All of the original content on this website is copyright © 1994-2009 by Steuard Jensen, unless another author is given explicit attribution. (No, I don't think it's worth the effort to pin the date down better than that. Most of this material was written after 1998 and much of it has continuously evolved for years, but a few pieces have remained unchanged since 1994.)
In cases where material written by others is included, the author is identified and retains copyright; all such material is used either by permission or under fair use. As one might expect for a site like this, copyright for the vast majority of quoted material belongs to J. R. R. Tolkien or the Tolkien Estate, and is included by fair use with my thanks. The Tolkien FAQ and LessFAQ were written by William D. B. Loos, and are included here by his kind permission. Several essays by Conrad Dunkerson are included by permission as well. And the Tolkien newsgroups' Lord of the Rings parody E-text project is the work of many authors, all of whom are identified on the chapter list page and retain copyright to their work. That should cover at least the vast majority of other peoples' direct contributions here; my sincere thanks to all of them. In all of the above cases, formatting of the material for the web was entirely my own work.
Others are of course welcome to quote limited portions of the material here in a manner consistent with fair use. In such cases, I do ask that I (or the relevant author) be given credit for my work, and I strongly encourage those citing me in this way to include the URL of the original document so that readers can see the quote's full context and any revisions I may make to it. (Including the URL is less important in discussions on the Tolkien Usenet newsgroups, where the FAQs and this site are well known and its URL is posted regularly.)
Copying any substantial fraction of any document here would naturally require explicit permission from its author (usually me). I may at times grant some permissions in advance for a given document by specifying a Creative Commons license on its page. Otherwise, if you are interested in copying something here, please write to me by email at steuard@slimy.com so we can discuss the matter. I am reasonably open to such requests, though I do ask that you make it entirely clear from the start if you have any commercial interest in the matter. If I do give such permission, I do so with the understanding that I will be prominently given credit for my work by name and that the URL of my original document will be included as well (unless I explicitly relax those conditions when giving permission).
I have on occasion been asked permission to translate my work into other languages. I typically find such requests quite flattering, and I am likely (though not certain) to approve them (particularly if they are entirely non-commercial in nature; as before, make any commercial aspect clear from the start). In such cases, if I do give permission, I do so with the same requirements of credit and "back-linking" discussed above, and require that the translator(s) be prominently given credit for their contribution as well (unless I explicitly relax those conditions).
My apologies for all that legal-sounding stuff, but having received a number of requests along these lines I figured I ought to lay things out clearly somewhere. In any case, no portion of this statement should be taken to limit my rights more than they would be if I had left it out.
