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From: Larry Roschen/redwinglr@aol.com/Coon Rapids MN
Date: 08 Oct 1999
Time: 09:00:00
The RWCS Board wrestled with this issue for some time. The board appreciates and supports Byron's efforts to create an index for RWCS Newsletters. But once such an index exists, the logical place to post the index is the RWCS website since it relates directly to our organization's publication. There is no desire to "steal" credit for this idea from Byron; I believe Byron should receive a byline credit for the index and should be allowed to link to the index from WingTips. But I firmly believe the proper site for an index of the RWCS Newsletter is the RWCS website.
The board agreed that providing an index without ready access to the Newletter articles is a problem. Few RWCS members have access to older issues, much less the general public. And unlike nationally distributed publications, you can't run down to your local library to find an old back issue of the RWCS Newsletter. It's rather fruitless to inform people about an article unless that article can be readily retrieved; an interested person would be very frustrated by this. The board would like to address this issue PROACTIVELY rather than wait for the problem to develop. This is where the copyright issue comes to play. Whether old articles be photocopied or posted on the internet, permission is required from the copyright holder. It's not about withholding information from the public, it's about avoiding lawsuits. The board wants to secure that permission now rather than later. Again, we see no sense in posting an index without also providing access to the content.
There HAS to be a lag time between the Newletter's date of publication and the date when it could be reproduced online. If the copyright issues work out, I'd love to see content from back issues of the Newsletter available online. But no way can you do that with current issues; the Newsletter would lose all value. I'd have no problem with including current issues in the index listing, but interested persons would have to join the RWCS and subscribe to the Newsletter to get the current content; that's just good business sense.