That is somewhat curious. Maybe someone can explain copyright to me, then. I was under the impression that if I write a story and do not sell it and do not specifically assign the rights to it to someone else, then I retain the copyright. I don’t have to file anything with anyone or register it; I own it by default. It works that way with photographs, which is why photographers have models sign releases.
How does one prove ownership of the copyright to one’s own material?
Here’s a question for the mods:
When an OP comes back to their thread and says something along the lines of “maybe this thread wasn’t such a good idea” you’ll close the thread as a courtesy.
Now andrewdt85 has come along and said something along the lines of “maybe my board membership wasn’t such a good idea”. Perhaps you should relieve him of his membership as a courtesy?
Pleeeeeeeeeeeeeeease?
You guys have no idea how incredibly brilliant my posts would be if I weren’t saving the best stuff for my fiction writing and my web pages! I mean, really, you’re missing out on a lot! For example:
Bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage bondage.
And so on! You poor shmucks!
The Reader claims a non-exclusive copyright. You retain your own copyright to your own posts; however, that copyright is non-exclusive with respect to the Reader. Your copyright would presumably be exclusive with respect to any other individuals or entities. Two individuals may own non-exclusive copyright to the same material.
andrewdt85, you’re probably a very good boy when visiting elderly relatives and mindful of your manners in certain public fora like libraries and laundromats, but you seem not to have yet learned the most important lesson when it comes to intellectual (or any) property: it’s irrelevant until you have something worth stealing in the first place. When you have something worthwhile, chances are you’ll be developing it off-board anyhow, and even if you do carelessly post your blueprint for the enema bag of tomorrow™ or the entire manuscript of The Great American Novel – With Pictures!, or whatever, you’ll have a big head start on The Reader and all of the rest of us thievin’ rascals who scan the boards waiting for your next pearl of wisdom to drop. Also, you may take comfort in the fact that this is the most practical and profitable forum for the Reader to publish the offerings of its subscribers, and that it hasn’t yet failed to keep our system of (mostly pseudonymous) attribution straight. Relax: people who have good ideas seldom have only one. You’re doing yourself more damage by spending time worrying about theft instead of thinking creatively.
Besides, what you really have to worry about is those guys in striped shirts and gray slacks who are following you around writing down everything you say in public. I mean, what the hell is their deal?
It’s a newspaper, not a magazine. They’re policies, not laws. They’re “Nazis,” not “fuckheads.”
Yep, this is hardcore stupidity.
The OP’s little tantrum appears to have started in this thread. I guess the OP wants to make a game using copyrighted characters?
You mean he is angry because someone might steal his idea of stealing characters? I’d say “how ironic!” but andrew wouldn’t know irony if it landed on him tied to a brick.
Actually, photographers have models sign releases so that they won’t get their asses sued when they sell the pictures for commercial purposes. But it has nothing to do with copyright * per se *.
The Chicago Reader and ** everyone else with a brain who runs a bulletin board ** has a copyright notice like that because otherwise their lives would be a perpetual nightmare of people claiming copyright on some lame-brained post that got dredged up from years back and demanding compensation or that the post be removed. It also provides them leverage to prevent other websites from pirating content (and yes, this has happened).
And, yeah, as a side effect, it means that if, by some miniscule chance, one of your posts gets chosen for reprinting in a SD book, they probably don’t have to track you down for a release and they don’t have to pay you. So there’s a remote possibility that the Chicago Reader might make a few shekels from the pearls you’ve cast. Can’t say I begrudge them that – there’s got to be some reason they put up with the monumental crap involved in running this place.
Nitpick: Trademarked.
Also, add Colibri’s mention of the non-exclusive copyright the Reader has to my list of points andrew needs to ponder.
I think he’s working on that one…
Wait, Evil Captor’s into bondage? Really? Why, I had no idea… 
You know, you agreed when you signed up to give the Chicago Reader the rights to anything you post here. If you didn’t want to give them those rights, you shouldn’t have signed up. It’s not stealing when you take something that’s freely given.
Thanks for the explanation, Finagle and Colibri. That makes sense.
Actually, he posted an idea for an apple harvest themed tablescape that I liked so much I used it in my new book, Entertaining with Slacker.
Oh wait, I got that from Martha Stewart. Nevermind.
If I see Chicago Reader brand bean beef and cheese burritos I am going to be very pissed off.
Man, I really hope no one starts using “penis ensues”.
I didn’t hear so much as a whimper from the producers of Shallow Hal when you expropriated your sig line from smiling bandit:
I think you owe them a few bucks in past due royalties.
Don’t worry, i’m sure if anyone uses that, the footnote “Created by Anastasaeon” will always be there to prove you said it first.
Bwahaha.