Newspaper Articles Not Copyrightable In Slovakia

Re:First! by Twinbee · 2012-01-09 20:21 · Score: 1, Funny

You win 270 internet points. Congratulations. Your post however contains copyrighted content (I copyrighted it a few years back). Expect then a visit from Your Friendly Law Enforcement officers within the next couple of days!

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In Slovakia.... by WarJolt · 2012-01-09 20:24 · Score: 1

Your slashdot comments don't get copyright protection either.

Re:In Slovakia.... by Opportunist · 2012-01-09 21:07 · Score: 3, Insightful

You sure? These comments are original works of me, my opinion, my creation.
You have to see the difference between information and creation. That Hydrogen is the lightest element in the periodic table is not copyrightable. It's information. Even if I create an elaborate statement that culminates in its essence in this and little else, there's no chance that I'll retain copyright of it. Because the main part of what I created is still just the information that hydrogen is the element with the least mass.
A fantasy story about various atoms coming together and having a party, while playing puns on their weight and some of their properties (and look how fat uranium looks, any more yellow cake and she's gonna blow!) is a different matter. That IS copyrightable.

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Re:In Slovakia.... by ciderbrew · 2012-01-09 21:40 · Score: 5, Funny

You sure? These comments are original works of me, my opinion, my creation.
You have to see the difference between information and creation. That Hydrogen is the lightest element in the periodic table is not copyrightable. It's information. Even if I create an elaborate statement that culminates in its essence in this and little else, there's no chance that I'll retain copyright of it. Because the main part of what I created is still just the information that hydrogen is the element with the least mass.
A fantasy story about various atoms coming together and having a party, while playing puns on their weight and some of their properties (and look how fat uranium looks, any more yellow cake and she's gonna blow!) is a different matter. That IS copyrightable.
Does this mean I can't use the quote button?
Re:In Slovakia.... by shentino · 2012-01-09 21:44 · Score: 1

Actually they do because Slashdot is hosted in the USA.
The implied license might be another hurdle though.
Re:In Slovakia.... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-09 22:54 · Score: 2, Informative

You seem confused. The copyright of facts and the copyright of newspaper articles are two distinct things.
Re:In Slovakia.... by fatphil · 2012-01-09 23:41 · Score: 2

I don't know why you were marked funny, it's more worth "insightful". You raise a good point, and it's one that predates web-based communities like /.. There would often be loons on usenet who would like to assert copyright over everything they posted (grand theories about how something impossible was true, usually), who used to get all riled up when people would reply quoting everything. The general consensus was that such posts, whilst copyrighted by the original poster, have been explicitly sent into a medium which by design permits, or even requires, mass duplication and sometimes cosmetic rewriting. So permission to copy has already been granted as soon as the initial "send" was clicked.

I don't recall this precise (fora) idea being tested in court, but I'm far from confident that the decision would go the right way. Similar requires-duplication-in-order-to-even-ever-work scenarios have been tested, and decided upon in the braindead fashion. (Namely that the person who issued a HTTP GET for an image, and who was then willingly send a copy of the image by the web server, was found guilty of copyright infringement.)

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Re:In Slovakia.... by blind+biker · 2012-01-09 23:52 · Score: 1

Does this mean I can't use the quote button?
There is a quote button?

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Re:In Slovakia.... by aix+tom · 2012-01-09 23:52 · Score: 5, Funny

You seem confused. The copyright of facts and the copyright of newspaper articles are two distinct things.
That may indeed be true in the US, where "facts" and "newspaper articles" definitely are two distinct things most of the time.
Re:In Slovakia.... by Ihmhi · 2012-01-10 04:28 · Score: 1

You sure? These comments are original works of me, my opinion, my creation.
You have to see the difference between information and creation. That Hydrogen is the lightest element in the periodic table is not copyrightable. It's information. Even if I create an elaborate statement that culminates in its essence in this and little else, there's no chance that I'll retain copyright of it. Because the main part of what I created is still just the information that hydrogen is the element with the least mass.
A fantasy story about various atoms coming together and having a party, while playing puns on their weight and some of their properties (and look how fat uranium looks, any more yellow cake and she's gonna blow!) is a different matter. That IS copyrightable.
Does this mean I can't use the quote button?
That joke is so derivative.

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Re:In Slovakia.... by Ihmhi · 2012-01-10 04:30 · Score: 1

A fantasy story about various atoms coming together and having a party, while playing puns on their weight and some of their properties (and look how fat uranium looks, any more yellow cake and she's gonna blow!) is a different matter.
Ten copies, please. WHY WON'T YOU TAKE MY MONEY?!

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Random Thoughts From A Diseased Mind (Not For Dummies)
Re:In Slovakia.... by datavirtue · 2012-01-10 06:34 · Score: 1

There is a quote button?! Where is it!?

