Brodhead Pietenpol Association

Original Posted By:
I know enough about copyright issues to know for absolute certainty thatthere would be plenty of room for a legal action AND a successful defense ofthat action. If nothing else, my (costly) past "interactions" with thelegal profession have shown that EVERY battle can be won OR lost, and notnecessarily based on what's right or wrong or moral or ethical. A lot offactors determine who "wins" and who "loses". This would not be as clearcut as some would hope. But one thing's for sure, WE would all lose, nomatter what the legal outcome.Having said that, the fact remains:.....I'm not making any copies. Period.I will say that I was really surprised (and a bit embarrassed actually) atwhat a simple "can I make some copies? no? ok..." turned into yesterday.That lpossibly happened because of my failure to communicate clearly or fromOVER communicating.For THAT, I apologize.Frankly, my initial reaction was, "ok, I love sharing the reference materialothers have shared with me and I love helping spread the "Pietenpol"message. But threats of legal action? The heck with it, I'll just shut upand mind my own business from now on." Then I realized that I had justadded one more negative to an issue that had already been blown out ofproportion. Then I saw a LOT of messages I wanted to reply to and realizedagain, I would just be adding more negatives to an issue that has alreadybeen blown out of proportion.No, I do not agree with (what I perceive as) the spirit of Mr. MacLaren'sposition, inspite of having some idea why he has taken this position.Actually, when I realized there were people out there willing to pay moneyfor what he has reprinted, I decided to make the cd's myself and send themout myself and ask only that a "contribution" be sent directly to him.Seemed like a win-win-win to me (even with the fact that I would be doingthis "labor of love" for free....) But I WILL support Mr MacLaren'sposition. And I'll move on.....What do you say we ALL move on now and leave this issue alone?This note is NOT intended to encourage a continuation of the discussion. Infact, just the opposite. If you just can't help yourself and feel compelledto reply to me or whatever, PLEASE do it offline. Everyone's beenannoyed/distracted enough for one decade.....Jim in Plano....READY TO MOVE ON!!!!! ----- Original Message -----

Original Posted By: "Jim Markle"
When I became interested in Pietenpol's, I bought all the old newsletters fromMacLaren. He sold me all the letters that he had "copied" from Frank P. as partof his package. I wonder if he had permission to copy the old letters and makea profit for himself and not the organization.As for the dues, I also was suckered-in on the request to save money and pay 4years in advance. OUCH!!! Yea he got me for 4 years dues. No, he won't returnmy emails or calls either.Barry Davis________________________________________________________________________________

Original Posted By: "Christian Bobka"
Hello Grant,You don't know me.However, I feel the need to apologize for inadvertently causing a few peopleto vent frustrations which I feel should have been long forgotten. Here'sthe story.I am just getting into building a Pietenpol. I began my search forinformation about this fine aircraft on the internet. Of course, Iencountered your very informative and extremely helpful website. It containsa wealth of information. In reading through your site, I found the Pietenpolfamily website, and found out about Brodhead and countless other essentialbits of information for Piet fans/builders. Eventually, I joined thePietenpol discussion group on the web, and visited Brodhead. Thefriendliness and willingness to help of all those I encountered struck me. Idecided to take the plunge and build one of these wonderful antiqueairplanes, knowing that there was a great group of people out there willingto help along the way. I ordered my plans from Don Pietenpol, and I am nowsourcing wood.In my few postings to the Piet discussion group, I have found everyone'sresponse to be friendly and helpful, and willing to share whatever insightsthey have gained through their experience. Through one of these postings,and following some e-mail discussion with Pietenpol builder, Jim Markle. Jimindicated that he had some old copies of the BPA newsletters, which he saidwere full of great builders' tips and historical info. I have seen a fewcopies of the great newsletter you published for all those years, and wassad to hear that they were no longer available. He indicated that he wouldbe willing to loan them to me (from down in Texas to up in Ontario). Intrying to figure out the best way to get those newsletters from South toNorth (and through customs), we discussed several options. Eventually theidea of copying them onto a CD came up, and, at the time it seemed like agreat idea. Since the newsletter's original purpose was to share informationand help fellow builders, the idea of sharing copies of the past newslettersseemed to be in the same spirit. There was never any intent to infringe uponyour copyright. There was never any talk of anyone making a profit. The ideawas simply to share knowledge.The reaction of a few people on the discussion group, when it was made clearthat you did not give anyone permission to duplicate your newsletters, wassurprising. I found it hard to believe that anyone would harbour resentmentfor five years, over the apparent loss of a few dollars. And according toinformation supplied by Mike Cuy, you stated that you effectively did refundsubscriptions, by simply not cashing checks.Having seen the interest expressed in being able to obtain copies of thefull series of the BPA newsletter, I pose the following question: Have youever considered publishing complete sets of the old newsletters? Anotheridea would be to compile all the old issues on a CD, which you could offerfor sale to all of us newbies, who didn't know about the BPA newsletterswhen they were being published? I think the assumption was that you were nolonger interested in publishing and distributing and al the headaches thatgo with all of that (maybe I'm wrong). It seems a shame to prevent thesharing of all that great information.Nonetheless, let me close by saying that I (and many others) trulyappreciate the fact that you have kept your BPA website open, following thedemise of the newsletter. Thanks for keeping the information in itavailable.Sincerely,Bill Church________________________________________________________________________________

