Re Professor Lind's recent pronouncement on the retirement of "copyright" as
a verb:

It seems that we have segued ("segue" is both a noun and a verb) from the
topic of copyright law into the laws of language.  This is good, as I
probably have a little more expertise in the latter than in the former.  I
believe there are several flaws in Professor Lind's argument that "copyright"
is either incorrect or meaningless as a verb (or by extension, "copyrighted"
as a verb or verbal adjective).

A word describing an activity or action does not automatically become
obsolete or incorrect when the activity becomes extinct.  We still need to
describe "obsolete" objects and historical activities with "period" words.
 Even if Professor Lind is correct that it is now meaningless "to copyright"
something, we still have occasion to discuss works "copyrighted" before 1978.
 The modern propensity to make verbs out of nouns, which has been criticized
by many language experts, frequently produces awkward, inelegant usage (e.g.,
"to parent" from the noun "parent"), and I suspect that H. W. Fowler, author
of "A Dictionary of Modern English Usage," would have disapproved of
"copyright, -ed, -ing" as verb forms, but he was silent about it; I think
it's safe to
cite the standard dictionaries which sanction "copyright" as a verb.

Whether or not it is now necessary, effective, or useful "to copyright" a
work in the sense of a formal registration for copyright, people are in fact
still doing it.  And if they ARE still "copyrighting" in the active sense
that he describes--which the Copyright Office assures me they are--how have
we outgrown our need for the verb?  Professor Lind's assertion is absurd.
 Neither a decrease nor a complete halt in copyright registrations, nor a
redundant copyright registration for works automatically under copyright when
created, would obviate the need for the verb.  Moreover, who appointed either
Amalyeh or Professor Lind to determine whether a word or meaning is "in" or
"out" of the English language?

The Copyright Office at the Library of Congress is still using the verb and
verbal adjective
"copyrighted" in its post-1978 publications (bibliography upon request).  If
the Copyright Office itself still considers "copyright" a verb, it's
presumptuous for anyone--even a lawyer--to retire it prematurely.

The question about the date of my dictionary is pointlessly argumentative,
and apparently derives from an erroneous assumption.  Compilers of
dictionaries do not omit a word because someone thinks that some new law has
suddenly rendered it obsolete. Even if everyone abruptly stopped using
"copyright" as a verb after the new Copyright Law went into effect in 1978,
someone might chance upon a pre-1978 text which used "copyright" as a verb
and need to decipher it.  If Professor Lind visits his local library, I'm
sure he will encounter a few tattered, dusty tomes published in those dim,
benighted days prior to 1978.  I'm told that law libraries are bulging with
books published as long ago as (gasp!) 1950, some even earlier.  For the
record, the dictionary I used when I said Amalyeh was wrong was a 1983 pocket
Webster's New World Dictionary.  I also consulted a 1959 American College
Dictionary and a 1961 fat Webster's, as well as a 1994 Webster's, and all
agree that "copyright" is a transitive verb (v.t.); bibliography upon
request.  The writers on this list who prompted Amalyeh to render her
spurious judgment have shown that "copyright" is still a verb in current
usage.  Dictionaries are both prescriptive and descriptive of language usage.
 A word or meaning has to be pretty old and decrepit before it's marked
"obsolete" or "archaic," but it's still included through many editions.
 Hardly anyone uses "gay" in the pre-1970s sense any more, but it's still in
the dictionary; the contemporary usage is considered "slang," and no one is
justified in calling the original usage "incorrect."

Dictionaries are our standards, arbiters, and authorities on the language.
 Some are better, more comprehensive, or more useful than others, but they
are generally in agreement, and when the users of the language agree to abide
by common standards, communication and efficient discourse are facilitated.
 Any dictionary published in the latter half of the twentieth century as a
source for a word or meaning ought to be good enough for anyone.  All the
dictionaries I consulted agree that "copyright" can be a verb, and it is a
deterrent to rational discourse to deny that reality through some convoluted
manipulation of logic.  I would welcome any citation from Professor Lind for
a dictionary which fails to include "copyright" as a verb.  Perhaps he can
send me a xerographic copy of a page which would support his assertion (I
assume that such copying would be considered fair use).

Speaking of convoluted logic: I cannot understand the assertion that active
copyrighting in the form of registration offers no copyright protection.  The
law specifically states that it does, and the Copyright Office asserts that
it does, and claims that it confers the right to recover the full range of
"remedies," such as attorney's fees and use of the special schedule of
minimum damages described in the statute, whereas the more passive form of
copyrighting does not confer this right.  It is true that registration is no
longer mandatory, but there are inducements "to copyright" via registration.
 Since the procedure for formal registration still exists and has not been
rendered inoperative by the new law, why does our legal eagle imply that it
does NOT exist and therefore the verb is without meaning?  Whether or not
active, formal copyright registration offers EFFECTIVE protection is
irrelevant.  "To copyright" will remain a verb in that sense, whether it's
useful or not.  (But I have seen enough reports of successful awards for
copyright infringement to suggest that "to copyright" is still a very active
AND useful verb.)

If informal copyright is established by the mere creation of a work without
the necessity of the formal registration process, how does that nullify the
concept of copyrighting?  If creation accompanies or confers copyright status
so that copyright no longer needs to be a voluntary, separate process or
status which FOLLOWS creation, it does NOT logically follow that that
circumstance would eliminate the verb form.  I don't presume to say whether
creation EQUALS copyright or merely ACCOMPANIES or EFFECTS it in some
automatic sense, but it appears to me that "to create" is in some way "to
copyright," and you still have two verbs, two infinitives, no matter how they
overlap or how you slice them.  Would our dynamic duo argue that only words
which represent deliberate, conscious, aggressive actions qualify as verbs?
 A curious grammatical concept.

Formal copyright registration is still alive, available, advantageous, and
highly recommended.  If that was the justification for "copyright" as a verb
before 1978, that justification still exists, even if the procedure is not
mandatory, so it's still a verb.  The new law provides for limited copyright
protection without registration; even if copyrighting is an automatic process
or status which coincides with the act of creation and the creator does not
need to perform a separate act of copyrighting, it seems to me that it is
splitting hairs--incorrectly--to argue that no copyrighting ACTION has
occurred.  A COPYRIGHTED (verbal adjective) work results either way.  The
verb, even if weakened, still stands.   How a law professor can claim that
neither mode of copyrighting offers copyright protection, moreover, is
mind-boggling: this is patently (no pun intended) untrue.  I can only hope
that we will find that some cyber-demon garbled his message and made it come
out the opposite way that he had intended.

Counselor, I rest my case.

--David Haberstich