Then they put icons in your browser in your quick launch bar, your systray, your browser, your desktop, and your start menu even when you told the installation not to
Netscape does the same thing as well (at least some versions do). I distinctly remember unchecking dozens of boxes to prevent it from becoming my default html, image, etc. viewer. And then it goes ahead and makes itself the default browser anyway. Not to mention the annoying AIM popup which kindly informs you that you can have AIM just by clicking on this button here.
I know a number of people who are, or have been, telemarketers; apparently making one sale out of a hundred calls is good-to-average. It wouldn't be too far-fetched to say that one out of every hundred spam mails that's attended to
But the beauty of spam is that it costs as much for the spammer to send out a 1000 emails as it does to send out 1 email.
I think there will also be an option to have your digital COMPACTflash card processed at the chemists into glossies
There already are such services. e.g. see www.ophoto.com.
I've seen some ophoto developed pictures, taken with fairly high end digital cameras, and the result is indistinguishable (or better than) traditional film. It's only a matter of time before digital cameras replace traditional cameras for almost all applications.
. Archiving is part of Slashdot, and posters are not given a choice on whether or not their posts are archived.
I posted this earlier, but it is relevant and refutes your point:
From http://www.etext.org/Politics/Conspiracy/AJTeel/US C/17usc.txt
(On anthologies:)
"The second sentence of section 201(c), in conjunction with the provisions of section 404 dealing with copyright notice, will preserve the author's copyright in a contribution even if the contribution does not bear a separate notice in the author's name,and without requiring any unqualified transfer of rights to the owner of the collective work. This is coupled with a presumption that, unless there has been an express transfer of more, the owner of the collective work acquires, 'only the privilege of reproducing and distributing the contribution as part of that particular collective work, any revision of that collective work, and any later collective work in the same series.
...
Under the language of this clause a publishing company could reprint a contribution from one issue in a later issue of its magazine, and could reprint an article from a 1980 edition of an encyclopedia in a 1990 revision of it; the publisher could not revise the contribution itself or include it in a new anthology or an entirely different magazine or other collective work."
As Jon said, requests not to reproduce the comments were honored. So in future, if you don't want what you say in a public forum to be reproduced for charity or for anything else, then ask for it not to be.
The onus is not on the author to ask not to be reproduced. The author has a copyright by default. The onus is on the publisher to ask for permission to reproduce.
There is no blanket answer to the question that will make everyone happy.
No, there is. The poster owns the copyright to the post. Since the Berne Convention, you own a copyright to everything you write, even when a copyright statement does not appear. For something to go into public domain, the author has to place very explicit statement to that effect.
Incidently, parodies such as those done by Weird Al Yankovic don't really need permission. Parodies have long been protected by law from recrimination by the original authors. And the world is better off for it.
But nonetheless, Weird Al Yankovic thinks it important to ask for forgiveness. It's about civility. The Slashdot editors should take note.
I once read an interview with Weird Al Yankovic, where he said that he would sometimes perform parodies of popular songs without permission, then hope for forgiveness later.
But what annoys me most about how Slashdot has handled the whole affair is how incredibly self-righteous the Slashdot editors have been about it. There is no tone of apology or asking of forgiveness, such as "We used your posts without permission, we thought it was important, but we're sorry about it."
Instead, what we have is a big brotherly, condescending, holier than thou attitude. To paraphrase: "We know they would have wanted their comments in the book"
or "the few (loud) people for whom this is a major stumbling block should most certainly be allowed to determine the destiny of their own words" (translation: you whiners, you should be ashamed of yourselves)
or "it's a public forum. We can quote you without asking."
I don't think anyone here would seriously object to having their posts appear in a book. But what we want is to be asked first. It's a simple principle really, and goes a long way towards showing regard for you readers.
If asking isn't possible, then do as Weird Al Yankovic does, and ask for forgiveness. The condescending and righteous attitude displayed by the editors is disgusting.
