Message from discussion Is Onlisp public domain?

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From: Kent M Pitman <pit...@world.std.com>
Newsgroups: comp.lang.lisp
Subject: Re: Is Onlisp public domain?
Date: 09 Jul 2003 17:02:17 -0400
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Lars Brinkhoff <lars.s...@nocrew.org> writes:

> How about the Common Lisp dpANS documents?  I was under the impression
> that they were released under public domainish terms, but now that I
> look, I can't find any copyright notice.

You're right that there isn't a proper notice per se.  Documents do
exist (but are not on display publicly) that would show that the legal
intent was to have placed them into the public domain, even though we
botched the final execution of that.  A good intellectual property
lawyer would tell you that this means the legal status is messy, but
what that really means (I believe) is that those who paid for its
creation could (hypothetically) have grounds to make a claim that it
was encumbered in some way, that is, to assert that they have some
right of ownership.  But since all of those parties at one time or
another signed into this system of contracts identifying that the
intent was to make a public domain document, I don't personally think
they would succeed.  

Historically, the community has generally behaved as if they are
properly in the public domain, and I've never heard of any problem
resulting from that.  But then, I don't purport to be omniscient.

A lot of the law is about intimidation.  Who can intimidate who into
doing (or not doing) what.  In this case, there is probably no one
with any potential standing who has any serious motivation to want to
intimidate anyone, so I think you're ok on that score.

But then, I'm not a lawyer.  If you plan to make a decision that would 
bring you into legal jeopardy (making or distributing a derivative work),
you really should consult a lawyer.