When I questioned why USLaw.com used my posts, in their entirety, on its website, it caused quite a ruckus. It seems that the proprietor of USLaw.com, a fellow who uses the name Gregory Chase, though I have good reason to believe it’s a fake, reacted quite poorly. I was absolutely wrong, he informed me, and I was damaging his business. He was going to “embarrass” me and tossed slander out (I know, but he apparently isn’t aware of the distinction between slander and libel).
Using an appeal to “fairness”, a curious thing for someone in his position, Chase told me that I had agreed to allow him to steal my stuff in January, 2008. Anything being possible, I decided to check. In the meantime, he continued to defend his honor, going so far as to email commenters to the post to tell them how wrong I was. As the subsequent comments show, Chase’s efforts were not well received.
Now that I’ve had a chance to review the emails from and to Chase, here’s the deal. Chase was correct that we had email correspondence in January, 2008. He send me a solicitation that stated:
We’d be pleased to add your excellent Blog to our great new law blog directory at:
You’ll find a link to a form through which you can submit your blog for inclusion. As you’re no doubt aware, a high quality directory is a greet way to increase your exposure and web traffic. Let me know if you have any questions.
Best,
-Chase
USLaw.com
#1 Consumer Law Website
I took a look around the website and saw that Skelly at Arbitrary & Capricious was on there, so I sent Skelly an email asking him what he know about the joint. He responded that he knew nothing and was unaware that his blawg were in there. He didn’t seem pleased. I nonetheless decided that it was no big deal to be part of someone’s blog directory. After all, he offered “exposure and web traffic,” which is fine, and being in someone’s “directory” hardly seemed a big deal.
I saw that the website listed Skelly’s blog and had blurbs, which I assumed linked back to A&C, like every other blog directory I’ve ever seen. Nothing suggested that he would scrape other people’s website for their content, effectively appropriating their content wholesale. Given the content of USLaw.com, there was no reason to ever go back and look again. Had it not been for David Giacalone, I would never have known. I bet that most blawgers have no clue that this is happening to their content.
Nowhere did he mention anything about infringing on my copyright and trademark. Nowhere does he mention linking his index of my posts to his own republished versions of my posts on his website. Indeed, the one thing he absolutely did not deliver was web traffic, since what he was doing was directing traffic for my posts in his directory to his own unauthorized copies of my content on his website. Uh oh.
So I was going to put SJ into the directory, but the link didn’t work. I let Chase (back then he had yet to add the Gregory, apparently) know, and he added Simple Justice to his directory. And from this he apparently believe he was entitled to appropriate my content. And if you saw the index of my posts and wanted to read the full post, would click in his link which would take you to my post on his website. And apparently, to the extent there are links back to my blawg, they are “no follow” links so that they aren’t recognized by Google and the like.
The confusion here appears to be that Gregory Chase, or whatever he calls himself today, is of the view that allowing my blawg to be listed in his blawg directory somehow constituted authorization for him to take my content, in its entirety, and republish it on his website, link his index of my posts to his reproduction of my content and, apparently, superimpose an image of his USLaw logo on an image of my blawg, as if that existed in reality. He’s wrong. Absolutely, completely, wrong. I’m sure he will disagree, but it doesn’t matter since it’s not up to him. The law is clear, and he’s on the very wrong side of it. He doesn’t get a license to my content because he “feels” that he’s entitled, and it doesn’t matter how strenuously he feels. It’s just not his to take or use.
What we have here is a failure to communicate. Chase absolutely, if I can trust his emails to me (see below), believes that by including SJ in his directory, I waived all rights to my content and authorized him to do as he pleased with it. Because of this, he believes that he is entirely in the right. He went even further in a comment to WindyPundit where he wrote :
For the record, Scott Greenfield granted USLaw.com permission to include his blog feed in it’s Blog Directory. His recollection has been refreshed on this point and we await his response.
Note the disconnect from reality, where it went from a directory, to permission to include my blog feed, to permission to infringe on my copyright and trademark, with absolutely no comprehension of the distinctions. He’s totally, ignorantly wrong, and whoever told him that this was acceptable, and legal, needs to have a long talk with competent counsel. I might be inclined to call this an outright lie, but for the fact that I don’t think Chase comprehends that he lacks permission to republish my original content or alter my trademark by superimposing his onto mine. It’s just sheer, banal ignorance, rather than venal conduct. The guy’s just plain wrong but suffers from the Dunning-Kruger Effect.