I see nothing in there that supports Slashdot. In fact, it even says this about anthologies:
The second sentence of section 201(c), in conjunction with the provisions of section 404 dealing with copyright notice, will preserve the author's copyright in a contribution even if the contribution does not bear a separate notice in the author's name,and without requiring any unqualified transfer of rights to the owner of the collective work. This is coupled with a presumption that, unless there has been an express transfer of more, the owner of the collective work acquires, 'only the privilege of reproducing and distributing the contribution as part of that particular collective work, any revision of that collective work, and any later collective work in the same series.
...
Under the language of this clause a publishing company could reprint a contribution from one issue in a later issue of its magazine, and could reprint an article from a 1980 edition of an encyclopedia in a 1990 revision of it; the publisher could not revise the contribution itself or include it in a new anthology or an entirely different magazine or other collective work.
We thought about posting something before - but frankly, it's gone so damn fast
Frankly I find that difficult to believe. Slashdot posts tens of articles a day (many of them inane), but there wasn't time in the 2 months you've been working on this to post a simple article to/.? Especially on an issue as important as this (unless you think respecting your readers isn't important)?
I don't want to disparage your efforts, or indulge in conspiracy theories, but I think there's something seriously wrong with the way this affair has been handled.
I looked at the link you posted but I cannot find anything related to the present discussion. Perhaps you can be more specific and quote the relevant portion here?
Certainly limited quotation is fair use, but I don't see anything specifically relating to public forums there.
Slashdot. Where we hate intellectual property laws, but when someone takes ONE SENTENCE of our stuff, we scream bloody murder.
I can't speak for other Slashdotters, but personally, I'm a strong supporter of the principle of (although not necessarily the implementation of) intellectual property.
Limited quoting is fine. Wholesale reproduction without permission is not.
Actually nowhere when you post do you say that you are giving Slashdot permission to publish your post.
The act of submitting my post to Slashdot, with the understanding that it will appear on Slashdot, is equivalent to my giving permission to Slashdot to publish my post in that particular forum. What I have not given is permission to resell my posts in a book.
There is a fundemental difference between an article written by someone and published by Slashdot, and a comment displayed by Slashdot. In the former Slashdot is buying rights to display the article (buying may not involve monetary exchange though.)
I don't see the distinction. Jon Katz's articles in particular can be seen as the starting point of the discussion, essentially, the first post in the forum.
They are in no way agreeing to any conditions other then you still own the content of it.
If I still own the content of it, then my permission is required before it can be republished.
And since it is a public discussion forum, and called a comment, someone can probably quote your entire comment from it without having to reimburse you.
You could quote my entire comment in the forum, since it is assumed that the poster understands the nature of a forum. You could quote parts of my comment and resell it in a book. That's fair use. But you could not reproduce the entire content of my comment and resell it in a book.
e.g. Consider a book of publicly given speeches or lectures. No sane publisher would try to publish this without first obtaining permission from the speakers. Even if it were legal (I doubt so; the speaker could probably sue and win), it would be highly immoral.
Another example Technocrat.net states clearly on its posting forms that "By submitting this message, you grant TECHNOCRAT.NET and its owners a separate and independent copyright to your posting, and you retain your own copyright. Thus, we can do whatever we want with your posting, and so can you." Slashdot does not have such a statement on its comment posting form; I do not give similar permission when I write a comment on Slashdot.
Posts in a public forum can be quoted - and consider how little is quoted per quote, it falls under acceptable use.
If that's the case, I agree, it's alright if it's just quoting. I was under the impression that some posts were quoted wholesale. So no comments had substantial amounts reproduced?
I'd also like to find out, why didn't Slashdot post an article earlier telling us that Slashdot intended to publish a book containing substantial amounts of reader comments? If there was any interest consulting the readership and obtaining author permission, this would have been the obvious step to take.
As it is, the whole thing seems to have been kept under wraps until the last moment, where it would be too late to make any changes.
As the other poster pointed out, quoting isn't the same as wholesale copying and republishing.
