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Unless correspondents ask us not to, this Website will post selected letters that it receives and invite open debate. |
Pavle
Lebl writes from Toronto, Canada, Saturday, June 5, 1999
WE have noticed that our Open Letter to the Canadian Jewish Congress was posted on your website as of June 2, 1999.[*]
We are strongly opposed to the views expressed on your website and we do not want to be associated with it in any way.
THE LETTER IS A COPYRIGHTED MATERIAL AND YOU DID NOT ASK FOR A PERMISSION TO POST IT.
SUCH PERMISSION IS HEREBY EXPRESSLY DENIED.
IN ADDITION, YOU HAVE EDITED THE MATERIAL IN AN UNACCEPTABLE MANNER.
YOU ARE ADVISED TO REMOVE THE LETTER FROM YOUR SITE IMMEDIATELY.
It appears you have taken the letter from "Beograd.com". We will contact them and request that they demand the removal of the link to the article on their site as well.
IN THE CASE THE LETTER IS NOT REMOVED FROM YOUR WEBSITE IMMEDIATELY, WE WILL USE ALL MEANS AT OUR DISPOSAL, INCLUDING LEGAL ACTION, TO PROTECT OUR INTERESTS.
Yours, Pavle Lebl
[* alternative link: http://www.beograd.com/nato/texts/english/c/canadian_jewish_congress.html]
David Irving
replies:
THANK you for your letter, and I understand and identify closely with your people's concerns. Please identify to me however the materials on my website to which you object, and the editing of your letter which you claim I undertook (as you see from our footnote line, no editing whatever is undertaken of such items which we post). I am quite willing to take the article down, but in that case I would replace it merely with an External Hyperlink to the article as originally posted elsewhere, which would produce precisely the same result. Such is the nature of the Internet. If you wish to test in the courts this stubborn refusal to be censored, please do so. I shall be interested to learn the jurisdiction which you choose.
David Irving (now writing at Key West, Florida, USA).
Dear Mr. Irving:
Thank you for the prompt answer in which you say you are quite willing to take the article down. HOW COME OUR COPYRIGHTED MATERIAL IS STILL THERE? Our demand was that you remove it IMMEDIATELY and we expected you to act accordingly.
Editorial changes I referred to comprise changing bulleted paragraphs into regular ones, emphasizing (bolding) portions of the text, etc. It is, however, besides the point: OUR LETTER SHOULD NOT HAVE BEEN THERE IN THE FIRST PLACE.
Allow me to remind you that a copyright infringement is a copyright infringement in all jurisdictions and regardless of the particular medium in question.
Also, the use of "deep" hyperlinks (which, as your hyperlink to our material on "Beograd.com" does, bypass home pages of original content providers) has been repeatedly found to be inappropriate and is increasingly subject to court injunctions, both in the USA and in the UK. For example, as your website is UK-based, I would draw your attention to the 1996 case of Shetland News vs. Shetland Times.
Yours,
David Irving
replies:
How interesting. Please inform me of this judgement as I do not have access to it in Key West where I (and my Website currently) are based.
David Irving