[Air-l] ethics - aol data

[Nancy Baym]

I don't recall making that claim.

My understanding is that in the case of snail mail letters, at least 
in the US, the object belongs to the recipient, but the content 
belongs to the author (hence the controversy about the selling of the 
JD Salinger letters a few years ago which ended up not happening -- 
if I remember correctly, though the objects could be sold, the 
purchaser would be prohibited from releasing any of their contents). 
Legally, if that is an accurate representation of the law, I don't 
know how it translates into email (or any other kind of 
individually-addressed electronic message).

I think the ethics and morals depend on the content of the message 
and the intent of redistributing the content without the author's 
permission. At two extremes, the ethics of disclosing an innocuous 
yet embarrassing personal admission made privately in an email in 
order to humiliate the original sender are quite different from those 
of disclosing a violent plot in order to protect the innocent at the 
sender's expense. The policy of this mailing list (air-l) is that 
emails should not be sent to the list without consent of the author, 
and I believe that's a good general policy.

I'll leave the legal issues to others to those more versed in those 
matters to address.



>Nancy and Jeremy,
>
>About a year ago Nancy Bayme wrote that an email sent to someone is the
>property of the sender.
>
>I have been confused by this. The discussion of the AOL affair rekindled
>this confusion.
>
>I'm interested in her take on Jeremy's comments. I am also interested in
>Jeremy's take on Nancy's statement.
>
>Also, if it is not the sender's property, to what extent is the receiver
>ethically, legally, or morally obligated to sender for the use of the
>content.
>
>Reid
>
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