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Re:In Slovakia.... by evalhalla · 2012-01-10 07:27 · Score: 1

Even if I create an elaborate statement that culminates in its essence in this and little else, there's no chance that I'll retain copyright of it. Because the main part of what I created is still just the information that hydrogen is the element with the least mass.
Not strictly true: if you wrote an elaborate statement to affirm that hydrogen is the element with the least mass you would probably have copyright *on the statement*, just not on the hydrogen fact. This is how you have copyright on e.g. science books, which are basically based on the explanation of facts (and why you can take said facts and put them on wikipedia, but you can't copy the actual phrasing of the book).
Re:In Slovakia.... by Opportunist · 2012-01-12 12:18 · Score: 1

Umm... 'cause I give it away for free? It's not like I think my creations are worth enough to actually charge people for the privilege of reading them.
Actually, I'm kinda glad they don't try to get compensation for immaterial damage...

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We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.

whose history survived last time? by harvey+the+nerd · 2012-01-09 20:29 · Score: 1

In the coming Dark Age of lost or purged copyrighted history as libraries physically wink out, Slovakia may preserve more of its history.

Re:whose history survived last time? by Opportunist · 2012-01-09 21:01 · Score: 1

Not only Slovakia, I dimly remember that in our copyright laws there's an explicit note that news are not copyrightable. For the reason that they're news, not the creation of the newspapers.
Well, it MAY be different for the Sun or similar quality papers, where it might be an original work...

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We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.

Re:First! by gnasher719 · 2012-01-09 20:35 · Score: 0

You are making a completely baseless accusation of copyright infringement. That accusation is malicious, since you know it isn't true, and causes damage to the posters reputation. As a result, you are guilty of slander of title. Expect a lawsuit for millions in damages.

Because, they are not worth by rastos1 · 2012-01-09 20:38 · Score: 3, Insightful

Most likely, they are not worth protection, because they are generally crap. Journalism is a dying art. All you get is poorly translated blurbs from AP/AFP/Reuters. With population of 5 millions is not worth attention of foreign reporters and the only case where I've seen local reporters to get to the bottom of the issue are some consumer-protection cases. Never in science, politics or corruption, etc. But who cares. Most people just want tabloid, so they get that.

I get better news coverage here, than from newspaper articles.

Re:Because, they are not worth by SeaFox · 2012-01-09 20:40 · Score: 1

Your ideas are intriguing to me and I wish to subscribe to your newsletter.
Oh, wait...
Re:Because, they are not worth by viperidaenz · 2012-01-09 20:55 · Score: 1

What's wrong with only having 5 million people? I live in a country with 4,434,676 people. We have good news articles all the time, perhaps two, maybe three a month!
Re:Because, they are not worth by ddda · 2012-01-09 21:20 · Score: 0

Good Article @!@
Re:Because, they are not worth by fatphil · 2012-01-10 00:32 · Score: 1

1,339,646 here. We have a fantastic news service, and I'm not jesting.

Of course, whilst the news may be vitally important and exciting for nationals, it's likely to be of very little interest to foreigners. Whereas when things are happening in the US or Russia, even if we'd prefer it didn't affect us, we still have to wonder how far away the poor victim country will be and whether we'll get any fall-out.

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Also FatPhil on SoylentNews, id 863
Re:Because, they are not worth by AmiMoJo · 2012-01-10 02:34 · Score: 1

It isn't really about the quality of the work, otherwise you could argue that all sorts of art is just crap and thus not worthy of copyright. Who would decide? The court in this case is basing their decision on the idea that merely reporting facts is not a significant enough "work" to qualify, in the same way that you can't copyright raw data like statistics or sports scores in most places.
Opinion pieces might be different because they are creative. Unfortunately 99% of the average newspaper is opinion rather than reporting of facts, but perhaps things are different in Slovakia. It would seem that supposedly unbiased sources of raw facts like the AFP could be in trouble here though.

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Re:Because, they are not worth by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-10 05:59 · Score: 0

I'm not exactly a fan of current copyright law but, last I checked, the law wasn't supposed to distinguish between those deserving of protection and those who aren't based on "quality." If I emptied every bullet magazine in my house into my friend's horribly abusive boyfriend, I would be arrested, just like any other murderer because that's exactly what I would be at that point. Doesn't matter that he's a waste of organic matter that will likely put my friend her in a grave someday (though it might be taken into consideration in my sentencing) because the law considers him as worthy of protection as an innocent toddler. And that's how it should be - governments have no place deciding whether a group is "worthy" of a given legal right.
I agree, a lot of the stuff news organizations put out is crap anymore but that's largely because no one wants to pay for quality. I know two serious investigative journalists who are currently employed. The only reason they have jobs is because the one is very prolific and the other is the only one the local mobsters will talk to (and consumers are all over those stories). I personally think part of the problem is that the news organizations shot themselves in the foot by allowing content for free online way back when they thought it was unimportant and that web ads were as valuable as print ads. However, that ship has long since sailed. I'm not sure what the solution is but denying protection for all newspaper articles is certainly not going to improve quality.