While I don’t think much of the way Chase runs his little website, concealing his identity and making it impossible to communicate with him except on his terms, I can forgive his ignorance because he has apparently been horribly misinformed. But I find it far harder to forgive his fraudulent inducement, claiming to increase web traffic when he links to his infringed copy of content rather than to the original. More web savvy guys than me can explain all the details of how this happens and what it’s called. But the bottom line is he’s infringing on my copyright and trademark, defrauding blawgers by inducing them to list in his directory in exchange for traffic that will never come, and doing all of this to make a dime off the work of others. He’s not my kind of guy.
Chase has asked me to review all of this and then apologize profusely for all the harm I’ve done his business. I don’t think he’s going to be satisfied with this post. Interestingly, I’ve received a number of emails from him since all this began, with Chase assuming that I will honor his request not to disclose his emails because he wants to keep this quiet and “de-escalate” what he perceives as my attack on his perfectly legal, wholly legitimate business. Why he would think this is unclear, but I owe him no duty to conceal his emails, and have reproduced his last one below. Now you can see what we’re dealing with first hand.
While Gregory Chase may want (desperately) to keep his dirty laundry private, it’s not my job to cover his butt. And so you know, this is the kindest version of his peculiar view of life, which I’m including so readers can “consider” his point of view. Some of his earlier emails were truly wacky. He’s now had his chance to make his case, since I have no intention of spending the rest of my life debating his vision of what he is and isn’t allowed to do. If this isn’t enough for him, maybe I’ll post the rest of his emails. It appears that this disclosure of what he’s doing has really got him burning, and I would expect him to do anything possible to fight it.
Maybe he’ll sue me for “slander”, and then we can find out just who this fellow is and how many blawgs have been the victims of his conduct. Then we’ll have a nice chat about copyright and trademark infringement, and he’ll find out how the world of litigators works. As far as I’m concerned, he’s just another leech, albeit a particularly stupid and self-serving one. He will no doubt be pissed with me, but he would do better to reserve his cranium space for the interesting wire fraud issues raised by his conduct. As clueless as he might be, he’s engaged in some very bad stuff. I think it needs to stop.
If, by the way, you don’t mind that he’s stealing your content and posting it on his website, then that’s fine. But for those who do mind that he’s taking it, using it on his for-profit website, without permission, you should know that it’s happening. And it might well be worth our while to make sure that everyone in the blawgosphere is aware of what USLaw is doing, so feel free to spread the word.
And the funny thing is that he still has Simple Justice up at his website, and based upon his email to me, he thinks he’s doing me a favor. He really does.
_____________
Subject: Re: Your house, your rules – De-escalation
From: [email protected]
To: [email protected]
Your blog post caught me in a raw mood last evening which was made even more raw when you removed and blocked my comments from your blog this morning. After a day of blowing off some steam with a few short comments, in the spirit of resolving the confusion and addressing your concerns, please digest the following when time allows. In return, I ask that you thoughtfully consider retracting the accusations and name calling that could easily spiral out of control.As Simple Justice is so popular and you have so many sites linking to you, it must have slipped your recollection that back in January, 2008 we exchanged a few emails in which you acknowledged having your blog indexed by USLaw.com. Please let me know if you have changed your position. Please also understand that I do not believe USLaw.com’s Blog Directory, Index, and Blog Reader make use of publicly available RSS feeds in a way that absolutely requires any more or less permission than sought by other internet companies including companies like Google and Yahoo. Although you granted permission, from your recent reaction it seems as though you are not happy to have your syndication feed available to thid party blog readers. If that is the case, I’m sure you aware of ways to modify what content is mnade available in your such feeds.As for my blog comments which I prefer to associate with the USLaw.com name, I’m sure you appreciate there are several legitimate reasons many people prefer to be published by pseudonum (in books, onlne, etc.). USLaw.com is currently a relatively modest operation which I prefer not to dominate my professional associations outside of the legal industry. In addition, assistants occassionally respond to emails from a common account.As for my interest in keeping our private dialog private, I have had bad experiences with disclosing phone numbers in co-ordination with producing a website to someone whose intentions are not clear to me. There are so many inconsiderate and misintentioned people in the web/blog publishing business– I’m sure you’ve had to deal with quite a few yourself– that I consider it “best practices” to keep web business discussions through email and remain cautious with additional contact information until I more fully who I am dealing with. Further, I believe private correspondence should not be shared publicly without the consent of the parties involved. As many bloggers do not share that sentiment, I prefer to determine a potential correspondent’s feeling about that principle before investing too much time in a dialog.Below, please find the email we shared last January which I took the time to retrieve from an archive (best if read chronologically from bottom to top). I hope that you will use this information to set the record straight on your blog post.Thank you,Gregory Chase
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You know, just the other day I was talking to myself. Jdog, I said — I call myself that — it’d be a really smart thing to infringe on the intellectual property — copyright, trademarks, whatever — of a smart, prickly guy with a law degree. Maybe he wouldn’t notice. If he did, maybe he wouldn’t care. If he cared, maybe he wouldn’t complain. If he complained, maybe I could bully him into backing down.
