Commentary
Reposting News Stories Is Like Grand Theft Auto? Really?
- by Wendy Davis , Staff Writer @wendyndavis, June 3, 2010
In his recent column "Copyright theft: We're not taking it anymore," Frederick attempts to explain why he tapped the copyright enforcement outfit Righthaven to file 22 and counting lawsuits against nonprofits like the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, sports-related sites and individuals like a local real estate agent.
Frederick launches into an extended analogy involving a stranger stealing a Corvette from someone's front yard, concluding with this passage: "When it comes to copyrighted material -- news that my company spends money to gather and constitutes the essence of what we are as a business -- some people think they can not only look at it, but also steal it," he writes. "And they do. They essentially step into the front yard and drive that content away."
That argument isn't only ludicrous, it's an embarrassment to the newspaper.
Sharing a news article -- one that's available to a broad audience online -- obviously differs than stealing a tangible good like a car, which can only be driven by one person at a time.
What's more, Frederick doesn't even attempt to argue that the paper was harmed by any of the alleged copyright infringement perpetuated by Web site operators. At least when the record industry sued file-sharers, the labels attempted to show that the availability of free music on peer-to-peer networks enabled people to stop making purchases, resulting in a drop in revenue.
By contrast, the newspaper's articles were already available for free. Further, many of the sites sued by Righthaven linked back to the newspaper. If the paper lost even one cent in revenue because of these posts, it hasn't yet explained how.
There's another reason why this car-theft analogy is off-key: Anyone who takes off with a stranger's car knows -- or certainly should know -- that he or she is depriving the owner of the ability to use that car. Few people would attempt to argue that they should have the right to joyride simply because they feel like doing so.
But many Web users assume that once a newspaper posts free versions of stories, the paper intends for those stories to be read by a broad audience. Perhaps those users are mistaken; perhaps they have no legal justification for reposting the stories in their entirety. But they, unlike the car thief, didn't realize they might have been breaking the law.
On the contrary, several of the defendants told MediaPost that they assumed they were paying the newspaper a compliment, or at least helping it out, by distributing its articles and linking back to the original.
What's more, neither Righthaven nor the Las Vegas Review-Journal asked the sites to remove the material before suing. While the law doesn't require content owners to send cease-and-desist letters before suing, many content owners -- especially news organizations -- do so.
Marc Randazza, an attorney who is defending NORML in the lawsuit, shared some of his thoughts about the Corvette scenario with MediaPost. "The real analogy is this: You have a 1967 Corvette in your driveway, and you charge people $2.95 to take pictures of it. Someone drives by and doesn't know that you charge to take pictures of it. They take a picture, and you come running out of your house with baseball bat and demand $5,000 or you'll smash in the windows on their car."
Frederick, however, doesn't seem to realize that it doesn't look good for a newspaper to sue its readers for allegedly distributing its stories. Remarkably, he not only defends the lawsuits, but urges other content owners to also enlist Righthaven. "It is our primary hope that Righthaven will stop people from stealing our stuff," he writes. "It is our secondary hope, if Righthaven shows continued success, that it will find other clients looking for a solution to the theft of copyrighted material."
Continued success? Righthaven has yet to show any success, judging from the court records. And it's not clear the company ever will. A sympathetic judge could well decide that the Web site operators infringed on copyright, but that they should pay only the minimum possible damages. And should that happen, Righthaven and the newspaper could end up gaining very little from this ill-considered initiative.
Wendy Davis is a Senior Writer at MediaPost. You can reach Wendy at wdavis@mediapost.com
I've been writing published articles for 22 years. I constantly find 'lifted' material from my work despite the fact that there is a clear copyright mark. It doesn't really bother me if the 'lifter' extends the basic courtesy of giving me credit for the material and hopefully a link.
Long ago I gave up trying to chase those profiteering on my efforts. As Rudyard Kipling said, "They copied all they could copy, but they couldnt copy my mind. So I left them sweating and stealing a year and half behind."
I liked that quote so much, I put it in a frame and its been hanging over my desk for 20 years. I look at it whenever I get frustrated over plagerism.
I believe your logic on the theft of copyrighted original content is flawed in the framing.
The content is available and free to readers ON THE REVIEW-JOURNAL website, by design and choice of the creators. You call taking that content and reposting in its entirety "sharing." How is it not theft?
To my mind, you could "share" a reference, be it a link, excerpt, or summary. But the wholesale cut & paste of the entire creative product is theft.