I live in Slovakia by SlovakWakko · 2012-01-09 20:40 · Score: 5, Insightful

The copyright lobby is still trying to locate us on the map. Once they find us, our politicians will last maybe 3 minutes...

Re:I live in Slovakia by future+assassin · 2012-01-09 21:37 · Score: 1

That's why you have to organise and donate to the politicians first. Keep track of how much was donated and use that info as amo in case the US Media lobsters start to pay them off OR you could gather all the politicians and threaten them with mob and pitchforks.

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Re:I live in Slovakia by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-10 00:00 · Score: 1

Here in the EU (which Slovakia is a member of), "donating" to a politician is a serious crime (corruption) with several years of imprisonment as the punishment.
Re:I live in Slovakia by ScentCone · 2012-01-10 00:31 · Score: 1

Do any politicians run campaigns that cost money? If someone you truly think is the right person for the job is trying to get elected, are you prevented from supporting their campaign, or the political actions of their party/organization?

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Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
Re:I live in Slovakia by LordCrank · 2012-01-10 05:36 · Score: 1

Does copyright law in Slovakia have the notion of fair use applied as it does in the U.S.? Without fair use of copyrighted materials as a middle ground you'd have a much harder time arguing that news articles can be copyrighted.
Re:I live in Slovakia by SlovakWakko · 2012-01-10 06:20 · Score: 2

I don't know how about other member coutries, but in Slovakia you can donate to the politician's party. The parties also get some state donations after elections based on the votes they get, so they're supposed to get a loan to cover the campaign, and then repay it from this donation. IRL this money is not enough to run a serious political party, so they make a lot of shady deals with the private sector. The corruption is almost universal.
Re:I live in Slovakia by SlovakWakko · 2012-01-10 06:41 · Score: 2

Yes it does. It's not as strict as U.S. law, and it even recognizes 'private use' - for example I may copy a portion or all of certain types of copyrighted works (including movies and music, but not books) for private use, without having to notify or pay the copyright owner. He/she is reimbursed from a small tax levied on all recording media and devices (CD/DVD media and burners, HDDs, ...). The law also recognizes derivative works, which are allowed (a photo of a sculpture, for example) and other useful concepts. Besides, our police has never tried to go after small-time infringers who use p2p to dl movies, music, and software. All copyright-related busts were against companies using unlicensed software on a large scale or against individuals regularly selling unlicensed copies of copyrighted works. The court decision in question here does not mention fair use, it is based on the judge's notion that news articles are just reporting factual events, and thus are not creative works (yes, we still remember the purpose of copyright :). I know the original reasoning of the plaintiff and I have to say that in my opinion the judge is wrong, since the aggregated articles are sometimes also author commentaries, which clearly are creative works, sometimes of high quality. But I cannot imagine that many of our judges are educated enough in the modern issues of copyright in the virtual world to recognize the problem, and copyright laws is not really considered a big issue here. We are still waiting on the bastard who will come and turn it into a serious business.
Re:I live in Slovakia by turbidostato · 2012-01-10 07:04 · Score: 1

"I cannot imagine that many of our judges are educated enough in the modern issues of copyright in the virtual world to recognize the problem"
That's good for you: with regards of copyright notions, the more "luddites" the more probable the judge will reach a fair outcome.
There's absolutly *nothing* in the "virtual world" that means a damn with respect of copy rights except to muddy the waters.
"I have to say that in my opinion the judge is wrong"
With regards of court rules, the damn short letter makes a big difference. Given that the basic asumption seems fair (news are news, not creative work) I'll tend to think that it was the plaintiff the one that failed to show that among the non-copyrighteable facts there were creative work too. A judge must judge about what was presented to him, not about what he can imagine that "really happened".
Re:I live in Slovakia by SlovakWakko · 2012-01-10 07:43 · Score: 1

"it was the plaintiff the one that failed to show that among the non-copyrighteable facts there were creative work too"
You're right, at least the article suggest so. It also says that the court disregarded some EC directives and previous cases based on them. Since precedents are not binding in our law system, it is free to do so, and the plaintiff will have to appeal the decision in a higher court.

In Slovakia... by vikingpower · 2012-01-09 20:50 · Score: 2

...copyright owns you !

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Re:In Slovakia... by airfoobar · 2012-01-09 21:15 · Score: 4, Insightful

No no no, in America copyright owns you. In Slovakia, copyright knows its place.
Re:In Slovakia... by loneDreamer · 2012-01-10 06:37 · Score: 1

No no no, in America copyright owns you. In Slovakia, copyright knows its place.
in the USA, sure. Most countries in in America are much healthier though.

Interesting by gmhowell · 2012-01-09 21:00 · Score: 3, Interesting

There is plenty of creativity in journalism. In the US, journos exhibit creativity when they try to create two sides out of a one sided issue, conjures up non existent reasons for an illegal war, or print outright works of fiction as fact.