But then I sobered up.
Guess others thought differently. (Yes, others. It’d be a distraction now, but remind me, sometime.)
The funny part is that the thing that really set me off was when I tried to find some way to contact USLaw, a telephone, email, whatever, and there was absolutely no information about who, where or what they are. That’s when the scam bells start going off in a lawyer’s head.
My favorite part of the defense is the “because I can, I’m entitled,” based on the RSS feed. If a door is unlocked, can I take whatever I find inside? If I can break through the door, can I then? What if the door is wide open, does that mean it’s all mine? It’s amazing how people can rationalize why they are entitled to do whatever is good for them.
Brutal, but fair.
I didn’t notice before that “Greg Chase” was superimposing his logo over your logo. That’s hilarious, in a sad way.
What’s most amazing to me is the catastrophic lack of judgment shown by the “Greg Chase” response to this scenario. Why would any blog — let alone any business or lawyer — want to be associated with a site so run?
And by the way — is there any rational basis to conclude that the non-blog content on the site has been secured with appropriate permission? Someone ought to look into that . . . .
There’s quite a bit going on, but due to my lack computer/web savvy, I lack the proper words to adequately explain all of it. It would be a shame if this is left to happen to other blawgers without their knowledge and permission. At the very least, they need to know what this guy is up to.
He steals my stuff also. Two samples:
http://tinyurl.com/dc5lft
http://tinyurl.com/cuyt8f
Things like this happen all the time. Which makes it worse, not better.
A bit different, but a guy in Wisconsin once cut and pasted the content of my Minnesota Forum — complete with my own, rather distinctive descriptions* — substituted “Wisconsin” for “Minnesota,” ran it for two months, then threatened lawsuits and such when I stumbled across it and publicly pointed it out.
Reminds me of your douchebag-du-jour, although my guy didn’t claim to be a lawyer.
“But it was on the web . . . ”
Sorta “but the trust fund was just lying there” defense.
____________________
* e.g. “Here’s the place for the religious argument. The Management of this forum is a lay deacon in the Church of the Appropriate Revolver, but has an open mind. Arguments are not required; by popular request, it’s also the place for pleasant if opinionated discussion.”
I finally looked at this, and practically every legal blog is there, including mine, all without author attribution.
If you do WhoIs search you find this drop box:
P.O. Box 447
Herndon, VA 20172-0447
And if you Google the address you find many different “businesses” registered at that address.
My (admittedly bizarre) sense of decorum prevents me from asking you, but not Turkewitz, Bennett, or Gideon if they were wearing short skirts at the time that they were walking alone, late at night on the Internet and got syndicated by this guy.
Perhaps if Greg Chase claims “fair use” fervently enough, he can will away all of the copyright notices from the content he’s stolen.
Perhaps not. I note that some of the blawgers who appear in his “directory” (for instance Ron Coleman, Marc Randazza) are quite accomplished at intellectual property litigation.
Hell, there’s no rational basis to conclude that at least much of the blog content on the site has even been quasi-secured by asking for permission to index it, and then leaping to the wholely unfounded conclusion that a “yes” to that is permission to grab all the content.
Really. Figure there’s only about four thousand blogs that he’s scraping. If he spent five minutes (yeah, sure) writing an individualized email to each blog owner and getting permission to index (a mass email wouldn’t work, for obvious reasons) that’s more than three hundred hours of correspondence.
He didn’t do that.
I wish we could see his earlier emails.
FYI: This all started when that trouble-making Giacalone dude read Scott’s posting about the so-called web experts giving an NYSBA seminar. He was googling their names and discovered right away a link to Scott’s posting — but,it was at USLAW.com.
The simple fact that USLAW claims to be able to produce such online marketing success for lawyers set off scam alarms. The tag of “#1 online legal resouce” and the USLAW Library link to “Newsworthy Law Suits” also caused a smirk or two from the f/k/a Gang.
p.s. f/k/a did not make the USLAW.com directory — perhaps because it does not meet their standard of being at least 80% law-related. Thank goodness for eclectic and hectic content.
Wait, is my blog on there too? I didn’t see it in the list.
No, it isn’t. My hindbrain saw Gideon on the lengthy list and leaped to the conclusion that it was you; apologies for the suggestion that you were wearing the short skirt, too.
I looked for Popehat material there as well, but it only includes our stuff when it’s cited by real law blogs.
