Slashdot Mirror
Update On "Voices From The Hellmouth"
The voices of many people who were hurt by this tragedy were heard loudly and clearly on Slashdot. We decided to use their comments in the construction of the story. As often happens though, good intentious can cloud things: in our haste to create the most powerful story possible, we neglected to get the permission of all of the writers. At this time, we've contacted a large number of the posters, and all the responses so far have been affirmative.
Legally speaking, we've been told that what we intended to do was just fine, provided we gave credit. We would be publishing words from a public forum: this 'fair use' thing is one of the basic principles that makes journalism possible.
This point is kinda irrelevant, though. We've decided that publishing this book without asking for permission wouldn't be the right thing to do. Instead we've decided to run the story as a serial on Slashdot: since these comments were already posted here, this will still allow the message to be sent to those who want to hear it, but without taking copyrighted materials off the place they were intended to be seen.
We've got permission from many of these people to publish their comments anywhere we like. But putting this on Slashdot will give people the ability to see if they are quoted. I've had hundreds of people e-mail to say that they have no problem with us using their content ... only one person actually e-mailed me to say that he would not allow his comment to be published: and he hadn't even posted in any of the Hellmouth stories.
If one of your comments is posted, we'll have an e-mail address that you can use to either give us permission to use it, or explicitly refuse it. At the conclusion of the series, we'll re-evaluate if this book will ever be published. What this means is that over the next couple of months, the serial presentation will allow you to help us determine the book's future -- linking to the original comments as quoted, allowing people to comment on and evaluate the text. And, if you are in there, and want to be removed, you'll be able to e-mail hemos.
We should have done this the first time around, but we're only human. We make mistakes, and we apologize for them. We hope that this is the right thing to do.
"What this means is that over the next couple of months, the serial presentation will allow you to help us determine the book's future"
What this means is that a bunch of selfish whiners are keeping a much need book from being published. A book that could actually do some good in the world.
"You can't quote me! That post is my property"
You guys are just as bad as the RIAA amd the MPAA.
I ask, because I never received an email asking if publishing my post would be okay. I realize that you haven't contacted everyone, and I hope that's the case in my situation, rather than because my post wasn't set for publication.
I'm just a bit concerned, and I think with good reason, that the whole project is going to be a one-sided pity party along the lines of "those kind of guys picked on me when I was in school, so I don't blame Dylan and (whoever) for murdering 20+ people." I really hope that you aren't leaving out posts from those of us out in the real world familiar with both sides of the coin. For instance, NPR contacted me to add a counterpoint to the common sentiment around here. I hope Katz/Slashdot are planning to do the same thing instead of only giving one side of the story. And no, I don't mean by me necessarily, but by anyone who disagrees with the Slashdot mainstream on this subject.
Cheers,
ZicoKnows@hotmail.com
Copyright law, it originally appeared, did not come out on the side of the publishers. So what? Since when does being law mean anything? Laws can be wrong -- slashdotters almost always hold that copyright law is wrong at least to some extent. Well what is the moral (not legal) justification for keeping this book out of stores?? For what moral reason should anyone ever have to ask permission to print publically available information, sell the printed copy, and give the profits to charity!??
Those of you who have objected to publication, ask yourself this: if public outcry was sufficient to stop this book from being published, would the world be better off? Would anyone's post actually be secret (rather than just obscure)? Would anyone receive more payment for the authorship of the post? The answer, I'm sure we all must agree, is no.
Remember when news used to be reported instead of created?
I think this one little slip is the scariest thing I've seen so far related to the whole "hellmouth" incident.
WWJD? JWRTFM!!!
As one of those who was outspokenly critical of Slashdot in this matter, let me be one of the first say that I think Hemos, Katz, and company are doing the right thing here. In particular I'm happy to see that they weren't concerned so much with the nuts-and-bolts legality of publishing the book, as with the larger question of whether it was the right thing for them to do. If they had wanted nothing more than to keep the lawyers happy, they could have published anyway but that would have alienated many of the Slashdot faithful and would have been contrary to the spirit of the "little guy" that Slashdot so often seeks to defend.