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Jesus was all right but his disciples were thick and ordinary. -John Lennon

Re:Interesting by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-10 03:18 · Score: 0

Conjurs up non existent reasons for (insert any irrational thought or action I don't like here) to be illegal. There fixed your stupid fucking trolling illegal war crap .. you people drive me nuts with that crap
Re:Interesting by LordLimecat · 2012-01-10 04:01 · Score: 3, Informative

When you say "illegal war", you mean "military activity not authorized authorized by congress?"
Because heres the huge irony of all these bashing statements about "Bushe's War" being illegal getting +5 interesting: All of Bush's military activity was explicitly authorized [wikipedia.org] by Congress, in one case by a landslide [wikipedia.org]. The huge irony here is that Obama voted "yea" for both.
The same, unfortunately, cannot be said for Obama, despite his vocal opposition to non-authorized military activity-- Libya was not approved by Congress (though it was by the UN; I guess that trumps constitutionality requirements in Obama's book).
To be clear, I am not against the intervention in Libya-- I can give Obama credit where credit is due; but there is some HUGE hypocrisy from a guy who stated
"The president does not have power under the Constitution to unilaterally authorize a military attack in a situation that does not involve stopping an actual or imminent threat to the nation."
and even more so from those who ignore Libya and continue blithely attacking Bush. At least Obama had the good sense to shut up about Bush's "Kinetic Military Actions" being unconstitutional; yall should take a page out of his book.
Re:Interesting by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-10 08:23 · Score: 1

No, he means 'military action without a formal declaration of war as required by international law'.
Re:Interesting by LordLimecat · 2012-01-10 09:27 · Score: 1

My links didnt come through due to a bad copy-paste; you are right that Bush had no declaration of war, but that is not a constitutional requirement, and international law allows retaliation in self defense (which, it is argued, Afghanistan was).
Iraq was because Hussein refused to allow UN weapons inspectors in, along with an informant who claimed WMDs and bio / chem weapons were being stockpiled. You can argue that all day long, but basically everyone was for the Iraq invasion when it happened; It is possible Bush would have been "in trouble" had he not done Iraq, and very possible he would have been impeached if he had not done Afghanistan (Congress voted some 520 to 10 on that; whens the last time they were so united?)
All that aside, Im pretty certain that no declarations of war were issued for Libya, so any attacks on bush must be doubly leveled at Obama.
Re:Interesting by Tyler+Durden · 2012-01-10 09:48 · Score: 1

You can argue that all day long, but basically everyone was for the Iraq invasion when it happened; It is possible Bush would have been "in trouble" had he not done Iraq...
Um, the reason that "basically everyone" was for the Iraq invasion is because of a concerted effort made by the Bush administration to make a case for it. A case that was full of information that can be considered, at best, distortions and, at worst, outright lies. If you don't believe me, try watching the program "Bush's War" put out by Frontline. Maybe Congress was too trusting with what was presented to them, but in the end the Iraq war was the Bush administration's cause.
I agree with you about Obama's hypocrisy regarding Libya.

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Happy people make bad consumers.
Re:Interesting by gmhowell · 2012-01-10 15:50 · Score: 0

"Obama did it, so it's ok"?
That's a compelling argument.

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Jesus was all right but his disciples were thick and ordinary. -John Lennon

Manipulative wording by Forty+Two+Tenfold · 2012-01-09 21:08 · Score: 2

It's not 'author's rights' to recognition that are neglected rather than the publisher's rights to monopolize monetary or informative value of their writing.

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Re:Manipulative wording by Trevin · 2012-01-10 02:40 · Score: 3, Insightful

That's closer, but monopolizing the news is not a right. It's a privilege which may (or may not) be granted by the government.

Great, now take it a step further! by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-09 21:14 · Score: 1

while the news articles manifests traces of creativity, it is not enough to be considered worth protecting the authors rights

The same should apply to Hollywood movies, for the same reasons! :D

For now by Kikuchi · 2012-01-09 21:18 · Score: 2

US of A Ambassador : "That's a nice country you have here. It'd be a shame if something happened to its economy..."

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There's no scientific consensus that life is important.

Misleading conclusion by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-09 21:38 · Score: 1

Slovakia, like most European countries, doesn't have a common law system. This means that precedents have very little significance, and next time someone claims a copyright on a news article, the court may decide differently.

copyright in Slovakia by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-09 21:56 · Score: 0

the thing is that only DAILY NEWS are not protected by copyright in Slovakia and the court ruling was simply on this matter; but frankly: Slovak journalists mostly do not care about feeding public with news full of facts and clarifications, they mostly love and do make an author-like input filling news with clonclusions based on hear-say, personal feelings (positive, negative), etc. (often concealed with opinions of such experts as politologists, sociologists or former politicians; or if the can't find one proper then they "ask" someone from general public or they create a "anonymous source close to..."), so then they might see themselves as "authors"... anyway: this ruling of the court is plausible, but my impression is that journalists did not catch the point of what the judge wanted to tell them

Re:copyright in Slovakia by pjabardo · 2012-01-10 00:49 · Score: 1

So, Slovak journalists are like journalists everywhere?

