So AP wants to charge bloggers for "fair use" content. Good luck with that. Many are going to boycott them as a result, but one notable blogger is taking another tack.
Lots of blogs are calling for boycotts of AP content. Not me. I'm going to keep using it. I will copy and paste as many words as I feel necessary to make my points and that I feel are within bounds of copyright law (and remember, I've got a JD and specialized in media law, so I know the rules pretty well). And I will keep doing so if I get an AP takedown notice (which I will make a big public show of ignoring). And then, either the AP -- an organization famous for taking its members work without credit -- will either back down and shut the hell up, or we'll have a judge resolve the easiest question of law in the history of copyright jurisprudence.
The AP doesn't get to negotiate copyright law. But now, perhaps, they'll threaten someone who can afford to fight back, instead of cowardly going after small bloggers.
Which brings up a good point. Drudge Retort isn't doing anything that Boing Boing or Digg or the Huffington Post or any other mega site isn't doing. So why pick on some little guy who can't afford to defend itself, for such a truly minor infraction? It was complete bully tactics.
I still can't wrap my head around the idea of charging someone to link to you. We've been witness to some staggeringly stupid acts on the internet, but this one really takes the cake.
Do they understand that if they sue Markos, he'll get all the traffic he can eat? Do they even understand the whole concept of traffic?
Doubtful.
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so,
what if all of us who are commenters start to link to and copy and paste AP stuff,anything, as long as it comes from the AP? Will they come after each of us? or is it just in a blog? cause i can cut and paste the hell out of, well, “stuff”, ya know?
hehe
The Drudge Report can’t defend itself? Its a small Blog I don’t doubt you I have no idea.
Kos has issued his ”bring it on” declaration over at the Great Orange Satan.
Completely off-topic, please grab your sick-sack and go see this at Sadly, No! I can’t believe that even the McCain folks could countenance racism that blatant, or then again, maybe they can.
[Link repaired by moderator]
Didn’t the Ass. Press state that one of their concerns was short snippets being taken out of context?
So five word limits gives context, now?
Ho-Kay!
Go Markos!!
digg
oh
and
Jus Cogens
or zed or whatever.
hello???
am i the only one in here?
wow
echo
“President Bush fucked up again today…”
Wait, that’s six.
That’s the Drudge Retort, nor Drudge Report
Drudge Retort, not the other one.
Dugg!
everyone should digg this,
i LIKE that it’s an IN YO FACE to the almighty AP.
lol
Don’t links drive up advertising revenue? A quote without a link like in a dead tree newspaper seems more dangerous to misinterpretation than a partial quote with link, I think the AP is just trying to hassle bloggers.
It’s the corporate equivalent of throwing some little country up against the wall every few years, just to show we can.
Big Bad AP — BOOOO
Sorry my mistake.
No big, every one seems to confuse the two… which I am sure pisses Matt D. off, because he defines their (the media’s) Universe, after all. LOL…
yeah, I was thinking of charging the local newspaper if they publish an article about one of my projects.
LOl!
good one!
and who said AP could write the rules for the intrawebs???
they’re not the boss of ANY of us.
lol
nope, not when your concept of revenue is based on selling JC Penney bra ads :D
“President Bush fucked up again
today…”Fixed it for you. “today” is redundant anyway when referring to that subject/verb combo.
I like Markos’ thoughtful tactic.
I just hope that “news” organizations are not going to do the fascist dirty work and get new rules written re blogging.
Truth has a well known liberal bias.
I was going to drop “president”.
Oh, and the rate of $12.50 for five words, if the AP quotes you Jane (”Bite Me”, says Firedoglake’s Hamsher) they owe you $5.00 if my math is right.
Make sure you get that invoice out ASAP. :-)
$12.50 For Five Words?
I’ll save three words and spend my money on something else.
“More Beer”.
Idjits.
I thought beer was vetoed…
Progressive blogs, possibly following cues from their leadership in the Democratic Party, are underplaying and avoiding the issue of recent votes and maneuvers in Congress to perpetuate the illegal, immoral and failed Occupation of Iraq, that most Americans oppose.
The day after Reuters reports that “Democrats in the Congress, who came to power last year on a call to end the combat in Iraq, will soon give President George W. Bush the last war-funding bill of his presidency without any of the conditions they sought for withdrawing U.S. troops, congressional aides said…“
3 frontpage posts on Firedoglake were attacks on McCain, one attack on Karl Rove, and one laudatory post about Obama supporters delivering 11.000 names on a petition about something of momentary relevance. Then another post about a Republican politician ogling high school girls, then a post about the AP attempting to charge for quotations.
Meanwhile,
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/200.....funding_dc
Six months was all I could stand.
That would be Twelve Fifty right there.
Idjits.
Daily Kos tends to make me crazy so I don’t often go there. I have a couple of specific Diary authors bookmarked - but don’t tend to wander around in the site as a whole. But, THIS will change my mind.
Go Markos!
do they understand that if we DON’T link to them they lose money?
I doubt it
From DKOS;
[T]heir Terms of Use explicitly prohibit you, even if you’ve paid them, from quoting the Associated Press in order to criticize the Associated Press:
You shall not use the Content in any manner or context that will be in any way derogatory to the author, the publication from which the Content came, or any person connected with the creation of the Content or depicted in the Content. You agree not to use the Content in any manner or context that will be in any way derogatory to or damaging to the reputation of Publisher, its licensors, or any person connected with the creation of the Content or referenced in the Content […]
BuhBye AP.
Publisher reserves the right to terminate this Agreement at any time if Publisher or its agents finds Your use of the licensed Content to be offensive and/or damaging to Publisher’s reputation.
