I don't think Wendell has access to that database. The original RPLS.com was acquired by the big media company that owned POB magazine. Wendell acquired the RPLS.com web address after the media company's license to it expired without renewal. I expect that the big media company still has the old forum database stored on a forgotten server somewhere.

Database has value but only if viewed.  Was hoping for a way to drum up interest on this site.  Huge amount of subject matter with much being relevant today.

any idea who has ownership of the data?

The wayback machine on archive.org has snapshots of the old website:

https://web.archive.org/web/20000000000000*/rpls.com

Some of you may be forgetting what a piece of trash the POB Magazine run version of RPLS.com was. So bad that when Wendell started this site (as beerleg.com) the traffic on RPLS.com dried up to a trickle almost overnight. I would not expect those meatheads to have retained their jobs in web development, much less any data, for over a decade.  

Mark Deal's version was much simpler but ran fine.

@norman-oklahoma 

Amen.  Agree with everything you said.  A visit to the POB version was like sitting next to a pond in the evening listening to the buzzing insects and the occasional bull frog.

But the bullfrog knew where the center of the section was in that pond..

Anyone remember the name of the road on which POB Magazine received mail?

copyrights

[ Follow Ups ] [ Post Followup ] [ rpls.com WWWBoard ] [ FAQ ]

Posted by Aaron L. Morris on June 16, 1996 at 00:28:00:

I am working on a formula reference chart to place in
a field book. I have two questions about copyrights.
First, to keep from plagiarizing, how much must be changed
on origional formulas. And do I need to sight my sources?
Second, do I need to put a copyright on each page? Or just
on the cover?

Follow Ups:

• http://www.rpls.com/wwwboard/messages/7.htm l">Re: copyrights Jerry Broadus 7/04/96 (0)

for the above link, you need to use the wayback machine from post above.  Just fyi, Broadus post was:

Posted by Jerry Broadus on July 04, 1996 at 01:15:00:

In Reply to: http://www.rpls.com/wwwboard/messages/3.htm l">copyrights posted by Aaron L. Morris on June 16, 1996 at 00:28:00:

If you are talking about mathematical formulae, they are not subject to copyright. Copyright (in America) can not cover ideas or processes. Otherwise someone could copyright the pythagorean theorem. If you are talking about a computer program, that's a different story. Obviously, a program with a lot of creativity (such as AutoCad, for example) can be copyrighted. In that case the test is "is your product substantially similar" in look and "feel" (there are a lot of complications here).

Posted by: @geoff-ashworth

↑

The wayback machine on archive.org has snapshots of the old website:

https://web.archive.org/web/20000000000000*/rpls.com

and from the first year to include Mark Deal's first post on 5/22/1996 - fyi, the links do not work and you need to use the wayback machine as posted above:

http://rpls.com/images/seal.gi f" width="150" height="146" align="middle" />rpls.com WWWBoard

Feel free to post a message regarding any subject relevant to the field of surveying. Others will be able to read your message and respond to it.
This is an excellent way to compare opinions, or find solutions to problems.

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@hpalmer 

Wow.  Amazing.  Just seeing the names of Richard Schaut, Jerry Broadus and L. Paul Cook jerked my mind out of Forward into Neutral for a second on the way to Reverse.  Schaut was from Wisconsin and had a different opinion than almost anyone who dared to challenge him.  Broadus was a surveyor and an attorney, as I recall.  L. Paul Cook lived in that part of California where his house and property were sliding downhill continuously.  Boundaries had to move with the slow slide.

Posted by: @holy-cow

↑

@hpalmer 

[SNIP]  Broadus was a surveyor and an attorney, as I recall.  [/SNIP]

Yep- correct on both. Jerry R. Broadus's book, "Washington State Common Law of Surveys & Property Boundaries", is a veritable gold mine of information for any licensed surveyor in Washington State IMO. It was updated in 2023 by Kristopher Kline.

@crashbox 

Is Broadus surveying on the streets of gold these days?  I know Schaut and Cook are doing that.

Mr. Broadus was still alive the last I heard. He was consulted for the 2023 update, and I haven't heard or read of his passing.

Paul Cook is very much alive and well in the land of Facebook. Seems like he specializes in terrestrial scanning these days.

@andy-nold   Thank you for correcting me.  I do wish he would reconnect with this site.  I must have had a brain fart that switched his last name to Plutae.  That Paul was from southern California as well and is deceased.

@holy-cow 

I still chuckle once in a great while when I recall the Richard Schaut 'mistletoe post'.  

🤣  

@cv

He was consistently arguing about one thing or another.  Do your best to tell the story for us.  I honestly seem to have forgotten it.

Going off memory here but as I recall there were  debates between Richard and others concerning the merits of fence lines being considered as evidence of boundaries under various circumstances. If I recall correctly, over the course of many such debates Richard had 'softened' his original stance a bit. Anyway during one such debate, Richard invited an adversary to take notice of the mistletoe hanging from his rearmost belt loop. Days later in a subsequent related post that was becoming quite 'lively' someone else chimed in "Richard's going for his mistletoe". 🤣