Original Posted By: Barry Davis
We are all building airplanes that will be licensed as experimental-amateur builtand, if you read the definition of this elsewhere in the regs, it means thatthe aircraft must be built for the education of the builder, among a few otherreasons.If one wishes to copy the newsletters to further the education of others who arebuilding Experimental-ABs, then this is no different than when I legally photocopiedcopyrighted stuff and legally distributed it to my students at UT-Austin.I don't think Grant has anything to say on the matter.chris ----- Original Message -----

Original Posted By: KTS5TA6(at)wmconnect.com
reportHey folks,I'm very new to the Pietenpol and very excited about getting started. Ijust wanted to say that some folks may be under the impression that youcan still buy back-issues from Grant. I was under that impression aswell because of what is listed on his website. However, a few weeks agoGrant let me know even the back issues are no longer available. Thiswas a very big blow to me because I'm one of those people that like toread everything I can on something before I get started. Just knowingthat there is a full set of great newsletters out there but, because Igot in the game late, they are not available to me really burns me up.I for one really do not care whether Grant holds the legal rights to thenewsletter or not - I would gladly pay him or someone he has sold the"rights" to if I could just get my hands on that info! However, out ofrespect for what Grant has done, I won't buy or accept "unauthorizedcopies.Grant, if your listening, would you consider making back issuesavailable again or transfer that right to someone else so that folkslike me who need the info can get it? It would be a shame to let all ofyour hard work go to waste. Thanks.Jake CrauseI________________________________________________________________________________

Original Posted By: "walt evans"
Subject: Re: Pietenpol-List: BPA Newsletter CopyrightI might be interested in buying the rights to the newsletter if Grant would contact me. I too was smitten by the Pietenpol bug last year. When I discovered the news letter and back copies were no longer available, I was a bit discouraged. Because of my inability to access information (partly) and my own stupidity and haste, I made a bad purchase on a "new" dog of a Pietenpol that had been through the FSDO process but never flown. Maybe if I hada pile of newsletters to read, I would have done things differently and made a more enlightened decision.Grant is not to blame for anything! Typically when someone submits info to a newsletter, or a magazine or a newspaper or CBS NEWS, the stuff that goes intothe newsletter (or on TV) becomes the property of the publisher, regardless of the fact if the person who submitted the info was compensated or not. Evenif you submit a photo, you typically surrender all rights to the publication that prints it in their magazine, newsletter, brochure, etc, unless you have signed a contract to suggest otherwise. (Been there, done that for 30 years...)I say lets cut Grant some slack and back off. I'd also say, there are a lot of people out there in Air Camper Land that could greatly benefit from the info. Grant probably worked his butt off on putting the newsletter out each month.And for a measly $2.50 a copy, he wasn't getting rich. I suspect this Grant just loved Bernard's airplane and wanted to help folks. Maybe Grant is burned out, maybe he won the Wisconsin lotto and is living on an island somewhere drinking ice cold Coronas, but what ever ... the guy deserves some slack... After all, he developed a website and paid out of his ownpocket to have it up and running and many of us have used his website, never paying him a dime.Grant ... if you are out there in binary land, please contact me off line and tell me what you need in compensation for the rights. Maybe I can keep people off your ass and in their hangers where they belong (or garages, dens, living rooms ... where ever ... building Air Campers). This way, maybe everybody would be happy? If I started a newsletter, I only wish I could live up to everybody's expectations. I suspect not everyone would be happy because there a few soreheadslurking in Air Camper World. But if folks had access to the info and if an AirCamper newsletter could continue, at least some builders might benefit. Lastly, if I put out a newsletter, it would contain useful info and people would have to put up with my warped sense of humor! Lets face it, an Air Camperain't a serious airplane but it's probably one of the most fun things that ever lifted off the face of the earth. And I think a newsletter should not be designed for anal-retentive people only. It can contain technical info while keeping a smile on the face and a wrench in the hand. Maybe I'm wrong, but I'dlike to challenge anyone to step up to the plate and take over where Grant leftoff. But if I do a news letter, anal-retentives need not subscribe! Sterling BrooksKnot-2-Shabby Airport & Texas Longhorn Cattle Ranch 5TA6, San Antonio Sectionalwww.byop.comwww.sterlingbrooks.tvwww.tacoloco.us (coming soon)www.dumpeddogs.us________________________________________________________________________________

Original Posted By: KTS5TA6(at)wmconnect.com
Grants email seems to be...GMacLaren(at)aol.comwalt evansNX140DL ----- Original Message -----