And just maybe, the people who are actually DOING something about Congress and the war are too busy working to get these posts up often enough for you. We write on the war every day. We have guests from Iraq tell it from the bloody side. We support political candidates who oppose the Iraq occupation, who have opposed the occupation since before the invasion.
We will never be pure enough for some people but we are out there trying. And not everything that goes on makes it into print, fyi.
shorter kos from his latest post -
ya gotta love the little scamp
Hey, is ThingsComeUndone still here?
Remember Rupert Murdoch joined the AP Board in April of this year.
“things all of you should blog about!”
dah dah dah dahhhhhh (suspense horror music sting here).
No More Steny No More Joe
I don’t know anyone on this blog who is in favor of the occupations. There have literally been thousands of FDL posts about the occupations. Siun does one every Sunday night.
The AP will take my fair use when they pry it from my cold dead links.
Create your own blog, free
ok everybody, I’ll be on the lookout for your take on the matter.
also of interest will be how opposition to the occupation will be handled under a Democratic administration, which is likely to repeat the typical (D) pattern, as described by Glenn Greenwald:
my prediction - the progressive blogs role will be to counsel patience to those in the grassroots who keep demanding, y’know, and actual end to the criminal war.
This is the Drudge ReTort.
AP may be under pressure from their clients, especially print media, who pay for these stories and are seeing a decline in readership at the same time, because it’s no longer necessary to buy the physical newspaper, in order to get the news. While it’s foolish for the AP to restrict cut and paste’s to five words, they probably have a case, vis a vis lost revenues.
On the other hand, the advent of web logs such as Kos, Fire Dog Lake and HuffPo has changed the media landscape for the better, by providing balance to the corporate owned media, by acting more as the Administration’s stenographer, than doing their duty as a member of the fourth branch of government.
While the AP would have to beef up it’s own lamentable site, how would it be if AP required a link to them? Anything more than a paragraph could be charged, but on a sliding scale based on the amount of traffic a site gets.
OT– “Billyboy” Haynes tries to take McCaskill to school @ the Armed Services Cmte wrt to “how the DOD works.”
blah, blah, blah we’re so busy.
(btw he has a bad case of “can’t recall” s**t, too.)
The Firesign Theatre had a great one about the company that owns the “idea that is America”
Bechtel owns the rain in much of south america, why shouldn’t the AP have a copyright on the acts and statements of all humans?
I wonder if the supreme court will take up the challenge. I wonder if the ap has enough money to purchase the votes on our court that are, clearly, for sale.
Hey everyone, don’t rough up Spork too much. I’m feeling frustrated too that there is so damn much to keep our eyes on. I mean it is overwhelming and feelings are pretty raw. I’m sure FDL can weather a little mild talk back.
I get the feeling that the election, as important and essential as it is, will be used as a diversion for the last gasp of Bushco to push through more attrocities, like OKing drilling in all of Wyoming, Alaska, Florida, etc. and slipping in some onerous military provision and immunity for Halliburton, KBR, and Blackwater.
I think Spork is just saying, don’t let our guard down. I’m jumpy too.
Who’s “counseling patience”? What progressive blog has expressed satisfaction with the Dem leadership on the war since the 2006 elections?
That is not nice. Everyone knows Progressive blogs are controlled by George Soros.
Not to go all Link Nanny on a thread about linkage etiquette, but…
linkie?
thanks dosido. this ol’ turtle hasa hard shell, and is used to being the skunk at the tea-party, to mix my metaphors once again.
BushCo may well have some game changing aces up its sleeve, an October surprise, or even a November spiteful debacle after an electoral pounding.
Of sociological interest is how the left Blogs will act with a (D) in power … thats what I was getting at because I thought the relative silence about the 163 billion dollar supplemental the congressional (D)’s are working to pass was foreshadowing of things to come.
here - not his column, but in a letter.
http://letters.salon.com/opini.....4dada.html
like a B-side rarity.
Got it, thanks sporko.
ok ok I’m sorry for the OT I was just drawing a contrast to todays posts and the 163 billion dollar supplemental …
I know there has been lots of clamor against Congress for their failure to curtail the war - my point has always been that they are just doing what they do best, doing what they want to do, and that different conclusions follow from this.
RE:
mmm, sounds yummy! I can’t wait for desert!!!
dugg!
As a small time blogger who was also hit with this tactic, I understand the problem. (See EFF Spocko and ABC Radio/Disney) For the AP it’s “just business”. But for me it was personal and corporate bullying. And frankly I’m sick of it. ABC Radio Disney used a bogus copyright claim to destroy a critic by using the law in a fashion in which it was not intended.
I did everything right regarding fair use and they STILL came after me. And that just stinks. They never withdrew their C&D to 1&1 hosting and I even complied with the request to remove info. They got HUGE negative PR and it cost KSFO 28 national and local advertisers. But knowing them, if I try and push this again they will move to the next tactic, character assassination on the air, financial attacks aren’t enough for big media. How can we get them to stop this? Hmmmm. Any suggestions?
Are you in CA? Couldn’t you file an anti-SLAPP suit against them, under CA Code of Civil Procedure § 425.16?
Can’t help wondering if we should be forming a guild, maybe one located in CA until federal law catches up with 425.16, through which we could post our work as blog guild members…and then for a de minimis fee each year to join the guild, we fund SLAPP protection for all members. Food for thought.
p.s. IANAL, forgot to add that caveat.
If only, if only. All these conservatives talking about Soros funding us.
Where’s my check!? I demand my check!
No one tells us what to do, because, guess what, they don’t pay our bills. There was a point, about 4 years ago, where a million bucks could have bought most of the progblogs, but the donors blew it and didn’t see the opportunity. Too late now.
What shapes prog blog coverage is much more subtle than theories about Dem leadership “giving orders”. The dem leadership has very little to no say. They can push storylines, but that blows up in their face as often as not. They certainly don’t give orders.