Copyright If Terms or Public Domain or CR/TM

[Tax Counsel]

The publisher's explanation doesn't support your contention at all.

Actually, it does. It clearly states that it is a historical dictionary, distinguishing it from all other well know English dictionaries. That term, as the OED states, means that it includes both modern and historical use of English words, something that indeed no other dictionary does, to my knowledge. Considering that the OED itself uses the term historical dictionary as a way of distinguishing itself from all other dictionaries, I think my use of the term was quite appropriate. If you think that the OED's description of what it provides is wrong, feel free to contact the editors of the OED to point out your concerns.

It specifically says that the modern definitions are there (and in fact, do track modern changes in both American and British usage) as well as the extensive historical use.

Yes it does. Nor did I say otherwise. However, the OED calls itself a historical dictionary, and so that was the term I used. It's choice of term to describe the product might be implied not to include modern words. To the extent it does, that's on the OED, not me. I simply used the term the OED itself uses

My point was that in my experience in using it, I have come across a few instances in which the OED fumbled the American defintion in one way or another. So if I use the OED for current definitions of American English in general use I'll also look at Webster's or other appropriate dictionary too. Your reaction suggests to me that you thought I said it's a terrible dictionary, reading into my post something that is not there. The OED is a great dictionary; certainly it has a lot to offer. But in trying to cover all variations of English around the world it is taking on a massive challenge and, as the OED is based in England, it doesn't surprise me that they occaissonally get the American definitions not quite right. I'd be quite surprised, in fact, if the OED got the definitions all of the various versions of English around the world spot on. The editors are human like the rest of us and thus imperfect. So I don't expect perfection in any dictionary, much less one that tackles the gargantuan task that the OED does. I was simply giving my experience in using it. Your experience and opinion of the OED is apparently a bit different from mine, and that's not an issue for me. I'm not calling you out for making "false" statements as your attack of me did.

I have been an OED subscriber for years, and your comments about it are unfounded and if you'd actually had used the resource you'd know it is untrue.

I have used it, as I've explained above, and have found some definitions for American use that do not quite hit the mark. Again, to me that's not surprising. If you are completely comfortable using it for American definitions that's great. The vast majority of the time it's going to be right. But again, in my experience, I've found a few American definitions that were not quite right. Hence my reluctance to solely rely on it when the definition is important to what I'm doing.

You may wish to do the little quiz at the bottom on OED myths and see how many of yours are indeed false.

I'll decline to do that. I'm actually reasonably familiar with it as I've used it myself. You make it sound like I made a whole slew of "false" statements about the OED. I only made two statement of fact in my post: (1) the OED is an English publication and (2) that it describes itself as a historical dictionary. I also provided a brief comment on my experience with it, which of course is opinion, not fact.

The term historical dictionary certainly could be read as implying it does't include modern use, but I didn't create the term. The OED itself uses that term. Thus my post was based on the OED's own description of what it provides and my experience in using it. So I don't see anything "false". Your opinion of the work is a bit different from mine, but opinions aren't provably right or wrong.

You omitted this boast in the link you provided:
The OED has been the last word on words for over a century.

Of course I did. The OED tooting it's own horn doesn't make true. It's like any other advertising jargon that claims the promoter of any good or service is the "best". It's no different than, say, if Crested called its oral care products something like "the ultimate in oral care for the last X decades."

Further, I was pointing out that the "misuse" of copyright as a verb is hardly "recent" (or American).

I merely pointed out that Black's Law Dictionary has updated its definition of the term as used in the law. As the standard dictionary for lawyers, I trust its definitions in my legal work over definitions provided in general use dictionaries like Webster's and the OED. The way lawyers use some words truly are different from what most non lawyers think it is.

It appears to me you've read into my earlier post a lot of things that were not there. That's the most likely possibility that comes to my mind for you exploding over it as you did, considering that I actually said very little about the OED. If my guess is wrong, please do tell me how you arrived at your conclusions. In any event, hopefully you'll better appreciate where I was coming from with the explanations I've provided here.

