NavList:

Sam L wrote:
"Give you an example- Buckleys video about Simplified Celestial navigation used to be on Youtube in its entirety. Bennett Marine (or whoever they are) sells the video and I assume had the complete video removed from Youtube as I suspect they think, or claim, they hold the copyright to it."

There are multiple copies of said video available on the Internet. If Bennett Marine holds a legally valid copyright to any video, then it is their right to decide what to do with it
--not yours.

And he wrote:
"Also, Youtube claims ownership of all videos put up on it's site"

That is false. They will not, however, provide users with copies of their videos after upload. In other words, youtube provides the online service, but if you accidentally delete something from your account, or if your account gets cancelled for some terms of service violation, then youtube is under no obligation to "return" your videos to you. They do not claim ownership of your videos (in any fashion that over-rides the original copyright), but they also do not provide a backup service. Youtube also explicitly states that anything you upload to their service, marked as public, can be displayed by them in any way that works for them in business terms. In other words, if they want to promote a public video, they can do so under their terms of service. Any user who doesn't like that can mark videos as private.

And:
"Amazon claims the right to copy and manufacture items you put up to sell on it regardless of Patent or Copyright. That sounds like theft to me."

That is nonsense. Where do people get these ridiculous notions?? 

Sam also wrote:
"Only because of the PDF above was I able to understand sextant Sun sight reductions as it was explained in simple to understand terms"

There are endless resources available for those interested in navigation who are less competent at mathematics. However, those interested in navigation who come at it with anger towards math are doomed to incompetence. Yes, one can learn to navigate with minimal mathematical skills, but that will make you a rudimentary navigator. An inability to do math is a crippling flaw. It's nothing to be proud of. 

Sam L concluded:
"Copyright is only to keep us "little people" from copying something. The machine, the corporations just take it."

That strikes me as the sort of populist rant we hear from people who have never created anything in life. And there's some logic to it: what value do uncreative people get from copyright law? The answer, of course, is they get the benefit of better artistic and intellectual works available to them. There are many countries where copyright law does not exist. Anyone can copy anything. Such places are not generally known for their creative products.

-FER