We can’t go polluting the USLaw legal blog directory with posts about Godzilla, the Orcs and the funny things Ezra’s friends say.
I have collaborated with Ron on other projects, and it has been a complete pleasure.
I think it would be a worthwhile and enjoyable endeavor to sue the living shit out of “Mr. Chase,” as long as everyone realizes that he is most likely not in the United States or he is some kid who lives with his parents – hence not much in the way of recoverable assets.
One practical thing about this: This is the reason that I only provide partial RSS feeds.
So where do I sign up for the suit? 🙂
Crime & Federalism is in there:
http://www.uslaw.com/law_blogs/Crime+%26+Federalism?blog=286
I received no request for permission to reprint my entire web content on a weblog that exists for commercial purposes. I know I did not give them permission because:
1. My e-mail settings are such that every e-mail sent to the Crime & Federalism e-mail box get forwarded to my personal e-mail address.
2. I do not delete ANY e-mails sent to the Crime & Federalism inbox, though I do often delete e-mails sent to my personal inbox.
I searched my personal e-mail (Gmail account) using several search strategies. I found no e-mail from USlaw.com
I then searched my Crime & Federalism e-mail account – logging into it for the first time in months. I found no reference to USLaw.
Perhaps they obtained permission elsewhere? I was once part of the Law.com Blog network (one of the original 8 blogs), so maybe someone from Law.com gave him permission? I find that unlikely. I do not want to pick-and-choose what evidence to present, though.
I can say conclusively that I personally did not give USLaw.com permission to reprint my blog posts.
So how did the blog end up there?
Actually he is stealing Gideon’s content:
http://www.uslaw.com/law_blogs/A+Public+Defender?blog=873
Well, okay, then. I withdraw the apology; Gid, dress more demurely.
I have unblocked Chase from commenting, per his request, but have mirandized him since he obviously needed better counsel. He’s also been told that if it gets out of hand, he’ll be blocked again. I also have no plans on allowing his shills to waste our time. It’s up to him whether he choses to comment or exercises good judgment and keeps his mouth shut.
I am some what confused now, I see what you are saying and understand that. My question is, if say some one just post a link to another’s blog with out any comments and surly not taking or copying there material is that legal ?
T.Mann, linking is not the problem. Bloggers appreciate links.
Have a look at the Gideon link posted above. USLaw is reposting the entire content of blogs, under its own url. That isn’t linking. It’s theft.
Thanks for your answer I realize what he is doing and I think it is just another example of a J.A. who thinks he knows more than anyone else or thinks he can fast talk around some one. I enjoy your blog and read it almost Evey day, I find it very informative and interesting. I surely would not want to read something you wrote that was rewritten by some one else. You would think one would have the common sense not to jerk around with attorneys.
I have unblocked Chase from commenting, per his request, but have mirandized him since he obviously needed better counsel… It’s up to him whether he choses to comment or exercises good judgment and keeps his mouth shut.
Now what did you go do that for? If the thief wants to hang himself your job is to just hand him the rope, not give him instructions on how not to use it.
I would have loved to hear his pathetic justifications for stealing the work of others.
His “simpleinjustice” page now claims that he will post an explanation in a few days, which will show us all how our misunderstanding of arcane internet stuff has led us into thinking he has done wrong, when he has not.
Should be entertaining.
I’ll leave the legal stuff to you guys what knows something about it, but there’s definitely a Billy Jack element to this, and I do love that movie.
‘Course, they guy kicked in the face probably didn’t, but . . .
And, I was hoping for more thrillingly insightful comments from “Ken2” telling us all what morons we are.
Sites that aggregate the work of others can provide a useful service in helping readers find and access information, and by providing links back to the original source that drive traffic. For example, one of the most well known examples is Guy Kawasaki’s alltop.com which has no original content and just aggregates RSS feeds grouped by topic. Simple Justice is one of the feeds on http://law.alltop.com/ and alltop.com makes its revenue from on-site advertising. Alltop in under a year has build a Page Rank of 7 using this model. mahalo.com is another scrape and aggregate business model, and it often faces criticism for the way it does this.
What does the blawg community think about this model? Sites with great content management systems scraping blawg news and making money from it.
It makes me somewhat uneasy, but it seems that in providing an RSS feed a publisher gives permission for it to be published in the way Alltop does?
Now on to our friend Chase, what he does with RSS feeds is not in the spirit of the internet, nor it seems is it legal.
I think uslaw.com could resolve this by saying that it recognizes that the way it uses feeds is incorrect, and that it corrects the method to an alltop style and apologizes.
