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