Because they aren't worth it by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-09 22:01 · Score: 2, Funny

The more likely explanation is that they are not worth protecting, because their quality is so low. Journalism is a dying art. Newspapers consist of poorly translated blurbs from AP/AFP/Reuters. With a population of 5 million, Slovakia does not receive much attention from the foreign press, and the only case where I've seen local reporters get to the bottom of an issue are in a few consumer-protection issues. Never in other important fields like science, politics, etc. But who cares. Most people just want a tabloid, and that's what they get.

I get better news coverage here on Slashdot than from Slovakian newspaper articles.

I'm sure you will be more than happy if my edit gets voted to +5. Now imagine if you were a professional, and had your text stolen. Still think it shouldn't be copyrightable?

Re:Because they aren't worth it by riegel · 2012-01-09 22:18 · Score: 1

I think you are confusing plagiarism with copyright.

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Re:Because they aren't worth it by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-09 23:14 · Score: 0

Hey, those blurbs from the major newsclowns are pretty fuzzy, ambiguous and disinformative in English to begin with. I wouldn't expect it to be any less than poorly translated in any language. Groucho would say they "mumble doubletalk in Esperanto". I think this should be a lesson to all the bilious scum wasting daddys money on a journalism degree. You are going to be worth less to society than crackheads.

Re:First! by WillerZ · 2012-01-09 22:05 · Score: 1

causes damage to the posters reputation

If the poster wasn't AC, maybe

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Re:First! by Urkki · 2012-01-09 22:16 · Score: 2

causes damage to the posters reputation

If the poster wasn't AC, maybe

Oh, no, that just means that everybody who ever posted as AC is is eligible for damages. Actually, this is a class action case!

Finally a test case by Mathinker · 2012-01-09 23:59 · Score: 5, Interesting

Will this cause the total collapse of the Slovakian news business? My suspicion is "no".

Anyway, it will be interesting to see what happens, so finally there might be some (slightly) more objective evidence for those of us who are interested in how the current copyright laws encourage or discourage various economic endeavors.

Re:Finally a test case by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-10 02:32 · Score: 0

Will it cause a massive boost for Slovakia's hosting business for worldwide content?
Re:Finally a test case by MisterMidi · 2012-01-10 03:24 · Score: 2

No test case. As an AC pointed out, Like most countries in the EU (and for that matter, most countries in the world), Slovakia doesn't have common law, precedents, and test cases. In civil law, law is written, not precedented.
Re:Finally a test case by Mathinker · 2012-01-10 04:47 · Score: 2

I think you misunderstand "test case", here. I did not mean a legal test case. I meant an economic test case --- for that, it is sufficient to have just this one decision.

Good sense? by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-10 00:47 · Score: 0

I don't agree newspapers should have no copyright, but there's got to be grounds for saying the information is transitory, so it can have a copyright term of 1 year (or something). Making it 70+ years or whatever the default is in Slovakia does seem rather overkill for something that expresses public domain information the day after it is published.

Re:Good sense? by msmoriarty · 2012-01-10 13:11 · Score: 1

Copyright (by US definition, at least) does NOT cover facts or information but the "expression" of those facts or information (when it comes to news, this is how it applies -- can't copyright facts). So you can actually take any news story, take all the information out of it, write a new story based on those facts and you're fine -- no copyright violation.
With that, there's no reason to ask them to give up the copyright in that anyone that same day or anytime can take the information and share it with everyone -- its not restricting the information. Yes, a reporter can and will be pissed if not credited for any exclusive information they dug up, but you're not violating copyright by sharing what they reported, with or without credit.

2 things by capoccia · 2012-01-10 00:56 · Score: 1

articles that are simplistic reporting of daily news are what has been ruled on. completely original investigative reporting is not affected. there is really very little creativity in slovak journalism. a lot of it is only one-sided rehashing of press releases.

slovakia does not have diversity in the journalism market. that is why piano media was able to get a foothold. hopefully, this will begin to eat away at the paywall and collusion piano media has created.

Fox News? by Visoblast · 2012-01-10 01:20 · Score: 0

If Fox News operates over there the way they do in the US, they should be able to copyright many of their articles. They are always very creative in how they don't use facts.

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-- Crow T. Robot

We could cut the copyright on newspaper articles by rollingcalf · 2012-01-10 01:31 · Score: 4, Insightful

... down to 5 or 10 days after publication, and it wouldn't kill the incentives of journalists to research and write the articles, or of newspapers to publish them. Nearly all of their monetary value is realized in the first 48 hours after publication.

Cutting the copyright short would also make it easier for newspapers to make their archives of old articles available. In America some newspapers get cockblocked by journalists suing to collect royalties again on years-old articles just because the article is republished in a different medium.

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There is inferior bacteria on the interior of your posterior.

