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Ebay Shop Scrapes Thingiverse, Sells Designs In Violation of Creative Commons (all3dp.com)
He Who Has No Name writes: A little over a week ago, Thingiverse user Loubie posted Sad Face! to Thingiverse, protesting the use — without permission — of their designs and those of others by JustPrint3D, an Ebay seller marketing physical prints of the designs in question (over 2,000 by some counts). Despite a terse and legally shaky denial of any wrongdoing by JustPrint3D, there are obviously multiple violations of various iterations of the Creative Commons licenses (several forms of the CC license are options for Thingiverse uploaders to assign to their Things when uploading, and one is the default). Now MakerBot itself is wading into the uproar firmly on the side of its users, and has released a statement mentioning potential legal action.
Their Ebay store is empty.
What's the problem? Did the author pick wrong license by mistake — and will they apologize to the folks now harmed by eBay's overreaction?
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
"Scraping" refers to "copying the content off of some website". It is adapted from the older term "screen scraping", which is copying the data from someone else's visual presentation of this data. This usually implies that you don't have access to the underlying data in a more convenient form (such as files or a database or an API), so you have to reconstruct it from some source that either wasn't intended to promote the efficient transfer of the data or was actually designed to make that transfer as difficult as possible, for IP reasons.
"4.)copy (data) from a website using a computer program.
"all search engines scrape content from sites without permission and display it on their own sites""
Scraping is using a computer to read data from a (human readable) website and extract formatted computer data. So an app might search the slashdot homepage, look for links with text of a certain size and colour, and produce a list of titles. That would be "scraping".
Ebay only takes action against illegal things when there is bad press.
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
This was also covered about a week ago on HackADay: http://hackaday.com/2016/02/22... "Most of the uploaded CAD models on Thingiverse are done under the Creative Commons license, which is pretty clear in its assertion that anyone can profit from the work. This would seem to put the eBay store owner in the clear for selling the work, but it should be noted that he’s not properly attributing the work to the original creator. " The only part that he's violating is that there's no attribution.
Sure the guy is a scumbag, but anyone buying from him deserves to be taken advantage of.
People list things for far more than what they are worth all the time.
I was looking to buy a Model A and look what I came across this
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Ford-M...
The rusted out body of a Model A for 18K+ when you can buy a beautiful fully restored working Model As for as little 16,000
If you don't shop around expect to be taken advantage of.
Because the author/editor assumed on site that bills itself as "News for Nerds" that most users would be able to understand the lingo - and if not could use a search engine to find the answer.
3d printer ...and nothing of value was lost. At all.
Creative Commons
Thingverse
Thing (as a proper noun)
Makerbot
I think she will never stop by...
The link points to a very short description of the license, and even that short description includes the following requirement:
"Attribution â" You must give appropriate credit,
"provide a link to the license, and indicate if changes
were made."
They didn't do those things. Here's the actual license:
http://creativecommons.org/lic...
Information should be free! Open source everything! Pirating media isn't stealing! And so forth...
But don't you dare reproduce and sell my custom designed paper towel holder.
Crawl back under the rock you've obviously been hiding under, dimwit. Everybody else knows what it means, the term "scraper" in the context of web apps is hardly unusual.
That's what Slashdot used to be, years ago. Now it's mostly clueless reactionaries, upset over various imagined problems.
Ebay: free shit we can rebrand and sell. 2016 is comin up ebay!
Creative Commons uses DMCA, its super effective!
Ebay: Fuck...
Good people go to bed earlier.
There's another ebay seller involved in doing similar things with model trains.
Goes by the name "Big Dawg Originals".
As if the "Originals" is fooling anyone. He makes (bad) molds of other manufacturer's models, casts them, and sells them.
Anybody who didn't get the connotation of the word needs to be firmly deported lol. Grammar idjits can stay. Oh the fucking irony.
OFF with his HEAD!
But they were NOT "scraping" the designs. They were downloading the design files directly, using an interface set up for exactly that purpose. Do you call it "scraping" when someone uses Github? This is no different. The downloading was perfectly legal, and there is no technical barrier to them, or anyone, who wants to do so. The (possibly) illegal part was the selling, not the downloading.
Note: What JustPrint3D was doing may not actually be illegal. Anti-trust laws in America prohibit a manufacturer or distributor from fixing prices. They cannot require a downstream retailer to sell above a minimum price, or below a maximum price. What is not clear, and has not been tested in the courts, is whether anti-trust laws apply when the cost is zero. Can an author or designer require that their product be free? The law is unsettled. IANAL.