I know this decision can't have been easy for Slashdot. In e-mail exchanges with Hemos and Jon Katz following my "Slashmouth" editorial, I came to appreciate the deep commitment they have to the people that Hellmouth is by and about. I know that they wanted the Hellmouth stories to reach as many people as possible, and I recognize that a book would probably have reached more people than a serialization will. But they also care about doing the right thing, and in this compromise I think they have done that.
It still remains for Slashdot to clarify, for the future, what their exact stance is on copyright issues. Who posts here, and what does "ownership" refer to? I have faith that they will answer these questions too, and that most Slashdot users will be happy with their answers.
Carry on, guys.
--Jim
Also, the idea that we, as geeks, or outcasts, or the formerly societally abused should use the shootings as a sounding point to 'stand up' for other people who don't 'fit in' is WAY wrong. It's sick.
Blue--
What you say would be true--should be true--had not a good number of skittish administrators started looking for the Dylans and the Erics among their own kind.
Guess who they found.
Go read the Hellmouth stories. Dylan and Eric didn't just traumatize kids in their own school; the backlash from their actions engulfed unquestionably innocent geeks for no cause that could ever be considered as fair. Consider the rather intriguing fact that Dylan and Eric weren't even *part* of the "Trenchcoat Mafia"--did you know that, Blue? Did you realize that was all a media invention because, well, they wore Trenchcoats, and, like, so did this other group that *hated these kids too*?
I don't think a single one of those kids from the Trenchcoat Mafia was allowed back into that school. It was apparently believed that their mere presence would be traumatic to the survivors, regardless of their total lack of involvement.
At its most extreme, that was probably what the entire Hellmouth rage was about--
1) Something must be done!
2) This is something.
Therefore,
3) This must be done.
Those kids over there looked like The Killers. Get 'em out! That group over there, we don't understand him. Get 'em out! That clique has a tradition of verbally harassing people? Ah. They're kids. And they're cheerleaders/football players/"boys will be boys".
Blue, people were SUSPENDED FOR THEIR BELIEFS. People were feared for no other reason than the games they played! Go read the Hellmouth responses--it was never really about people complaining about how they'd been victimized for all these years ad nauseum. It was how schools across the country started looking inward to find the secret "Most Likely to Kill Us All" award winners, and the slots kept on ringing up, "Isolated Computer Geek", "Dungeons and Dragons Player", and "That Guy Who Sits Alone In Lunch And Hates PE."
No administrator wanted to be liable for letting the school get shot up. So a veritable Lord Of The Flies environment sprouted up in schools across the country. Geeks still in school reported the harassment they were subject to, and stood back in awe as Slashdot spit back hundreds of similar stories from everywhere and anywhere inbetween. Geeks out of school shuddered--they(and *I*) knew deep down that we got out just in time, but there were those we left behind.
Would you have survived the Purge from Columbine? Would I? How many were harassed to make the popular feel safe? How many were exiled?
I honestly believe the greatest thing to come out of the Hellmouth series was that it was *so* quick to come out and *so* topical that it *had* to amount of something of a defense infrastructure for those being considered for extreme punishment.
I don't know this for sure, but I can hope: The Hellmouth series had the direct effect of making it much more expensive for administrators to eliminate subversive though entirely innocent elements from schools across the country. It made kids bolder in defending themselves, it gave parents a window into something they could only vaguely remember, and it made administrators know there'd be a heavy PR price for eliminating the "inconvenient" rather than the truly dangerous. That's why I want this book published, incidentally: For all the non-geek exposure this series got, it was most likely limited to short emails read for short periods of time by the people who could and should Make That Difference.
