Please assert your copyrights!

[Pab Sungenis]

As some people here know, there is a site which must not be named, which specializes in reposting our essays and other material here, and mocking it.

I finally got a phone call from the coward who runs that site (who uses a proxy registrar to hide his identity), who insists that, in spite of the 1976 Copyright Law, everything anyone posts online is public domain. We all know that to not be so.

PLEASE, everyone here, do me a favor. Edit your signatures as I have, to assert the copyright you hold in your writing, and prevent it from being redistributed without your permission. It's time to finally hit these people where they live.

[Warpy]

1. Actually, I WANT my stuff distributed, and I'm not particular

about where. I want folks to read these ideas, even if somebody else is taking credit for them or somebody else is trying to refute them in a cowardly manner, meaning elsewhere.

[alcibiades_mystery]

2. I wouldn't lift a finger to assist the relentless extension of copyright

I don't give a fuck who it favors.

[endarkenment]

3. Fair use. nt.

[Pab Sungenis]

4. Reproduction in its entirety is not fair use.

I'm not going after excerpts. I'm going after full-bore reproduction.

[ConservativeDemocrat]

6. If it's a free political opinion piece, it almost certainly is

That applies to every post here on the D.U.
Understand - copyright law is meant to allow people to have fair compensation for works of art that have value to the public, not to shield authors from being mocked for things they say.

Here's an idea for some of the crazier DUers: if you think you're going to embarrass yourself or the Democratic Party by writing something inane - don't write it in the first place.

- C.D. Proud Member of the Reality Based Community

[Pab Sungenis]

7. It's my writing.

I hold a copyright on it. I decide where and how it appears.

If I post it to DU, then I grant permission for it to be used here. Not for other purposes. Yes, it can be excerpted, but it cannot be reproduced in full. And before you say anything, just because material is posted online does NOT make it public domain unless explicitly stated, and I go the opposite direction: I fly the copyright flag on my writings, and I control their distribution. Even DU has rules on what constitutes a fair excerpt, and bans complete reproduction.

There are plenty of cases where my writing (inlcuding my writing here) has been addressed critically and even mocked, and I don't object to it. (Perfect examples are the columns here and here.) They offer criticism without wholesale reproduction.

I'm fully within my rights, and am pursuing them.

[ConservativeDemocrat]

8. Sure it's your writing, But you'll never win in Court

Hell, you'll never even get to Court. But I digress.

Attempts to use Copyright to impede political criticism is well covered legal territory. And uniformly, the law is not on your side. For you to win a copyright claim, you need to show not just that you've been embarrassed, but that you've suffered some form of financial damage. That's pretty hard to do when you've already granted permanent use of the material to a free forum.

So, do you expect to make money off these posts in the future?
Do you have a business built around this?
Has anyone ever paid you for your writings that you've posted on the D.U.?

Most importantly: do you have a spare $80,000 to pay a lawyer to go to Court to be told these things with much more exact legal wording? Cause I'll tell you right now, no lawyer is going to take up this case on commission or Pro Bono.

They have serious matters to deal with.

[endarkenment]

9. No actually replication in full is not fair use.

Copyright law does not restrict itself to works for which one receives compensation and replication in full is almost never considered fair use. Postings to message boards are gray areas, not from the lack of compensation, but from questions about expectations or implied license.

[Mugu]

10. Your thought to never post anything that may bring embarrassment

to one's self, this site, or the Democratic party is an excellent plan.


Regards,

Mugu

[Warren DeMontague]

5. Those folks need to find some low-level celebrities to stalk.

I hear Danny Bonaduce's available.