If that was the case the act of scanning any sculpture would automatically put it into the pubic domain.
clueless reactionaries!?!
lol
If you're scared of your govt then you need to further restrict its powers
Vote 3rd Party in 2016 and beyond
>Anti-trust laws in America prohibit a manufacturer or distributor from fixing prices.
You need to keep abreast of SCOTUS decisions. http://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/29/business/28cnd-bizcourt.html?_r=0
Because the author/editor assumed on site that bills itself as "News for Nerds" that most users would be able to understand the lingo - and if not could use a search engine to find the answer.
Oh come now! What you posit requires a bit of time and an an attention span longer than that a gnat...
all of which interferes with efficient, knee jerk, first snark type responses.
You have the right to remain sentient. If you give up the right to remain sentient, you will be elected to public office
"Ha ha! Ur clueless noob! I haz gots ur files for free!"
Dumb-ass.
Instead he could have said, "Oh, I didn't realize there were multiple licenses and that some require attribution. I'll go ahead and fix those now. It will take me a couple of days to get them updated." Would have maintained plausible deniability, this whole thing would have blown over, and he'd still have a shop.
Nope, no sig
You can't kill a corporation, you can only sue them out of existence and take all of their assets. I'm sure statutory damages for willful infringement would have been sufficient. but nobody bothers to register their CC works, so it's merely treble damages. And no lawyer is going to take on an IP case for $10,000 in crappy prints.
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
I believe it's done with scripts.
You seriously don't know the definition to the word "Scrape"?
Oh look, we aren't at the end of the process, so there is no process. Great conclusion. Did you point out to everyone in 1975 that the Internet was shite and the information revolution was a load of bollocks?
I do not want your cheap brainburning drugs. They are useless for work. And I am a working man today.
Unlike digital data and software, physical hardware has a cost of distribution. He is offering a 3D printing service to people without a 3D printer. The sale price pays for the time his printer is occupied, materials, and his time maintaining the system. In contrast, the designs only have a cost associated with initial production. Once that cost has been paid, the cost to store, maintain, and distribute the design is virtually nil.
This is the same silliness as the court decision which shut down Aereo. A group of people who are giving the software away for free decide that renting out your hardware to use that software is illegal, and that anyone wishing to use the software must do so using their own hardware.
that most users would be able to understand the lingo
We do understand the lingo. Thats the problem. Its the author/editor that doesn't.
"His name was James Damore."
IMO they are different things. Copying might mean that an employee of the shop downloaded designs from thingiverse and listed them for sale on ebay. Steals or infringes is pretty vague in terms of is actually happening.
It seems reasonable for the author to assume that the audience of this site knows what scraping is, and it is a more precise word for what happened than copying, stealing or infringing. Scraping implies a scripted, automated effort with little human intervention past the point of building the script. There is no selection in terms of, 'hey, this looks neat - I'm going to sell those'; it is a complete replication of a catalogue without intervention.
Actual: Ebay Shop Scrapes Thingiverse, Sells Designs In Violation of Creative Commons
Q? who sells in violation? Ebay or Thingiverse...
Correct: Ebay Shop Scrapes Thingiverse, Who Sells Designs In Violation of Creative Commons
The other one yesterday:
Actual: Mercedes-Benz Swaps Robots For People On Assembly Lines
Q? Which way is it going people out or robots out
Correct: Mercedes-Benz Removes Robots For People On Assembly Lines
Or is this a new strategy Huffinghtonpost style - creating questions in headlines to make people look at content - new in the beginning but now sucks overall.
Linked to the post on thingiverse as a suggestion is a Nuka Cola bottlecap design.
Either thingiverse is all about hardcore DMCA rights, or they're not. Personally, I'd prefer not.
But they weren't selling the designs — they were selling items made from the designs.
When people do that with electronics or medicines, this site sides with them and calls owners of the respective intellectual property "patent trolls" — while simultaneously denying the very concept of intellectual property and angrily rejecting any attempts to compare such things to "theft".
Why should not the design-creators be called "license trolls" and otherwise denounced in this case?
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
Anti-trust laws in America prohibit a manufacturer or distributor from fixing prices.
Anti-trust laws do not prevent the copyright owner from fixing prices, however, and they can.