One thing i don’t quite get is why uslaw.com is so keen to have all this duplicate content on its site as it should be penalized by Google and not indexed. However, with a Page Rank of 6 clearly it is doing something right in the eyes of Google.
Looks like the site is down.
You know, this is an interesting comment and a thought I had myself. Are we giving permission by publishing an RSS feed?
I guess with traditional RSS feeds, the reader has to sign up and the feed comes from your own site, but aggreggators like alltop do collect and publish the posts on their own site (albeit only with titles and a short mouseover blurb). Is uslaw any different? Is it more in the way they have chosen to display the posts?
WTF is wrong with some people? I am pissed that some are so moronic that I need to explain this. Oh well. Here is the problem:
USLaw.com has Google ads all over the place. So he’s not just aggregating content to be a nice guy or give blogs links or spread the Good Lord’s word. He is reproducing ENTIRE POSTS and ENTIRE BLOGS so that he can GENERATE AD REVENUE for HIMSELF based on what SOMEONE ELSE wrote.
Look at Simple Justice. How many ads does he have on this page? None. Now look at the ripped off page at USLaw.com. Hmm…….. Is it really that hard to see the problem?
Go to federalism.typepad.com. Where are the ads? Perhaps the author (that’s me) made a conscious decision to not use his content to sell ads. As an author, I have the right to profit – or not – from my work. I choose not to profit.
If you go to USLaw.com, though, you’ll see Google ads all over the place. So the thief at USLaw.com has decided that he will STEAL my posts so that HE can profit.
Do you really need to be told why that’s wrong? Do you really need a law degree to see why that might be immoral?
People are acting like this is a complicated legal issue or something. It’s pretty freaking clear that what is being done is wrong.
Quite frankly, anyone who lacks the moral intuition to see the problem is someone I wouldn’t trust giving me change at a cash register. I’d count every penny handed over to me by someone who can’t get why it’s wrong to steal my content to make a profit.
I don’t think the number of ads a site has is a criteria for criticism. Alltop has less ads, but probably gets a higher click through than USLaw as a result of their subtle placement, rather than a garish in your face approach that actually puts visitors off. Thus if the ad revenue generated per visitor is the problem then Alltop could be worse.
But I think what you are saying is that any ad revenue generated off republishing your site posts in full is not on. I agree with that point of view 100%
Where do you stand on something like alltop that publishes a portion of your post and provides a link back, and makes money from that?
I always assumed that’s what I was doing, but everybody here tells me I’m wrong.
Consider a site like Bloglines, which functions as a type of online reader. (I think Google Reader is similar.) How is USLaw.com any different from a legal standpoint? Is it just a matter of attribution? I’m curious how IP law makes a distinction.
Phil, Alltop’s approach entirely different than USLaw. You see a headline and blurb, click on it and it takes you to the original blawg. You’re not seeing the problem with USLaw. It’s not just the advertisements, but the theft of content for the purpose of USLaw’s own commercial benefit, It doesn’t send a read to the original blawg, but steals the content of the original blawg and uses it on its own page for its own commercial benefit. It’s an entirely different concept and execution.
Add another dimension, if you have a problem with how Guy Kawasaki does something, you can always let Guy know. He’s there, he’s real and we can find him anytime we want. Chase is a lie.
Bennett wrote Chase to demand that he remove Defending People’s posts from USLaw.com. This is what Chase sent in response:
In the meantime, please see the following: http://www.uslaw.com/law_blogs/about
Thanks for your understanding and patience. Blog on!
Bennett wrote back telling him to cut the sleaziness, and Chase responded again:
So you see, it’s not that he’s wrong, but that we are, as the good Prof. Yabut suggests, all morons and don’t appreciate how much good our pseudonymous patron Chase is doing for us.
It’s entirely different. The RSS feed doesn’t authorize the receiver to usurp the rights to content, only to veiw it. Alltop takes the headline and blurb (which would be fair use under the law even if it was wholly unauthorized otherwise) and then sends the reader to the original site. USLaw does the opposite, taking the original post and republishing it on its own site rather than send the reader to the original. There are additional issues with the changes it makes to the mark, such as superimposing its USLaw logo on images of blawgs and thus changing the blawg trademark to include a promotion for USLaw, a wholesale fraud and infringement.
Consider that your TV streams movies into your home constantly. Does that entitle you to copy the movie, put it on DVD and sell it as your own and keep the profits? Does that entitle you to change the credits to make yourself the director? It only entitles the viewer to view, nothing more. The rest is piracy.
yes i agree that ad revenue generated off republishing the site posts of others in full is not legitimate, especially given the way he secured “permission” to do so, and that links back to SJ are not prominent and no-follow. Your response to Windypundit clarified the difference in my mind. I am looking forward to Chase’s clarification post!
