wwp@yahoogroups.com:
Phone Call from ZKM
Carsten T. Rees 2008-May-27 09:59:00
As I had previously posted to the group, I have tried to contact Mr. Lintermann via email
last week. Yesterday evening I got a phone call from him. But let me try to sum up
yesterday.
One of the cooperation partners of the Globorama is the MPI for Biological Cybernetics in
T?bingen. This is a renowned research institute. Since I am webmaster for a well known
German Life Science journal, this caught my attention. Stealing intellectual property is
quite an issue in the scientific community ? and this whole affair could end up in an article
in the next issue of Laborjournal ? or event Labtimes, our European branch. So I contacted
the MPI. They actually were quite shocked. They told me that they were not cooperation
partners of the Globorama ? they only let there 360 degree camera to them for some pano
shots. They are cooperation partners of the technical side of the project. Their aim is the
visualisation of biological data with this type of projection the Globorama also uses. The
MPI told me, I should contact Mr. Lintermann directly. I told them, that I had tried, but
have had no success so far. They told me, that I can be assured, that he WILL contact me.
I am not at all firm in legal issues. So parallel to this I had discussed the whole issue with
my wife, who is a judge. She told me, that the clause of the silent consent is void and has
no legal effect whatsoever. It is rather some kind of bluff. And the infringement of
copyright is pretty obvious as well. All in all a fairly straight forward case.
So yesterday at about 18:00 CEST Mr. Lintermann called me on the phone. He told me that
he was extremely sorry about the hole thing. He does not want to work against the
panoramic community, quite the contrary. He told me that there would be a posting for
clarification. I explained the whole legal issue to him and he told me that there had been
meetings all day with the head of the ZKM and a laywer.
After this phone call I really looked foreward to the mail from the ZKM and hoped, that this
would settle the quarrel. You can imagine, how disappointed I have been, when I read the
mail from the ZKM. Strange enough, I did not receive this mailing from the ZKM directly,
but only since Willy Kaemena was so kind to include it in his posting.
So my conclusions are: The ZKM is by now aware of the legal problems they got themself
into. The whole business is by now taken over by the head of the ZKM ? Mr. Lintermann is
no longer free to deal with this on his own. The ZKM has already involved a laywer. I
cannot imagine how a peacefull settlement can be possible any longer.
P.S.: Last night I downloaded the movie from Stuttgart. And I must confess that I was
shocked. This seems to me not like an infringement of copyright but rather like a
highjacking of the WWP.
P.P.S.: Please forgive me poor "legal" English.