Occasionally copyright owners provide a distribution agreement where 99% or 100% of all profits go to the copyright owner, and the merchant/distributor is only allowed to resell according to the author's policies.
Also, copyright owners occasionally provide gratis copies for special purposes --- for example, pre-release reviews or screeners. Just because there is no fee, does not mean the movie theaters that received these exclusive media can legally make and distribute copies.
That's but a breeze compared to the hurricane that's gonna blow our way once people start printing car parts and car manufacturers get up in arms over not being able to sell some plastic parts worth 5 cents for 50+ bucks.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Oh you want this place to be an Asperger's echo chamber, got it.
Sorry, I don't get it? You have obviously learnt something nerdy from the headline, what more do you want from a site that promises "news for nerds"?
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.
Hate to say this but it's true. Many, I dare say most, people aren't actually interested in learning. They're not interested in constructive dialogue. They're not interested in changing their minds when presented with new information. They aren't interested in honest debate. They're not interested in accepting that they're wrong and adjusting their beliefs accordingly. They're sure as hell not interested in improving themselves because improving themselves involves both work and admission that they're less than perfect.
And, more on topic, scraping is a more specific type of copying. Being specific is a good thing. It means less confusion for those who actually understand the issues. Those who don't understand the issues probably don't have opinions of any value and can be discounted or ignored. Why they feel compelled, or perhaps entitled, to have a valued opinion is probably also a matter of ego - akin to needing to admin that they're not perfect in order to be willing to learn.
"So long and thanks for all the fish."
I disagree. They were scraping. Scraping doesn't have any additional connotations unless attached. It may even be done with permission. Knowing that you like to argue, I've gone ahead and grabbed a citation for this:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
"So long and thanks for all the fish."
Socialists are reactionaries wanting to return to the politics of the 1930s.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
>may not apply legal terms or technological measures that LEGALLY restrict
> Is converting a digital CAD file into a Physical Object ...
No, it doesn't create a LEGAL restriction as DRM would (because of anti-circumvention laws).
> Also, is a Print a derivative work of the original design plans ... I think this might be new legal ground
Yes, it's a derivative work with the exact same relationship as sheet music has to the performance of the same, or a script for a play has to the performance thereof. The printer performs the actions scripted in the CAD file. No, nothing new here.
> unless there is an aesthetic element deemed to have purely artistic value
Which is most of them. However, that may not matter. If the object is purely functional, you're allowed to create your own copy, without permission - BUT that doesn't mean you can use their copyrighted cad file to do so. If the CAD file is protectable under copyright, the license applies to the file. It was decided many years ago that downloading a file is copying it, for copyright law. Therefore, one could argue that the the download is lawful only if the recipient agrees to the license, which requires attribution, non-commercial use in some cases, etc. So if the object produced is purely functional, you could draw up your own CAD file, or use a 3D scanner to make a CAD file for an identical object. Their CAD file may still be protectable under copyright.
Lastly, the creator only asks for attribution and a link to the license. It's not that hard. to take their work and not comply with those two conditions means JustPrint is being a total dick - even if it were technically legal, which it's not.
Now that's funny.
If you're scared of your govt then you need to further restrict its powers
Vote 3rd Party in 2016 and beyond
Funny because it's true!
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
Then why not just say COPIES!?? For fuck's sake! Because "screen scraping" doesn't mean pressing print screen, it means using scripts to get data off a screen when an interface doesn't exist...
Scraping is when you remove a portion of something you fetch. Like you can fetch a page on ebay, and scrape the price. If price has decreased x% since last check, you add it to a list.
It's called "scraping" and not "copying" because it is more similar to "scraping". Imagine a webpage as a painted piece of wood. You want just a section. So you "scrape" that section off.
The usage is a bit older than that. Older than the World Wide Web, certainly. Think green screens. Think tapping and decoding TTY signals.
I don't understand the entire artticle never mind the headline. If the guy objects to his designs being used without his permission he should have reserved copyright.. instead of assigning CC to it. Dumb. As far as people using an actual copyrighted design or whatever to sell on ebay.. lately it looks to me like ebay has been really sloppy allowing questionable items to slip by (cassette tapes in my case). Personally I don't give a rat's #$$ about if they're there or not becase I can tell the difference between professional design and printing and the sloppy amateurish jobs these "rare!! paper label unusual design" countertfeits have - but others might not, and I really hate having to slog through all these "saudi" and chinese low quality fakes just to find what I'm looking for...