The publication of this book needs to happen--the bottom line is that there's a *reason* it's legal to quote, and Slashdot should not feel guilty about doing so--especially when most readers enthusiastically support the printing of this material! The people who would be quoted overwhelmingly support such a printing--they wrote what they wrote to be *read*, *understood*, and *acted upon*. Hemos, Taco, and even you, Katz, you've *done* that.
Do the authors proud! Release this book.
Yours Truly,
Dan Kaminsky
DoxPara Research
http://www.doxpara.com
Really, I don't see why. What are the differences between web-based text and print media?
--Web-based is dynamic within certain limits, print much less so.
--Web-based is available only with certain equipment (computers, web access, etc.). Print is accessible to anyone that can read the language it's printed in.
These are the basic differences. There may be some legal differences, but this is more an artifact of our legal system having failed to catch up to new technology.
Why is the change of media important?
And, perhaps what my real question is, why do these people care? People wrote in with their own stories of abuse at the hands of their peers; they wrote in with opinions, diatribes, and sometimes incoherent or off-topic rambling. They did this in a semi-public forum that is commonly frequented by others of their kind, an informal kind of clubhouse for the technically proficient. Preaching to the choir, you might say.
However, the instant that there is some possibility that a wider audience (perhaps less-technically inclined, perhaps less sympathetic) can see these remarks, then people come out of the woodwork crying about intellectual property and "my permission wasn't asked!"
The point I am trying (somewhat disjointedly) to make is this: The people who could benefit most from reading these remarks (i.e. anyone who cares to pick up the book) are being denied that insight by the people who have the information (i.e. the Slashdot posters--some of them, anyway). It is as if a repressed minority lashes out against a largely ignorant majority with "You don't understand us! You are oppressing us!" and then refuses to give that majority the insight that would prevent oppression from ignorance.
This is a step towards social suicide.
www.alarmist.org
And it isn't about whether or not money is going to be made on a magazine article or book. /. isn't a charity (even though it is a .org). It's a business. If it wasn't, it wouldn't have sold for the money that it sold for. Those banner ads up at the top are the reason the site is allowed to exist. They pay for the bandwidth and the boxes.
If you don't want people to associate you with what you've said, post as an AC. If you don't trust the journalists that run the site, don't post at all.
Nothing to see here. Move along.
I suggest that there be added to the per-user preferences an option specifying whether you want Slashdot (or other people) to feel free to use your posts (with attribution) in books or other works.
I think this re-thinking of attitudes on behalf of the editors is a good thing. In the future. tje editors may want to consider this idea:
Give users a chance to be quoted on the "Post Comment" screen. Two checkboxes saying "this can" or "this can NOT" be quoted in a different medium. Have the boxes unchecked by default. Allow the users to decide AS they are posting; not before or after. For registered users, this may even be set to a default.
If neither is selected, the editors may make some sort of announcement that such a republication of ideas is being considered, and remind people that they can opt in or out when they post.
And Slashdot should have an EDITORIAL POLICY as to the disposition of those comments that have neither of those selections made.
This is all hindsight, of course, but mistakes like this are good if people learn from them. If you want to retain copyright, there is a simple method. And if you don't care if your comments are posted, you can either give explicit permission or not select either choice.
--
"May I have ten thousand marbles, please?"
We've gone over why posting on Slashdot just isn't as effective in this instance:
you/Jon Katz/whoever would just be preaching to the converted. Yes, Slashdot is a very popular electronic magazine. No, the people who really need to see these stories probably don't visit us here!
IMHO, Andover / Slashdot would do more good than bad overall by going ahead and publishing the book. Sure, a few people might not be credited with their brilliant musings, but the people who really NEED to read this book, will be more likely to read it if it's on paper!
You also weaken your own point, by telling us that the only person who'd emailed you negatively so far is someone who didn't even post on that series of stories! Considering that publishing the book would be a legally sound action, and your (admittedly non-scientific) report above of a 100:1 positive to negative reaction ratio, it would seem that Slashdot readers are giving you a thumbs up on whether publishing the book would be ethical.
So why not publish?