[modeleng] M.E. mag Public Domain

There has been another discussion on the kepler-eng.com List about ME and MEW 
copyright. Dale Givnes has posted a email from David Clark - Editor of MEW 
concerning a proposed web site: which may be of interest to us.
Hi There
When the issue of copyright first came up,
I said I would try to get as much material released on the internet
as possible. I said this would take time as I was new to the editors
(MEW) job. Things are slowly moving on. A team of web designers will
take several to build a professional website. This is almost ready to
start. It will include forums which are likely to be unmoderated but
that will depend on the posts we receive.

The intention is to release as much material as possible but to do
this I would like to get the original contributer or their
decendant's permission.

Recent contributors have signed an agreement that includes the right
to publish their offerings on the internet but I would still ask
their permission to do so.

A lot of articles were written by employed editors, assistant editors
and technical editors of ME and also some editors of MEW. This
material is copyright Magicalia, the problem is deciding who wrote
what and when especially as I do not have access to a full range of
ME's at home.

All material ever published in ME and MEW is the copyright of the
publisher, currently Magicalia. This is because all articles would be
edited and pictures cropped, lightened, darkened or otherwise
modified and the whole laid out in magazine format.

Yes, you may be able to get the original articles from the relevant
people but I expect that they were typed out and sent to ME without a
copy being kept. Also photos probably don't exist other than in the
magazines themselves.

There is no intention to charge for access although a small
proportion of articles may be locked to Model Engineer and Model
Engineers' Workshop subscribers. Hopefully not a lot (none if I can
get away with it).

My intention is to release 'how to' articles and as many as possible
of the construction articles as possible. The catch is the
construction articles may only have general arrangement drawings and
finished photographs available for people to view prior to purchasing
plans.

Obviously Magicalia wants to make some money from providing the
website. This will come from the sale of plans and of subscriptions
to ME and MEW. This is a small price to pay for the free release of
all the material available, (over 100 years worth).

If a plan is not available from the plans service, I see no reason
why the plans should not be made available in the articles.

Magicalia can release any complete copy of Model Engineer or Model
Engineers' Workshop on CD as long as it is the complete magazine
including all original adverts. They are legally entitled to do so.

I have asked Magicalia to look at doing this and they are seriously
considering it. I may even be able to convince them to do the first
MEW one as a cover mount.

I posted the add to get in touch with as many people as quickly as
possible. Yes Magicalia do have contact information but it will take
a while for them to let me have this information and some contact
information will also have been lost over time.

There was no intention to upset Roger Mason. His father has given me
a lot of reading pleasure over the years, (I have the Minnie book and
it is on my to do list)and I would like everybody to be able to
access this information. However, at the end of the day it will be
Rogers decision and I will abide by that.

All in all, it will probably be best to let me get on with it. It is
going to be a long process, it will probably take the rest of my life
to do it but I will leave it all for posterity. How else will we
encourage the next generation of model makers?

regards David

Editor Model Engineers' Workshop
MODEL ENGINEERING DISCUSSION LIST.

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