The fact that they even tried is admirable, considering that they have absolutly NO legal obligation to do so.
He doesn't sound like he tried very hard. He basically made a few attempts, then gave up. At the least, he should have made a good faith attempt to contact every poster whose comment appears in the book.
Or Slashdot could have posted an article, asking what the Slashdot readership thought of having their posts republished. Instead, out of the blue, CmdrTaco tells us "Guess what! We're going to publish and sell your comments! Make sure you buy a copy!"
But as a matter of law, comments posting in public for public dissemination can be reprinted, since they were posted for public discussion.
I don't think this is the case here. When I post on Slashdot, I'm giving permission to Slashdot to publish my post on Slashdot, in the particular forum where I submitted my post to, and nowhere else. Would it be alright if I took your Slashdot articles, bound them into a book, and sold them? I don't think so.
Furthermore, Slashdot clearly indicates that "comments are owned by the poster" -- this clearly implies that in posting to Slashdot, I understand, and Slashdot understands, that I retain all rights to my post.
Posters take note, the bottomline is this: Slashdot will republish and resell your posts without asking for your permission.
people are not identified by e-mail or name, so their privacy is protected
Have you considered that some posters will want to be credited for what they wrote? I certainly would.
non-profit book, so there is no question of anybody's getting money.
The fact that it's non-profit is irrelevant. I can't take someone else's work and republish it, even if I don't make anything from it.
For those who posted in a public forum, they were not consulted. We had considered tracking down people, but my inital test run of trying to track down people went so terribly, we gave up. You'd be amazed how many people change e-mail addresses in a year.
This sounds like blatant copyright infringement. Slashdot clearly says that "Comments are owned by the poster". If you couldn't contact the author, then maybe the comment shouldn't have been included in the book.
The amount of time that would have added to things would have made the book impossible.
So you don't ask the author for permission, and you don't pay them, simply because it's inconvenient? Don't mind me, but that sounds like a very convenient excuse.
As far as funds collected at this time, Katz is not taking money, I'm not taking any - we have to pay for the cost of making the book and the editor, but besides that, nada.
At $15 a copy, much higher than the cost of a regular paperback, you say that none of you are making any money?
It will be better at web-FTP than IE5 for windows, which was the MOST IRRITATING thing I have ever seen. (it turned it into a file folder, but drag and drop didn't work, so you needed to Right Click, Copy To Folder, then do some GODFORSAKEN SHIT to get it to save... that option went off REAL FAST)
All you have to do is double click on the file and it'll ask you whether you want to download the file. Counter-intuitive, but not as bad as you made it out to be.
- Boycott Amazon.com!.. oops,we're still an Amazon partner. - Open source, open source, open source.. oops, no Slashdot source code - Linux IPO frenzy and rah rahing.. oops, we're not reporting on their precipitous decline.
All these were corrected eventually, but not until after much reader ranting and sour words from Cmdr. Taco. If you really want gifs removed from/., you'd better start emailing, trolling, and generally complaining. That's really the only way to get anyone's attention.
After being bored and insulted with/required/ remedial writing classes, despite my 800 in the Language section of the SAT and my attendence of AP English as a sophomore (apparently they thought that since I skipped my last year of HS I must be an illiteral moron)
Are you refering to the John S. Knight Freshman writing seminar? That's considerably more than a "remedial writing class" -- it exposes you to writing in different fields of study, like philosophy, government, literature, etc.
And to put it bluntly, from the writing ability you displayed in your post, your writing really isn't that wonderful.
Slashdot Mirror
I sincerely hope that junkscience.com does an expose on this one and debunks it quick!
Yup, debunk it quick. Then we can go back to our regularly scheduled polluting.
====
Then they put icons in your browser in your quick launch bar, your systray, your browser, your desktop, and your start menu even when you told the installation not to
Netscape does the same thing as well (at least some versions do). I distinctly remember unchecking dozens of boxes to prevent it from becoming my default html, image, etc. viewer. And then it goes ahead and makes itself the default browser anyway. Not to mention the annoying AIM popup which kindly informs you that you can have AIM just by clicking on this button here.