Imagine if I copied all of your columns, and reproduced them in my new monthly journal the "Monthly Examiner of Online Legal Issues." I'm sure you'd be cool with it, because I'm sharing it with my readers, and I've included the URL to your original articles, and of course I'm helping you reach a wider audience.
And you MAY well be okay with that, but I'd bet big that you would be angry and offended by not being asked in advance (as would the people that pay for your creative product).
A crucial ingredient of this type theft of original content is that it is done without permission -- a dead giveaway to the dicey and immoral position your column endorses.
As Randy stated, Wendy, your logic is about as flawed as it can get.
But perhaps that is because you are looking at the issue strictly from the viewpoint of a journalist and creative individual, instead of looking at what print and journalism really is, which is a business.
Certainly, the public service aspect, and the fact that information is "shared," is all fine and good. I understand that completely, having been a former journalist with a BS in journalism.
But looking at it from a strictly business standpoint, as one must do when he or she moves into the management and/or ownership position, means that serving the public and sharing information is fine and good, as long as no none is harmed in the doing.
And in the scenarios that you described, there is definite harm.
You wrote: "At least when the record industry sued file-sharers, the labels attempted to show that the availability of free music on peer-to-peer networks enabled people to stop making purchases, resulting in a drop in revenue."
What is so different from publishers who post original content online? We do it as a service, but mostly we do it to get a paycheck for our online work.
And how do we -- and YOU -- get that paycheck? There is one -- and ONLY one way -- by getting eyes onto our websites. Whether by subscription or by advertisement impressions or click throughs, or by selling other products or services online, getting people onto our websites to view our content is the only way that we can make a living.
Why have so many print dailies and weeklies disappeared? One major reason is a steep decline in circulation. Fewer people read them, fewer advertisers market to that declining market, money goes away, and the presses are shut down. One big reason for decline in print circulation was that readers were getting their news on the papers' websites, and no longer needed the print.
While the publishing industry is trying to backtrack to correct the mistake that many made by placing their print content online at no charge, the fact remains that anything that they do post online is their proprietary information, placed on their website for the sole purpose of driving traffic to that website.
And when someone lifts the content off of a paper's website, and places it on their website or blog for the sole purpose of providing valuable information and driving traffic to THEIR site, that is tantamount to stealing.
(This is different from providing an excerpt with link and directing viewers to the original content, which is the proper way to handle it.)
Sure, the word "stealing" is tough and perhaps not completely descriptive. As a kid, we would sneak into the local public swimming pool at night to swim. Technically, it was breaking and entering or trespassing, but really, could you call it that?
However, if we had drained the swimming pool water into trucks, and taken it to our own pool, and then invited others to our pool, what would you call that?
After all, water is free (wait for the rain), we didn't damage any property or break anything or cause them a loss in revenue.
Ah, but the water wasn't free. Someone had to pay to have it shipped there, it is treated with chemicals, a staff has to maintain it (sort of like paying writers, editors and IT folks to write and post content). And there was a loss of revenue if people went to the new pool, and fewer people went to the now-empty pool. Even if admission was free, they lost revenue from the snack bar, from selling sun screen, from advertising for paid-events at the pool, etc.
It does do harm. And unfortunately, because it has become so accepted, it is not looked upon as stealing. But really, it is.
I would venture that if a media writer on the Wall Street Journal's website (one of the top-ranked news websites) and simply pasted your blog (even giving you attribution) and traffic to your blog all but disappeared, while traffic to the WSJ's media writer's page increased, you would see it differently.
In fact, from a print and web publisher who sees it daily, I would not only venture it, I would guarantee it.
The major flaw in the argument is that content is generally not provided "free." It is provided in return for ad and other revenue. By reposting content you are robbing the publication and/or author of that revenue.
It doesn't matter if it's a non-profit or a for-profit doing the plagairism.
Now if the blogger or other property reacts to the content without repeating the original content, that is a different matter. That furthers both the responders goals and actually helps the originating site. However, wholesale copying = a loss of revenue for the content creator.
Good to see people writing in to support content owners. I've been in the content licensing business for 12 years and I can tell you that most of the people that say they didn't realize they needed permission or a licensing agreement to post our content are really full of crap.
The "taking a picture of the 1967 Corvette" analogy completely misses the point. How would anyone know that there is a fee for taking a picture? Content thieves know exactly what they are doing - they can see the copyright notices at the bottom of the content they are using. They play dumb and deserve to be sued.
Even at newspapers, there were a few advertisers who used to say to me their ad space didn't cost the paper anything. It was just space. (They were in my dead file - out of business or real bad credit - sooner than others.)