms. it explicitly mentions the cdroms are not 'copies' but
'professional made' cdroms.

>the law on copyright and 'electronic theft'.

every state in europe has different laws here. some countries go further than
others.

>Unless Chessbase have 'watermarked' their published version of Eugene's files -
>and I don't think the 'header' of the file allows for that - there is no way
>afaik to tell whether an 'EN table' has come from Chessbase's CD or been ftp'd
>from the web.

if the egtb files fall under the author right, because nalimov has himself
generated them, then the case is more complicated.

>
>Chessbase 'provide value' in that they:
>a)  deliver the tables to you and save you download time

you refer to the 'copy costs' which is true in case nalimov doesn't do claims
which are validated. In other cases things are not so easy and very complicated
from a law viewpoint.

For example you are not allowed to sell a cd with selftaken pictures in GIF
format, because GIF is a patented file format.

(i deliberately say pictures and not mp3's, because music things are complete
crazy with the music maffia organized within RIAAA, i've been negotiating with
those chaps in the past myself so i can be a witness that the organisations
under that umbrella BUMRA/STEMRA/SEMA in netherlands they are completely away
from this planet and avoid good popsongs from even having good instrumental
music; they must all use synthezisers because if you do not use them the music
maffia will ask money for each instrument that is played by a person X who once
signs up with them).

>b)  provide you with CD-storage, useful if you want to later delete the files
>        ok:  it's not as inexpensive as buying your own blank CDs
>
>c)  provide assurance that the EN tables are 'correct'
>        well, I would have said this until recently re the 6-man glitch
>
>So, clearly, their _collection_ and _publication_ of tables benefits from
>copyright protection, even though the individual tables do not.

Things are not so clear at all. the only clear thing is that when Nalimov says
he never has sold rights to chessbase to sell the EGTBs, but that everyone is
free to copy the files, that there is no more police criminal investigation into
this matter.

I expect however Nalimov to say nothing, as usual, and then things remain
unclear.

I do not know the person in question who sold things on ebay, but i can assure
you he makes a chance to go to jail there in germany when nalimov says chessbase
has the legal right to sell them and no one else.

>
>guy



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