Felvidek by Whiteox · 2012-01-10 01:54 · Score: 1

I ran a manual aggregator service but I stopped because I got paranoid with all the copyright as I paid for nothing. The site was not set up to earn any money and users got what they needed for free. So this news is welcome IMHO as news is news and should be free, notwithstanding the costs that a paper forks out which is basically recouped by advertising and edition sales. I never felt guilty about that, just the paranoia of copyright.
The Slovak model is interesting for another reason, that the newsprint media shy away from some of the real issues which are too hot to handle. These issues stem from Slovak government policy on how they handle their very close neighbours like Moravia, the Czech Republic and Hungary.
Exposition: The Moravians want their own government, the Czech are typical overlords and most of the southern part of the country aren't Slovaks but Hungarians.
Even though these people are called a minority, there are many towns and villages that have been and are still Hungarian for a thousand years. Due to border changes after WWI (The Treaty of Trianon), most of Northern Hungary is trapped in Southern Slovakia. The end result of this is a nightmare for ethnic Hungarians who are forced into 'Slovakization', losing their identity and in some cases their citizenship. It's no at all rosy in Southern Slovakia :(
So I reckon that if the Slovak newsmedia started to investigate how its own government's policies discriminate against minorities then those court rulings will be turned around pretty fast. It's something they do not want to share.

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Don't be apathetic. Procrastinate!

Re:Felvidek by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-10 03:00 · Score: 0

Excuse me, mister, do you live there, or are you only receiving this info from some other country's news? Things you say are pretty much nonsense and non-issue for anyone informed. I haven't heard anything about Moravian's trying to separate from Czechs or having their own government. Relations between Czech and Slovak republic have never been better than it is now. Only issue is that Hungary has major political and economical issues that it try to hide by trying to fix something in other countries that is not broken. Just look at warning memos Hungary received from USA or EU lately.
Just FYI, slovak citizens of hungarian nationality have education system from elementary school to university degree available in their mother tongue. Is this also available in Hungary for Romanians, Slovaks. Austrians,...? Only issue that occured lately comes from not understanding law that requires government-employess to ALSO know slovak language and force her/him to use it in situations when any party requires it, which seem to me pretty much understandable. This law was very badly misinterpreted in hungarian news, unfortunatelly.
Re:Felvidek by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-10 05:02 · Score: 0

The Moravians want their own government.
This is a long running JOKE and it just shows how badly informed you are.

most of the southern part of the country aren't Slovaks but Hungarians.Even though these people are called a minority, there are many towns and villages that have been and are still Hungarian for a thousand years.
[citation needed]

The end result of this is a nightmare for ethnic Hungarians who are forced into 'Slovakization', losing their identity and in some cases their citizenship.

If by nightmare you mean that citizens of Slovakia who choose so can attend schools teaching in hungarian, use hungarian language while dealing with all government institutions, get free translator(person) provided if clerks don't speak hungarian etc.. than yeah, it's pure horror story for poor poor Hungarians.
(Hint: Don't just believe everything extreme nationalist will write, check about dual citizenship issues which Hungary started to provide 'entertainment' and distract from their failing economy.)
Re:Felvidek by VAElynx · 2012-01-10 06:02 · Score: 1

All right. When I saw the title of the post, i thought this will be bad, but congratulations, you have managed to dig under my already low-set hurdle
Firstly, newspapers definitely don't side away from real issues... except that their definition of real issues isn't constantly poking the same stale issue, which is how both Slovak National Party and SMK, Most-Hid or whatever the hungarian party is at the moment get their votes.
Now, let's address things in turn.
I don't think i have ever seen Moravians seriously wanting their own government, of course if we don't count Slovakia getting one, since we are essentially the same people , having been severed from Greater Moravia when the Hungarians showed around.
No, Bolek Polivka and his joke "Wallachian Kingdom" doesn't count.

Now, ignoring your pointless jab at the Czechs, let's say something about the idiocy that you try to pass as historic fact.
To uproot these misconceptions we have to look before 1914. During that time , the land that now constitutes Slovakia (and Subcarpthian Ruthenia, but that's another story) was a part of Uhorsko, or Greater Hungary - the second half of the Austro-Hungarian Empire
Now, if we are to ask what were the national rights of Slovaks, Romanians, Ruthenians or whoever else living in this country, the answer is simple - none at all. State provided education was hungarian only, and people of other nationalities were treated as second-class citizens on their own land.
Both of these factors provided a mechanism for hungarisation of the population - even to this day, there are jokes about "madaroni" - slovaks that tried hard to pass off as hungarians, going so far as to hungarise their names and try to dig in their history for a gramme of hungarian ancestry. I cannot say, but I am pretty sure that similar things were happening in the other regions as well.
Now, a partial result of this was ,that indeed, when the borders of Czechoslovakia were drawn after the first world war, a part of the land did indeed contain significant proportions of hungarian population, in the same way as the border part of hungary contained a significant slovak population.
However, over the years (For now on , i will ignore the second world war and the so-called "small war" where hungarian armies invaded the Slovak State, supposedly their ally, and claimed land up to Nitra) hungarisation has been still going on in hungary, while in Slovakia, the hungarian minority has had relatively extensive rights.
As a result, the slovak population in Hungaria was assimilated while the hungarian population in Slovakia still tends to differ from the main population