====
I know a number of people who are, or have been, telemarketers; apparently making one sale out of a hundred calls is good-to-average. It wouldn't be too far-fetched to say that one out of every hundred spam mails that's attended to
But the beauty of spam is that it costs as much for the spammer to send out a 1000 emails as it does to send out 1 email.
====
PDF, for all its faults, is at least searchable
Not much good when PDFs are practically unreadable online.
====
I think there will also be an option to have your digital COMPACTflash card processed at the chemists into glossies
There already are such services. e.g. see www.ophoto.com.
I've seen some ophoto developed pictures, taken with fairly high end digital cameras, and the result is indistinguishable (or better than) traditional film. It's only a matter of time before digital cameras replace traditional cameras for almost all applications.
====
His remarks about performing first and hoping for forgivness later was for live performances. He always does ask for permission for recordings.
====
. Archiving is part of Slashdot, and posters are not given a choice on whether or not their posts are archived.
S C/17usc.txt
,and without requiring any unqualified transfer of rights to the owner of the collective work. This is coupled with a presumption that, unless there has been an express transfer of more, the owner of the collective work acquires, 'only the privilege of reproducing and distributing the contribution as part of that particular collective work, any revision of that collective work, and any later collective work in the same series.
I posted this earlier, but it is relevant and refutes your point:
From http://www.etext.org/Politics/Conspiracy/AJTeel/U
(On anthologies:)
"The second sentence of section 201(c), in conjunction with the provisions of section 404 dealing with copyright notice, will preserve the author's copyright in a contribution even if the contribution does not bear a separate notice in the author's name
...
Under the language of this clause a publishing company could reprint a contribution from one issue in a later issue of its magazine, and could reprint an article from a 1980 edition of an encyclopedia in a 1990 revision of it; the publisher could not revise the contribution itself or include it in a new anthology or an entirely different magazine or other collective work."
As Jon said, requests not to reproduce the comments were honored. So in future, if you don't want what you say in a public forum to be reproduced for charity or for anything else, then ask for it not to be.
The onus is not on the author to ask not to be reproduced. The author has a copyright by default. The onus is on the publisher to ask for permission to reproduce.
====
There is no blanket answer to the question that will make everyone happy.
No, there is. The poster owns the copyright to the post. Since the Berne Convention, you own a copyright to everything you write, even when a copyright statement does not appear. For something to go into public domain, the author has to place very explicit statement to that effect.
====
Incidently, parodies such as those done by Weird Al Yankovic don't really need permission. Parodies have long been protected by law from recrimination by the original authors. And the world is better off for it.
But nonetheless, Weird Al Yankovic thinks it important to ask for forgiveness. It's about civility. The Slashdot editors should take note.
====
I once read an interview with Weird Al Yankovic, where he said that he would sometimes perform parodies of popular songs without permission, then hope for forgiveness later.
But what annoys me most about how Slashdot has handled the whole affair is how incredibly self-righteous the Slashdot editors have been about it. There is no tone of apology or asking of forgiveness, such as "We used your posts without permission, we thought it was important, but we're sorry about it."
Instead, what we have is a big brotherly, condescending, holier than thou attitude. To paraphrase: "We know they would have wanted their comments in the book"
or "the few (loud) people for whom this is a major stumbling block should most certainly be allowed to determine the destiny of their own words" (translation: you whiners, you should be ashamed of yourselves)
or "it's a public forum. We can quote you without asking."
I don't think anyone here would seriously object to having their posts appear in a book. But what we want is to be asked first. It's a simple principle really, and goes a long way towards showing regard for you readers.
If asking isn't possible, then do as Weird Al Yankovic does, and ask for forgiveness. The condescending and righteous attitude displayed by the editors is disgusting.
