... Andy. Imposed by the quirks of the copyright law, which compel the copyright holder to treat equally infringers who do so solely for their own benefit and well-intentioned infringers, even those who do so for the benefit of the copyright holder.

A quick example: Disney sends cease and desist letters to day care centers which decorate their walls with Disney cartoon characters. The use of these characters in the commerical setting is an infringement on the copyrights. If Disney tolerates the use without a license, the company could lose the copyright interest in the characters. All of this despite the obvious fact that use of such characters on the day care center walls can only encourage the children to want to buy Disney items and see Disney movies.

Is the law which puts companies in this position stupid? Looks that way to me. But, you can't blame the copyright holder for attempting to protect a valuable intellectual property interest. And, you couldn't really blame the casinos "If it ever comes down to the Casinos telling me I can't make a scan of the chips THEY want to walk from the Casino then I will quit having anything to do with Limited Edition chips all together & also let them know where I think they can go. I'm sure I'm not the only one either. <<

>> As for your "we should keep that biblical "stone throwing" advice in mind" line, that does not fit here. << I guess that's one of the problems of being a lawyer; sometimes you know too much for your own good. If you were to go to court for the purpose of getting someone to stop stealing your scans, one of the first questions you'd be asked is, "did you have permission to use this image to begin with?" If the answer is "no", the court could invoke a legal doctrine called "clean hands" to throw your case out of court. "Clean hands" means, essentially, don't ask for help from the court unless you're completely "clean" yourself.

>> If I sell a $100 Tom Petty chip from the Hard Rock THEY make about $99 ......... I make about $10 after postage & insurance. At LEAST I am making money for the Hard Rock by scanning their chips. <<

As I said in response to Bob Orme, use of a scan to sell the scanned chip would be within the "fair use" exception to the copyright infringement rules.

>> BENNIE MANCINO is just a scan theft who takes scans from myself, Pete,
Josh & others to make HIS life easier after WE have done ALL the work. <<

One more time, I THINK SCAN THEFT REALLY SUCKS. And we as a collecting community can assign to such conduct whatever level of approbation we think appropriate. But, we should do so with a clear understanding that FROM A LEGAL POINT OF VIEW, what Bennie is doing may be no worse than what others are doing in using copyrighted material without permission.

BTW, Andy, I apologize for using the word "confession" in my previous post -- I didn't mean to imply that you were trying to hide anything. Poor choice of words on my part. ----- jim o\-S