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Copyright Information

Views of the Solar System is copyrighted by Calvin J. Hamilton; however, many of the images come from NASA or other government sources and are in the public domain. Many are copyrighted by Calvin J. Hamilton, and others are copyrighted by various individuals and organizations. Here are the copyright guidelines for the various materials.

General Copyright Guidlines and Disclaimer

I have tried to make sure the information in Views of the Solar System is as correct as possible. However, I cannot guarantee that errors have not crept into the documents. If errors are found, I would appreciate knowing about them. Here are some general conditions for use of this information.

The Views of the Solar System web site along with many of the images and information are copyrighted by Calvin J. Hamilton.

The material Calvin J. Hamilton produced may not be used to state or imply endorsement by Calvin J. Hamilton of a commercial product service or activity, or used in any other manner that might mislead.

It is unlawful to falsely claim copyright on material found in Views of the Solar System.

Calvin J. Hamilton and/or authors shall in no way be liable for any costs, expenses, claims or demands out of use or lack of use of Views of the Solar System's photographs and material by a recipient or recipient's distributes.

Images and Texts by Calvin J. Hamilton

Most of the text incorporated in Views of the Solar System is copyrighted by Calvin J. Hamilton. There are a few pages that are copyrighted by other individuals or organizations. My policy is that school teachers can use Views of the Solar System materials in their class rooms as long as teachers do not ask for money for the materials. Students my use Views of the Solar System materials in their class reports. Teachers and students must give proper credit when using Views of the Solar System materials. A proper credit line is (Courtesy Calvin J. Hamilton).

Students may use Views of the Solar System text for research purposes and may properly quote from Calvin J. Hamilton's materials. In general you should be original in your writing; however, if you want to use the text and your teacher would approve, visit the page Student Resources for information on using Views of the Solar System text. Under all conditions, you must give credit on the page that it is used on.

I have processed many of the images in this tour and they are copyrighted. If you wish to use one these images in a publication you can send the request to .

Students may use images by Calvin J. Hamilton in their papers and reports as long as they give proper credit. If a student wants to use an image on a web page, for a class project, he or she may do so as long as the following conditions are observed:

  1. Calvin J. Hamilton's images must be clearly marked with "Copyright Calvin J. Hamilton". This MUST appear next to the image and not at the bottom of the page or on a separate web page.
  2. A link to http://www.solarviews.com or http://www.planetscapes.com must also be included.
  3. Students may not use the images for-profit purposes with out contacting Calvin J. Hamilton.
  4. Only thumbnail images may be used on web pages. Calvin J. Hamilton's full resolution images may NOT be copied onto other web sites.

Commercial Use: Commercial use of Calvin J. Hamilton's materials MUST be made in writing to . Permission will be granted on a case by case basis. Please be specific when making a request.

NASA, JPL, USGS and NGDC Images

The NASA, JPL, USGS, and NGDC images are in the public domain, but please give them credit when using their images. The following are two statements by NASA:
  • No copyright is asserted for these images. If a recognizable person appears in an image, use for commercial purposes may infringe a right of privacy or publicity. These images may not be used to state or imply the endorsement by NASA or by any NASA employee of a commercial product, process or service, or used in any other manner that might mislead. Accordingly, it is requested that if these images are used in advertising and other commercial promotion, layout and copy be submitted to NASA prior to release.

    National Aeronautics and Space Administration, Houston TX, 77058

  • All of the images presented on NSSDC's Photo Gallery are in the public domain. As such, they may be used for any purpose. NSSDC does ask, however, that you acknowledge NSSDC as the supplier of the data. In addition, where the source of the image (by project or as a specific person) is credited in the text, you should also acknowledge that, too.

Hubble Space Telescope Images

The Hubble Space Telescope (HST) images on my web site were obtained at the time the following was in effect:
  • All of the HST images available via WWW and ftp may be used without restriction as long as credit information accompanies the picture. Credit usually includes the principal scientist responsible for the data, AURA/STScI, NASA and/or ESA, the European Space Agency. Specific credit information may be found in the captions accompanying the images as plain text files. The captions are available via links from the Web pages as well as separate files in the gif directory on the ftp server.

Other Images

A few of the images come from other sources; some of which are in the public domain, but some have a copyright associated with them. In order to use these images you will need to contact the author.

Views of the Solar System Copyright © 1995-2009 by Calvin J. Hamilton. All rights reserved. Privacy Statement.