====
I see nothing in there that supports Slashdot. In fact, it even says this about anthologies:
,and without requiring any unqualified transfer of rights to the owner of the collective work. This is coupled with a presumption that, unless there has been an express transfer of more, the owner of the collective work acquires, 'only the privilege of reproducing and distributing the contribution as part of that particular collective work, any revision of that collective work, and any later collective work in the same series.
The second sentence of section 201(c), in conjunction with the provisions of section 404 dealing with copyright notice, will preserve the author's copyright in a contribution even if the contribution does not bear a separate notice in the author's name
...
Under the language of this clause a publishing company could reprint a contribution from one issue in a later issue of its magazine, and could reprint an article from a 1980 edition of an encyclopedia in a 1990 revision of it; the publisher could not revise the contribution itself or include it in a new anthology or an entirely different magazine or other collective work.
====
We thought about posting something before - but frankly, it's gone so damn fast
/.? Especially on an issue as important as this (unless you think respecting your readers isn't important)?
Frankly I find that difficult to believe. Slashdot posts tens of articles a day (many of them inane), but there wasn't time in the 2 months you've been working on this to post a simple article to
I don't want to disparage your efforts, or indulge in conspiracy theories, but I think there's something seriously wrong with the way this affair has been handled.
====
I looked at the link you posted but I cannot find anything related to the present discussion. Perhaps you can be more specific and quote the relevant portion here?
Certainly limited quotation is fair use, but I don't see anything specifically relating to public forums there.
====
The joke answer will be "Hemos". And Hemos will keep everything.
====
Slashdot. Where we hate intellectual property laws, but when someone takes ONE SENTENCE of our stuff, we scream bloody murder.
I can't speak for other Slashdotters, but personally, I'm a strong supporter of the principle of (although not necessarily the implementation of) intellectual property.
Limited quoting is fine. Wholesale reproduction without permission is not.
====
Actually nowhere when you post do you say that you are giving Slashdot permission to publish your post.
The act of submitting my post to Slashdot, with the understanding that it will appear on Slashdot, is equivalent to my giving permission to Slashdot to publish my post in that particular forum. What I have not given is permission to resell my posts in a book.
There is a fundemental difference between an article written by someone and published by Slashdot, and a comment displayed by Slashdot. In the former Slashdot is buying rights to display the article (buying may not involve monetary exchange though.)
I don't see the distinction. Jon Katz's articles in particular can be seen as the starting point of the discussion, essentially, the first post in the forum.
They are in no way agreeing to any conditions other then you still own the content of it.
If I still own the content of it, then my permission is required before it can be republished.
And since it is a public discussion forum, and called a comment, someone can probably quote your entire comment from it without having to reimburse you.
You could quote my entire comment in the forum, since it is assumed that the poster understands the nature of a forum. You could quote parts of my comment and resell it in a book. That's fair use. But you could not reproduce the entire content of my comment and resell it in a book.
e.g. Consider a book of publicly given speeches or lectures. No sane publisher would try to publish this without first obtaining permission from the speakers. Even if it were legal (I doubt so; the speaker could probably sue and win), it would be highly immoral.
Another example Technocrat.net states clearly on its posting forms that "By submitting this message, you grant TECHNOCRAT.NET and its owners a separate and independent copyright to your posting, and you retain your own copyright. Thus, we can do whatever we want with your posting, and so can you." Slashdot does not have such a statement on its comment posting form; I do not give similar permission when I write a comment on Slashdot.
====
Posts in a public forum can be quoted - and consider how little is quoted per quote, it falls under acceptable use.
If that's the case, I agree, it's alright if it's just quoting. I was under the impression that some posts were quoted wholesale. So no comments had substantial amounts reproduced?
I'd also like to find out, why didn't Slashdot post an article earlier telling us that Slashdot intended to publish a book containing substantial amounts of reader comments? If there was any interest consulting the readership and obtaining author permission, this would have been the obvious step to take.
As it is, the whole thing seems to have been kept under wraps until the last moment, where it would be too late to make any changes.
====
As the other poster pointed out, quoting isn't the same as wholesale copying and republishing.
