Slashdot Mirror
Blogspace vs. NPR
jonkl writes "National Public Radio's linking policy at npr.org has caused a fuss within the blog community that's hot and getting hotter. The policy's simply stated in two sentences: 'Linking to or framing of any material on this site without the prior written consent of NPR is prohibited. If you would like to link to NPR from your Web site, please fill out the link permission request form.' This is buried, of course, in a page linked to the site's footer, but somebody noticed and mentioned it to Howard Rheingold, who passed it on to Cory Doctorow of boingboing.net. Cory wrote scathing commentary, calling the policy 'brutally stupid,' even 'fatally stupid.' The outrage is spreading; this has to be a rough day for the NPR ombudsman who's deluged with email by now... ~24 hours after Cory's report." Reminds of the KPMG policy.
Did we (slashdot) ask permission to link
"Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle." -- Plato (427?-347? BC)
So we'll /. NPR and thus demonstrate to them that linking really *is* harmless, right?
Wait... I just deep linked to a link prohibiting deep links! Ack! My brain!
This is clearly a case of freedom of speech. Let's see NPR try to bring charges against someone for linking to their site. It'll be laughed out of court. It's a basic right for someone to be able to publish publically available information, such as a universal resource locator.
Just ask 2600.
whoops
"And like that
Why don't this just do away with their domain name npr.org and have everyone visit them with via their IP address instead. No use making it easy for anyone.