Now, let's look at the present situation. Slovak hungarians have state-issued hungarian textbooks and can learn in their own language, there are two-language sign tables in many places - a good example would be the district hospital in Galanta, and there are two hungarians representing Slovakia in the European Parliament who interestingly enough refuse to talk in Slovak, while babbling about how discriminated they are.
In comparison, Hungarian slovaks have none of the above, furthermore , they had trouble from the Hungarian government even gaining a place for their own House of Culture.
If you still talk about "Slovakisation" with all that going on, you are either stupid, or a liar. Furthermore, the talk about hungarian villages, while true, is demagogy, because alongside them, there are villages that have been slovak for a thousand years. It is simply that the population naturally segregates as each nationality tends to live with their own.

As a final point, it needs to be said that the reason for the often needless concessions to the hungarian minority in Slovakia is that the government of Dzurinda, starting in 1998 has , among others, relied on SMK, the hungarian party, to defeat the immensely popular Vladimir Meciar - it's an issue of a political trade-off. As such , they have encouraged and went nodding to any Hungarian complaints to the west - it is sadly a slovak nature that we'll do bad to ourselves just to spite our enemy more so - which has created an illusion about the large-scale mistreatment of ethnic hungarians in Slovakia.
Re:Felvidek by Whiteox · 2012-01-10 12:08 · Score: 1

Thank you for all the responses. It is very interesting to hear your collected views and I appreciate them.
Firstly, I do not have any issues with the Slovak peoples or their rights. My post was about contentious issues and possible Slovak government reactions to them based on practice
So: http://www.foruminst.sk/en/66/visual_bilingualism/0/research_on_usage_of_hungarian_language_in_southern_slovakia/1 will give you a perspective on bilingual problems (English).
Dual Citizenship: I do not have the time at present to provide links, but I know of at least 2 ethnic Hungarians where their Slovak citizenship was taken away because they applied and got their Hungarian citizenship. One was Boldoghy Olivér (CEO of Autobank) and another 102 year old woman that got some (Hungarian) press recently. This is discriminatory.
The Moravian movement for cultural autonomy can be found here: http://moravane.eu/category/aktuality/
As for the Magyarization in the decades preceding WWI, was not just a move for assimilation as you suggest, but stemmed from the Hapsburg directive that the official language of the Empire be German. The Hungarians who already had Magyar as an administrative language from 1849 (previously it was Latin), thought this was idiotic. As they were seceding slowly away from Austrian domination and already had cultural and political control of most of Slovakia and Uzbekistan, did go ahead with this.
As for the Little War, the Nazi government did agree to the border changes based on ethnic demographics, but you are right that the Hungarians took the lands a few days before they were supposed to.

It is simply that the population naturally segregates as each nationality tends to live with their own.

With the average town population around 1000-1500 people, you soon run out of gene pool. Most genealogical research shows that racial intermarriage was common (pre-industrialization) within the confessions, be it Eastern Orthodox, Roman Catholic or Evangelical. In fact, most ethnic delineations in Eastern Slovakia are by religious confession.
As for the Hungary today, they have serious internal political issues and they can't help themselves let alone their kin in bordering countries. I've never heard of large-scale mistreatment of ethnic Hungarians in Slovakia, just a few bashings/killings by irate Slovak gangs.
The Slovak government has a trick up their sleeves in that they will comply with EU directives only if 2 concurrent censuses (10 years apart) show a minimum of 10% ethnic residency. In other words, it will take 20 years before some communities get their bilingual rights. This is an eye for an eye attitude in retribution. That's why I used the word 'Slovakization' which is now considered to be politically incorrect.
Now if you read a bit of military history, you will find that the Czech controlled much of Vienna's administration and I wonder what effect they had on the Empire, bringing it almost to bankrupcy building useless forts down south against the Ottomans.
There are arguments on both sides of this.

--
Don't be apathetic. Procrastinate!
Re:Felvidek by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-11 02:42 · Score: 0

Felvidek (Score:1)
We're talking about copyright laws on a technology-related news site, and of course there has to be this one person who turns hyper-hungarian and pulls out the only argument he can, that being the Trianon-card.

FTFY, DMCA by Kamiza+Ikioi · 2012-01-10 02:11 · Score: 1

You xxxx? These comments are xxxxxx works of xx, xx opinion, xx creation.

Xxx have to see the difference between xxxxxxx and xxxxxxx. That xxxxxxx is the lightest element in the periodic table is not xxxxxxxxxx. It's information. Even if I xxxxx an elaborate statement that culminates in xxx essence in this and little else, there's no chance that X'xx retain xxxxxxx of it. Because the main part of what I xxxxxx is still just the information that hydrogen is the element with the least mass.