The fact that they even tried is admirable, considering that they have absolutly NO legal obligation to do so.
He doesn't sound like he tried very hard. He basically made a few attempts, then gave up. At the least, he should have made a good faith attempt to contact every poster whose comment appears in the book.
Or Slashdot could have posted an article, asking what the Slashdot readership thought of having their posts republished. Instead, out of the blue, CmdrTaco tells us "Guess what! We're going to publish and sell your comments! Make sure you buy a copy!"
====
But as a matter of law, comments posting in public for public dissemination can be reprinted, since they were posted for public discussion.
I don't think this is the case here. When I post on Slashdot, I'm giving permission to Slashdot to publish my post on Slashdot, in the particular forum where I submitted my post to, and nowhere else. Would it be alright if I took your Slashdot articles, bound them into a book, and sold them? I don't think so.
Furthermore, Slashdot clearly indicates that "comments are owned by the poster" -- this clearly implies that in posting to Slashdot, I understand, and Slashdot understands, that I retain all rights to my post.
Posters take note, the bottomline is this: Slashdot will republish and resell your posts without asking for your permission.
people are not identified by e-mail or name, so their privacy is protected
Have you considered that some posters will want to be credited for what they wrote? I certainly would.
non-profit book, so there is no question of anybody's getting money.
The fact that it's non-profit is irrelevant. I can't take someone else's work and republish it, even if I don't make anything from it.
====
Some questions:
For those who posted in a public forum, they were not consulted. We had considered tracking down people, but my inital test run of trying to track down people went so terribly, we gave up. You'd be amazed how many people change e-mail addresses in a year.
This sounds like blatant copyright infringement. Slashdot clearly says that "Comments are owned by the poster". If you couldn't contact the author, then maybe the comment shouldn't have been included in the book.
The amount of time that would have added to things would have made the book impossible.
So you don't ask the author for permission, and you don't pay them, simply because it's inconvenient? Don't mind me, but that sounds like a very convenient excuse.
As far as funds collected at this time, Katz is not taking money, I'm not taking any - we have to pay for the cost of making the book and the editor, but besides that, nada.
At $15 a copy, much higher than the cost of a regular paperback, you say that none of you are making any money?
====
It will be better at web-FTP than IE5 for windows, which was the MOST IRRITATING thing I have ever seen. (it turned it into a file folder, but drag and drop didn't work, so you needed to Right Click, Copy To Folder, then do some GODFORSAKEN SHIT to get it to save... that option went off REAL FAST)
All you have to do is double click on the file and it'll ask you whether you want to download the file. Counter-intuitive, but not as bad as you made it out to be.
====
How well do these things work compared to the Palm? I couldn't find any mention of battery life on the website either.
====
Slashdot has a history of being hypocritical:
.. oops,we're still an Amazon partner. .. oops, no Slashdot source code .. oops, we're not reporting on their precipitous decline.
/., you'd better start emailing, trolling, and generally complaining. That's really the only way to get anyone's attention.
- Boycott Amazon.com!
- Open source, open source, open source
- Linux IPO frenzy and rah rahing
All these were corrected eventually, but not until after much reader ranting and sour words from Cmdr. Taco. If you really want gifs removed from
====
Oh come on, that's bloody egoistical don't you think? You expect them to create an entry for, and index the homepage of every person who asks?
that the attitude (and relevance) of my treatment is endemic to how they treat everyone.
How so? If you're going to make claims like that, you'll have to provide a better example than them refusing to index your home page.
====
(Some defense of Cornell is in order here:)
/required/ remedial writing classes, despite my 800 in the Language section of the SAT and my attendence of AP English as a sophomore (apparently they thought that since I skipped my last year of HS I must be an illiteral moron)
After being bored and insulted with
Are you refering to the John S. Knight Freshman writing seminar? That's considerably more than a "remedial writing class" -- it exposes you to writing in different fields of study, like philosophy, government, literature, etc.
And to put it bluntly, from the writing ability you displayed in your post, your writing really isn't that wonderful.
====