Copyright, Sterling-style

Rico says he couldn't have said it better himself (and wishes he had):

If you go and buy the print version of The Hacker Crackdown, an action I encourage heartily, you may notice that in the front of the book, right under the copyright sign, Copyright 1992 by Bruce Sterling, it has this little block of printed legal boilerplate from the publisher. It says, and I quote:

"No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. For information, address Bantam Books."

This is a pretty good disclaimer, as such disclaimers go. I collect intellectual-property disclaimers, and I've seen dozens of them, and this one is at least pretty straightforward. Unfortunately, it doesn't have much to do with reality. Bantam Books puts that disclaimer on every book they publish, but Bantam Books does not, in fact, own the electronic rights to this book. I do.
However, if you were so foolish as to print this book and start retailing it for money in violation of my copyright and the commercial interests of Bantam Books, then Bantam, a part of the gigantic Bertelsmann multinational publishing combine, would roust some of their heavy-duty attorneys out of hibernation and crush you like a bug. I didn't write this book so that you could make money out of it. If anybody is gonna make money out of this book, it's gonna be me and my publisher.

Rico says he particularly likes the part about 'rousting some of their heavy-duty attorneys out of hibernation and crushing you like a bug'...