Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!
HoL infringing copyright by linking?
The right2link movement has been set up on the understanding that old print media, now on the internet want to capture high ground as possible to generate cash by controlling linking to free-to-access content. Their problem is, how do you charge for something that is freely available?
Their answer is to stretch the idea of copyright by claiming that by accessing their website from a link, or quoting a headline in a link, you could be infringing their copyright.
That would be a tough one for sites like Harringay Online.
Read more (and sign a petition if you like) at right2link...........
Their answer is to stretch the idea of copyright by claiming that by accessing their website from a link, or quoting a headline in a link, you could be infringing their copyright.
That would be a tough one for sites like Harringay Online.
Read more (and sign a petition if you like) at right2link...........
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Alan Stanton on
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Hugh, this is one more reason why both the values and the practical mechanisms of Creative Commons are vitally important.
Although I'm unclear why the legal concept of Fair Dealing does not apply. When I include a link in something I post, it's always for one of the permitted purposes: non-commercial research, private study, criticism or review.
This applies even for links to commercial sites. So when people on HoL link to the local or national press, or mention a book they've read, or a restaurant they like, these "reviews" potentially generate 'business'; it's a free advert.
Are any Hol members copyright lawyers who can shed some light?
(Labour councillor & candidate Tottenham Hale)
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Permalink Reply by majurey on
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I'm no copyright lawyer, but I have worked in academic publishing for almost 20 years. This does seem a bit of a non-issue, with respect to newspapers actually carrying out the threat of litigation over a published link.
Fair dealing has always been notoriously ambiguous, but publishers use it all the time in order to quote from each other without paying ridiculous permissions fees. In my line of work, we are given the additional detail of no more than 10% in total aggregation of the source you're quoting, and no more than 400 words at a time. However, there are always exceptions to this, hence Fair Dealing seems more like a guideline than a legal imperative. For example, I cannot quote ANY words of a poem, or lyrics of a song etc. under Fair Dealing. I always have to pay for permission to use that kind of content.
So would links fall under the same exceptions? It hasn't been tested, so no-one can say. But would the likes of Newscorp come after the likes of HoL in any case? I seriously doubt it. After all, as Alan points out, linking is simply free publicity in most cases, and following a link does not grant exclusive and unfettered access to the article: we all know we get the "pay a subscription now if you want to access this article" from following links to Times articles, for example (once you've exceeded your free quota that month of course). So there's no issue of losing out on monetizing their content, as far as online newspapers are concerned.
If the newspapers are really concerned, they can block crawlers by using robots.txt to instruct them on what can or cannot be crawled on the site. If they need more detailed instructions, then emerging standards such as ACAP might be used. But ACAP has been roundly rejected by Google (though not Yahoo or Bing, yet). And therein lies the rub, I reckon. The Papers want ACAP to be adopted by all search engines, Google does not.
Ultimately, I don't see this as being something the 'old media' will use against the likes of HoL. This is, looking at the subtext, all about the fight between Murdoch and Google. And let's face it, if such linking was judged to require permission in advance, the logical conclusion to a judgment like that would be to bring the internet to a halt. I really cannot see it happening. (Google likes to push the boundaries on all things legal. For example, it has used the much less well-defined US concept of Fair Use to justify its scanning of entire works and books, which has led to the long-running Google Settlement with the Authors Society and the AAP.)
One final point worth considering: there is already a precedent set for this behaviour of linking, within academic publishing. In the world of academic journals and books, citations, abstracts and linking are a vital part of the way the academic world works. Indeed, since the dawn of digitisation, new standards in linking (such as DOIs) have become widely adopted within publishing. Linking, referencing, and citing are therefore old accepted practices, and it would be a lost cause in my opinion to attempt to overturn a centuries-old practice and principle, as well as an established internet practice which underpins how the www works.
In short, I reckon it'll never happen.
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