A fantasy xxxxx about various xxxxxx coming together and having a party, while playing puns on xxxxx weight and some of their properties (and look how fat xxxxxx looks, any more yellow cake and she's gonna blow!) is a different matter. That IS xxxxxxxxx.

Does xxxx xxxx I can't use the xxxxx button?

FTFY, DMCA compatible now.

--
I8-D

Re:FTFY, DMCA by ciderbrew · 2012-01-10 03:45 · Score: 2

You've just made that filthy. Well done.

Slovakia isn't unique by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-10 02:59 · Score: 0

Just checked our local Dutch law. It specifically limits the copyright on newspaper articles, requiring only attribution for republication. It's almost the old BSD license! This case would have been trivial under that law; is the original source properly named?

fuck Yah! by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-10 04:47 · Score: 0

Fuck yah slovakia!
Knowing what common sense means. I'm proud of my heritage now

Re:In 1968 by shutdown+-p+now · 2012-01-10 06:33 · Score: 1

Czechoslovakia was not annexed in 1968; not any more than, say, Iraq was annexed by U.S. in 2003.

Neither are Vowels, It Appears by Tablizer · 2012-01-10 09:28 · Score: 1

(Obligatory Onion reference)

--
Table-ized A.I.

journalists stealing other stories.. by AssholeMcGee+ · 2012-01-10 19:43 · Score: 1

So what happens when journalists steal other journalists stories?? I guess that is okay?

FYI: Slovak copyright law in English by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-10 23:57 · Score: 0

Here's the full text of the English translation in case someone is interested:

http://www.wipo.int/wipolex/en/details.jsp?id=3752

here in india by alancore2duo · 2012-01-11 00:21 · Score: 1

here in india,all news paper have their content copyrighted times of india lead here just cause 2 !

Big talkin' FatPhil runs from a challenge, lol... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-11 01:18 · Score: 0

http://it.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=2603836&cid=38589290

George M. Howell = admitted trolling asshole on /. by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-11 03:55 · Score: 0

Informing others about this scumbag punk gmhowell (who thinks it's cool to harass others online, with his diabetic fatass pal tomhudson).

"I've been trolling people for 36 years. Why would I stop now? I've also never denied trolling you. Why would I?" - by gmhowell (26755) on Sunday April 17, @05:03AM (#35846218) Homepage

QUOTED VERBATIM DIRECTLY FROM -> http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=2087330&cid=35846218

"I never denied trolling you" - by gmhowell (26755) on Tuesday December 14 2010, @01:55AM (#34543612) Homepage Journal

QUOTED VERBATIM DIRECTLY FROM -> http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1907528&cid=34543612

gmhowell posts journal on trolling myself, years ago now -> http://slashdot.org/journal/266768/the-best-thing-about-trolling-apk

PERTINENT QUOTE/EXCERPT:

"The best thing about trolling APK?" - http://slashdot.org/journal/266768/the-best-thing-about-trolling-apk

QUOTED VERBATIM FROM -> http://slashdot.org/journal/266768/the-best-thing-about-trolling-apk

---

gmhowell says he will stop next below (after I got on his case) too:

"But seriously, I may stop" - by gmhowell on Thursday June 16, @09:38PM (#36470452) Attached to: The best thing about trolling APK?

and

"Hmm... Maybe oughta lay off for a while." - by gmhowell (26755) on Thursday June 16, @09:38PM (#36470452) Homepage

I took him @ his word, & then laid off on retrolling he, but?

gmhowell starts up YET again (now by AC posts only)!

Proof? Ok, this week -> http://slashdot.org/journal/276148/now-this-is-entertaining

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gmhowell's part of the "trolltalk.com" crew (a domain tomhudson, a total scumbag troll actually keeps no less).

gmhowell hangs around with (or is just another alternate registered 'luser' guise tomhudson keeps) tomhudson, a known troll

(tomhudson = a miserable fat diabetic wreck too that can't program for shit & *thinks* she can but hasn't been noted for it in anything in publication in the realm of the computer sciences, fact)!

Example:

"Wait until he starts on another kick, then reply to him as an AC. It's the new meme". - by tomhudson (43916) on Sunday May 09 2010, @08:29PM (#32150544) Homepage Journal

QUOTED VERBATIM DIRECTLY FROM -> http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1646272&cid=32150544

"BTW - if you're going to tell this guy to stop spamming his hosts file crap, make sure you do it anonymously" - by tomhudson (43916) on Saturday April 16 2011, @11:45AM (#35840680) Journal

QUOTED VERBATIM DIRECTLY FROM -> http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=2086920&cid=35840680

---

(This "trolltalk.com" pack of weasels? Heh - They're all "scumbags of a feather that flock together")

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gmhowell & crew from trolltalk.com also CHEAT THE MODERATION SYSTEM HERE, & others noted it also -> http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=2236608&cid=36442386

"I do whatever amuses me at the moment. Sometimes that i

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Newspaper Articles Not Copyrightable In Slovakia

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