Just so it’s clear, the republication without authorization of copyrighted material, in itself, is the wrong. That it’s used for personal gain via ad revenue adds insult to injury. He did not secure permission to infringe on anyone’s copyright, even if he thinks otherwise. It is not up to each individual to decide what constitutes legal permission, and then contend that what he did was fine because in his mind it was adequate.
While I appreciate that you’ve come to partially understand that what Chase did was wrong (and I assume you aren’t lawyer), you seem to fall into the hole that non-lawyers enjoy where they think they get to decide what the law should be, and then argue that what they did should be legal. Each of us doesn’t get to make up our own law, but follow the law as it is. No one, Chase included, gets to decide what constitutes sufficient permission to take what belongs to others, regardless of whether it appears later with advertisements or not. I hope that clarifies things.
Thanks, as a non-lawyer I was unclear as to how the law distinguishes between scraping a little content and scraping it all. I now understand that under the principle of fair use of copyrighted material the limited way Alltop publishes the work of others for its commercial advantage is fair use, and USLaw’s method is not. I appreciate that Chase’s ignorance of these facts is no defense, and am not in the hole!
The factors considered in “is it fair use” analysis:
http://fairuse.stanford.edu/Copyright_and_Fair_Use_Overview/chapter9/9-b.html
1. the purpose and character of your use
2. the nature of the copyrighted work
3. the amount and substantiality of the portion taken, and
4. the effect of the use upon the potential market.
But even the most favorable reading of what fair use allows him doesn’t cover the trademark angle — the fact that he’s passing off your content as his.
Exactly. Sorry if I was unclear before. That happens sometimes.
Were I a betting man, I’d bet that his forthcoming “explanation” will not even make a colorable attempt to establish that what he was doing was legal under existing law. Rather, I expect it’s going to be a lengthy argument about why it ought to be legal under existing law, and about how the coldhearted law, like law bloggers, simply doesn’t understand how The Real Internets work.
We lawyers have a technical term for that: damaging admission of liability. As much as I find his conduct (and his entitled response to critiques of his conduct) contemptible, I hope for his sake and for the sake of anyone who relies on his assets for support that he is now getting competent legal advice before writing anything else.
That was why I Mirandized him. I know it’s not my place, but I just couldn’t help myself.
I also sent an E-mail asking to be removed and got similar responses to Mark’s — but this morning, the site is up and my blog is not there, although many others still are. And Joel, I am always demure on the Internet.
Even if it were legal, would it be moral?
I have a hard time seeing how stealing my content so that someone else may make a profit is moral.
Also, how does it benefit me when my entire post is reproduced on another blog – with no link back to me? Or when a USLaw.com logo is superimposed on a screen shot of my blog – implying that USLaw.com owns my blog?
So I get no links. No money. No credit, as it looks like I’m owned by USLaw.com. WTF!
People keep throwing around fair use and related terms. Putting how ignorant that reveals those people to be: What this guy is doing is scummy as hell.
Are people really having trouble seeing the moral problem? Other than SHG and the Popehat gang, it seems so.
Though I’m a nihilist, I still see that there does exist an agreement between people that can roughly be called morality. How is what this guy doing even close to that shared morality?
Can anyone seriously defend what this guy is doing?
Or is typing “fair use” somehow a short hand or some broader moral principle that I must be unaware of?
Look at this screen shot: http://www.uslaw.com/blogimages/blogscreenusl286.jpg
Does anyone throwing around “fair use” truly NOT see a problem with a company superimposing its logo on a screen shot of my blog – for which I pay all associated fees?
Would those of you throwing around “fair use” please actually ANALYZE what is happening rather than simply typing, “fair use.”
Even outside of “fair use,” do you think it’s MORAL to:
1. Reproduce all my blog content without my permission;
2. Sell ads based on said reproduction;
3. Keep 100% of ad revenue earned from said reproduction;
4. Superimpose your logo over a screen shot of my blog, thus implying ownership or some other association with my blog.
Please share with me under what moral (or legal) theory the above behavior is appropriate.
Mike,
I don’t think anybody is suggesting that it’s legal or moral, but some are confused as to what distinguished fair use and others have tried to explain. But there’s no doubt that what this mutt does is neither fair use nor morally justifiable. You know how people, especially non-lawyers, find all this confusing.
And bear in mind, even if he wasn’t cashing in on our content, it would still be an infringement of copyright and trademark. That he uses it for profit just adds fuel to the fire.
