In the short time that I have been a SF member I have come to realize that there are some pretty crazy ideas out there. Most are nonsense and the senior members do a good job of trying to correct (clarify) any misconceptions so right off the bat I know the "crackpot" ideas will be weaseled out. All new ideas must be scrutinized. Could SF be a starting point to this never ending process? Most everyone has some kind of pet theory, thought out discrepancies with conceptual explanations. Hardly anyone can express there answers threw a numerical framework that is consistent with current and future observations. Yet, every so often someome is capable of exceeding there predecessors understanding with just such a framework. What role dose SF play if such a framework were to be posted by a member? I read somewhere that: anything anyone posts becomes the property of SF. Dose this mean no credit would be given to the original post? If not, how would that work in a world of avatars?
No. Members retain the copyright in their posts. By posting here, you agree to publish your post on sciforums. However, we cannot, without your permission, sell your post to another publication, for example, or repost it to another forum. Any copying of your material must be properly referenced as being written by you. Posting on a forum is not a bad way to claim priority for an idea, since all posts are time-stamped. Of course, you have to trust the admin not to mess with time stamps...
These are my words. It's basically disclaimer for those who try to erase their presence on SciForums. That basically means (in theory of course) that if all members decide to rewrite/erase/kill with fire their thoughts from the past one day, we would have situation of losing all threads and posts. From million posts to none. That could have catastrophic proportions as similar as database crash or something equally grim. Of course that members are owners of their own posts. As James said, SciForums will never use/sell them outside. We should ask members if we want to use their posts but only as referenced material. Also, members should ask us if they want to delete or edit certain posts from the past. BTW, nice OP.
As this is somewhat related to my question in another thread, Plazma, how about my question here: http://www.sciforums.com/showthread.php?t=93966 I am afraid to take any conclusion yet.
BenTheMan: The most famous example I can give is what Einstein did to Newton. A quote from Wikipedia under Isaac Newton: "His Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica (was) published in 1687... In this work, Newton described universal gravitation and the three laws of motion which dominated the scientific view of the physical universe for the next three centuries." The reason it only lasted three centuries is because of a new framework published by a man named Albert Einstein ("On the Electrodynamics of Moving Bodies" published 1905). Both men were able to explain motion and force better than anyone before them. There equations matched the observations of the day but how long do you think this can hold true? Even the greats get it wrong eventually. I was not implying that hardly anyone knows what there doing. Its just that for those that do, sooner or later they will be considerd "not as right". Nobody knows what new phenomena will be observed in the future.
Thank you for describing SF's copyright policy but how dose this pertain to other members/guests. What is preventing someone else from claiming a members idea as there own? There are many different countries represented on this form, all with there own laws. Would SF, as our publisher, standup for the original work in the event of intellectual piracy or is that the risk we take for sharing our work?
is this a peer reviewed journal? I have some interesting ideas on sociological topics after observing people and underpeople at work. Mostly underpeople.
There is nothing protecting anyone from copying anything, other than a persons own resolve. If you are truly concerned of people copying something, then you really should publish it at all online. You see if you write something on a website, it get cached by search engines and when looked at by individuals it's cached by their browser, so you could suggest that as soon as someone looks at your written work, there will already be two temporary copies made. (More so if they archive too) You'll find true publicists in written literature have disclaimers and legal texts explaining not to copy their work part or in whole and not to use on electronic mediums (The internet). If you had a work that you found was copied, it would actually be up to you to get legal advise and advocates. Sciforums doesn't give free legal protection or advice, and it would be foolish to assume it does. However if you could prove you were the person that posted the material to the administrator, information could be submitted to aid in proving that you were the original intellectual responsible for the material (at least to this site). Obviously it's a whole different kettle of fish if you've come up with a Patentable idea. If you have a decent idea and intend to patent it, then keep it to yourself to begin with. You can find information from various patent sites on how to go about getting your idea into the real world, but you have to keep it as much of a secret as you can because you can't patent something that's already public knowledge.
If a poster retains the copyright to all his posts, why are users banned when they try and delete all of their posts? What is the procedure for having all of one's posts deleted? ie, removal of their copyrighted material from this website?
The main reason was to protect poster integrity from slander (i.e. someone manipulates a previous post to make it look like someone said something different) and Continuity (e.g. Someone responds to the poster, but to delete their post would mean deleting the response or leaving the response seemingly disjointed from the overall subject.) There is of course if someone fraudulently gained your account and asked us to delete it. You'll find most mainstream sites online will "close" your account when you ask for it to be deleted, They then sit in a limbo state for or more months before an eventual account deletion. The idea being that it gives the account holder enough time to make sure they truly want to delete their account. (Obviously their email address is mailed a couple of times over the time duration to explain their account is being closed). It is obviously something that we are going to have to draw up for the forum for when people ask such questions.
