MEMORANDUM

TO:	June Morris
FROM:	Keith M. Corbett
DATE:	5-Jan-88
SUBJ:	Rights to copy material from LISP Machine Manual
COPY:	Bill O'Brien


I need your assistance in order to complete the documentation efforts in
progress for release 4.  Specifically, we need a determination of what
rights, if any, we have to copy material in whole or in part from the
"LISP Machine Manual" (LMM).

The LMM -- also known as the "grey manual" -- is the basic programming
reference for the Lambda software.  The most recent printing (the
version that LMI distributed to all its customers) was June 1984. I have
attached a copy of the inside copyright page.  You will note that a
statement is included describing the original grants under which the MIT
AI research was conducted.  A copyright for MIT is also listed.

Of particular concern is the authorship, and whether the authors hold
any rights.  Under what agreement, if any, did LMI distribute the
manual?  One author was an early LMI employee; the others are leading
co-founders of Symbolics.  This same material (updated extensively, of
course) is also distributed by Symbolics as customer documentation.

I have three concerns:

1) For release 4 I need to extract and revise large portions (about
10-20 pages) from the book for the release 4 networking manual.  It is
not easy to rewrite this material in such a way as to disguise its
origins; in fact, most of the information is not available from other
sources.

2) We may need to revise and redistribute this manual at some point.  It
is three years out of date; if we make any attempt to sustain the Lambda
software (either on the Lambda hardware or a future platform), this
manual must be rewritten extensively.  Obviously we must have complete
confidence in our position and right to do so.

3) GigaMos has sent copies of this manual with new systems.  (We may in
fact be quite close to running out of copies.)  Can we reprint and
distribute the manual in the event of future sales?

Rick Greenblatt or Steve Wiley may be in a position to provide further
background on the situation.

Perhaps I have raised a series of moot issues; but of course, better
safe than sorry.

KMC