 

[flyingron]

You're dissing the OED solely because you regard it as a British publication but you appear to have ZERO experience using it. It is quite modern and covers historical and modern British and American English to greater detail that any other English language dictionary I have ever use (and I'm an amateur etymologist so I've used more than a few).

I concede that if you're defining legal terms, Black's is a better reference, but we were off the tracks into talking about colloquial usage and the I was refuting the prior assertion that copyright as a verb was a modern American colloquialism, when in fact, it goes back over a century on both side of the pond.

 

[Tax Counsel]

You're dissing the OED solely because you regard it as a British publication but you appear to have ZERO experience using it. It is quite modern and covers historical and modern British and American English to greater detail that any other English language dictionary I have ever use (and I'm an amateur etymologist so I've used more than a few).

I'm not "dissing" it at all. Did you not read in my first post on the subject that I said it was a "great dictionary"? Or did you just skip over that part?

I concede that if you're defining legal terms, Black's is a better reference, but we were off the tracks into talking about colloquial usage and the I was refuting the prior assertion that copyright as a verb was a modern American colloquialism, when in fact, it goes back over a century on both side of the pond.

I don't see where you think the conversation had veered off to colloquial use. I certainly had no such impression when I made my first post in this thread about the use of copyright. I was responding to this assertion:

The point is that "copyright" has no meaning as a verb.

He was speaking about the word's use in the law, as he has in many posts before. I just had never raised it with him until now. What puzzles me is that my contention about its use as a verb being valid in some contexts appears to be the same as yours, unless I've misread something. So I'm not getting why you are pushing back so hard on this.

The only real difference is that I pointed out that in law it changed several decades ago to recognize its use as a verb. I had no disagreement about its use as verb or a disagreement over how long it had been in general use. I simply pointed out when the change occurred in Blacks. I didn't speak about the point that it been recognized as a verb for much longer in general use. Moreover, I fail to see why the length of time matters, whether its a few decades in the law or a century or more in general. Either way, in the present it's pretty clear that it may properly used as a verb in the law and general conversation, in the right context.

I was pointing out that even in the practice of law the word has been recognized as being a verb as well as a noun for several decades, which means zddoodah's comment, as he wrote it, is behind the times even in legal practice. Black's Law Dictionary did not support his contention and indeed had referenced its use as a verb going back several editions. Not as long as other dictionaries did (as you pointed out), but the language of law moves more slowly than the language used in ordinary conversation. The law relies greatly on documents written in the past, sometimes centuries past, and reuse old terms from those ancient statutes and court decisions continue to the present day out of necessity, which make legal jargon more archaic.

This is one of the big factors contributing to arguments between lawyers and others over the meaning of words. Both may, in the contexts that they use it, be correct. Context matters a lot in a language as messy and sometime contradictory as English is. (An article I recently read rated English as the hardest language in the world to learn as a second language in part because of all the oddities in it.)

So if it wasn't clear before, I hope it is now: I was referring to the way the word is currently defined in the law and pointing out that it had been changed even in Black's decades ago.

My mention of OED not being perfect doesn't mean I think its poor resource. Just the opposite, actually. It's a fantastic work, which is why I use it some of my research. But as good as it is, I don't expect it to be perfect and have found some instances where it got the American use (sometimes in general conversation and sometimes in law) off the mark. That's simply my opinion and experience with using the OED: it's not perfect based on my experience in using it. But while not perfect, it is a great resource and I admire all the work that went into it.

That my experience differs from yours does not make my statement false, as you claimed. It's an opinion, and you and I both know that opinions vary on almost everything and are not provable either way.

I just don't see why some people explode when someone else's opinion does not match their own on a relatively trivial matter like what the exact definition of a word is. We fortunately live in a society where people are free to have wildly different opinions. I'd hate to live in China where the state is attempting mass group thinking among the population with a goal that everyone's opinion always matches the party line.