The Catch-22, though, is that he wouldn’t reproduce the content if it weren’t for a commercial purpose. He and others like him are not saying, “Wow. I really want to spread knowledge. I’m just going to set up a server; pay a bunch of fees; and reproduce blog content to further truth.” I had to laugh out loud just typing that.
You are more protecting of your content than I am. So I suspect you might not be kosher with that set-up. I wouldn’t tell you to think otherwise.
If he were really reproducing content to help me or even if he thought some of my content could help the public: I wouldn’t have any beef.
Instead he’s attempting to leverage the work of thousands of people to enrich himself. We are all voluntary employees of his. That’s my (though yours would be different; and I respect that) biggest problem with the set up.
You’re right, I am a bit more protective. When other bloggers have taken my posts and republished them in their entirety without having my prior permission, I’ve asked them to remove them. They are welcome to link, or use a few paragraphs, but not republish the entire post, even with attribution. That’s always been where I draw the line. So while the commercial aspect makes it far more venal, I still adhere to the basic infringement principles.
My theory is that they are welcome to work with, or off of, my work, but they can’t just take my work. Of course, they can always just write their own original content.
I am a newcomer to this blog since I wanted to educate myself on “my RSS feed is free, but other people make money off it” issue. This thread came up.
First, I’m not an attorney, but I find the idea of “moral” issues irrelevant. After all, morality in some locales is immoral in others. The web has always been a place where the idea that “content is free” is always used as a justification for ad hominem attacks against those trying to make money. However, I am reminded of how IMDB.com, which was created by the “free” content of thousands of users was then sold to Amazon for tens of millions of dollars–and the users that generated the value got nothing. Was this immoral? Possibly. Illegal? Apparently not.
Has this type of value creation on the web really been adjudicated against? Does writing a blog really give more protection in a strict legal sense? I’m not talking about “fair use”, I mean the actual legal language of most of the RSS feeds when you look at the fine print seems to permit anyone to do whatever whenever.
Am I missing something? I write a financial blog to a limited audience that has some valuable insight based on hours of personal research, and I’m about to open that insight up to the web at large so this is a real issue to me.
Does writing a blog really give more protection in a strict legal sense?
Yes. We write them on our own sites that we own. Comments made on other people’s sites, such as IMDB or this reply I am making now, might not share that same protection (though I don’t know if it was ever litigated). But the first circumstance is pretty darn clear.
Just because a person chooses to publish an RSS feed in addition to the site doesn’t convey a right to others to steal the content.
DavidF: if I write a book and give it away for “free” does that mean you can claim authorship and sell it? Even if I say you are free to sell it, can you claim it as your own?
I think the answer is no.
I thought RSS feeds were a convenience for users, so then I could subscribe to feeds (an analogy is magazines and newspapers) and then read the content offline or through a non-web-browser medium. I never thought an RSS feed subscription gave me license to pass the work off as my own and charge my friends. (Although I do sometimes post links to twitter or facebook with an abstract.)
Also, I went to USlaw.com – was trying to avoid giving him the traffic – and noticed the copyright at the bottom of the page, is there any original content on it? Could that be parsed as claiming the copyright on the blogs it pirates? I ask because I’m curious and am not trying to add to folks’ understandable anger.
(disclaimer: I *am* a lawyer and do not understand copyright/fair-use/etc. Then again I’m neither civil nor private.)
Via Windy, it appears that the lover of law blogs, Gregory Chase, has posted, on his , an explanation:
I note he uses the word “we”. Schizophrenia perhaps?
We? Let’s run down the checklist. Pope? No. Editor? Nah. I’m going with “guy with tapeworm”.
You forgot royalty. Some of them get weird from the inbreeding, don’t you know.
I think Randazza said it all.
Does this beat your record yet for comments?
Yep, he’s stealing my content, too, and I never respond to any offers like his. So any argument that I gave him permission is even more specious than one he makes about you, Scott. I sent an email, but I’m not holding my breath.
Thanks very much for the tip.
What I find most extraordinary is that he persists in contending that this is his right, and that we’re all nuts. All these lawyers telling him that he’s stealing content, and we’re just a bunch of dopes who don’t get it, all the while denying him his chance to “explain” himself. To continue denying reality in the face of all this is borderline psychotic.
Oh, even better — I searched my email archives and found a message saying “We’d be pleased to add your blog to our directory.” No response from me. I started getting a daily email feed until I sent an “unsubscribe” email. So apparently my silence equaled consent for “Chase.”
Okay; I give up — you’ve got a better imagination than I do. Hadn’t occurred to me that “Chase” might be royalty.
Interesting issue. I’m astonished that USLaw.com is quite so brazen or so encom,passing to take the entire blog posts.
I had a similar issue with a site in the UK – but then I realised that it was a small guy trying to aggregate news and other content to make a few modest pounds. The scale was altogether different. He responded to my rather terse request with great style, apologised and offered to remove immediately.
At this point – as I like people reading my stuff, as many bloggers do – I relented (simply because he was so polite and open) – and I gave him a very clear non-exclusibve licence terminable at my election without notice. He did offer to pay me a modest fee. I declined the offer – but appreciated the sentiment. He does not try to pass off content as his own and there is a follow link back to my blog.
I have a section on Insite Law to provide coverage of UK (and some US) blogs to encourage people to read blogs. I usually extract the title and perhaps the first sentence or short para – to entice readers to hit the link to that blog. It takes a surprising amount of time to read these blopgs and then do the html etc etc – sometimes with a pic.
This is, I believe, a fairly common practice. I do sell advertising on Insite Law – simply to defray the considerable costs of running an online mag and news service.
It takes me four to five hours daily to put it all together – and, of course, all content, podcasts, films, analyses etc I do (or do with podcastees) is free to view.
It also helps to pay my wine bills – although this latter matter is much improved now that I have miraculously become a wine reviewer for an online law lifetsyle website!. It is a hard life, but someone has to do it.
Mr Chase is taking things far too far, and superimposing a logo over someone else’s content is just plain daft, let alone anything worse.
Good stuff Scott – I shall do a cross-post and publicise.
What you (and many others) do by including the title and maybe a line is neither infringement nor problematic. This fellow is clueless, and worse yet, certain that we just don’t get it.
Personally, I’m a little torn about whether to ask “Chase” to remove my site or not.
Sure, my efforts with my site is to get information about police misconduct out into public view as much as possible, so I’m not concerned about people absconding my own content so long as that content not used to market spam or something nefarious. So, in that regard what USLaw is doing isn’t a concern for my site… and it’s not like it costs me any revenue since I’m entirely non-profit and don’t run adverts or even ask for donations.
But, when what USLaw does with the content of others is unethical or illegal, then my content is associated with that by proxy, and that’s not something I can consent to…
To say it another way, just like I wouldn’t buy a used bike from some questionable guy on a street for $10, people won’t accept my content from some guy stealing content from everyone else. So usage of my conduct with his branding associates my content with what he does, and if what he does is negative, that projects on my content.
So, I think I’ll be asking Chase to remove my content… though, I don’t think my content really helps his site much anyway, I know it doesn’t help mine if I go by the stats…
Thanks to my content his site appears to have gotten 1248 views while those views only resulted in 41 click-throughs to my site for all time.
Referrals aren’t much better, only 127 people visited my site via direct links from his site, ranking him 16th in my list of referrers…
I guess people aren’t inclined to read my site after seeing what they came for on his site.
In doing your referral calculations, Pack, can you tell how many people were sent from Google or another search engine to USLAW.com’s version of your posting, rather than directly to you? I found USALAW in the first place with a link to a Greenfield post that took me to USALaw.com. If USALaw diverts search engine traffic away from the original author’s site, it is not doing that site any favors.
David,
No, not directly, though I could possibly assume that it’s happened around 1248 times since any read on my RSS Feed that registers from USLaw is someone reading the copy of my content listed on their site.
But, yes, like you, I have noticed that there are a lot of links to my content listed on Google that are directed to USLaw instead of my site. Some of those are ranked higher than my site, some aren’t… it would take me a while to extrapolate the percentage and guess at the impact.
Though, I think my site would be a poor representation of the overall impact to others since my stats are negligible in comparison to blogs like Scott’s or the other high-profile blawgers who have been mentioned here so far.
…but, if my assumption that the RSS Feed stats are a close approximation to the number of hits he gets from Google searches that would have otherwise resulted in visits to my site, then that would represent a 10% reduction in traffic that I get from Google search over the entire history of my site.
If that’s what you were asking.
Mine’s on there. I have never given USLaw licence to use my/our content and we have a no commercial use without permission clause of which he is in flagrant breach.
I’m not happy. I wonder how Mr Chase is with English litigators in addition to US ones.
USLaw.com: A Call to Arms
One of the “victims” of the USLaw.com fiasco is none other than copyright and trademark lawyer, not to mention lawprof, Marc Randazza.
USLaw.com: A Call to Arms
One of the “victims” of the USLaw.com fiasco is none other than copyright and trademark lawyer, not to mention lawprof, Marc Randazza.
USLaw.com: A Call to Arms
One of the “victims” of the USLaw.com fiasco is none other than copyright and trademark lawyer, not to mention lawprof, Marc Randazza.