― Tep (ktepi), Thursday, 24 June 2004 01:20 (nineteen years ago) link
― Kim (Kim), Thursday, 24 June 2004 01:22 (nineteen years ago) link
― Trayce (trayce), Thursday, 24 June 2004 01:23 (nineteen years ago) link
― Trayce (trayce), Thursday, 24 June 2004 01:25 (nineteen years ago) link
(J0hn leaving is a big deal, of course, if he doesn't change his mind; but I think the fact of that and the size of the thread are making people overestimate the severity of general response.)
(xpost; oh okay, sorry -- but still, you see what I mean? Mark would be a criminal genius to have been able to predict this.)
― Tep (ktepi), Thursday, 24 June 2004 01:29 (nineteen years ago) link
― Tep (ktepi), Thursday, 24 June 2004 01:30 (nineteen years ago) link
I might have something to say about the fairness of that.
― Sean Carruthers (SeanC), Thursday, 24 June 2004 01:32 (nineteen years ago) link
― Kim (Kim), Thursday, 24 June 2004 01:34 (nineteen years ago) link
― Sean Carruthers (SeanC), Thursday, 24 June 2004 01:38 (nineteen years ago) link
― Kim (Kim), Thursday, 24 June 2004 01:40 (nineteen years ago) link
― Tep (ktepi), Thursday, 24 June 2004 01:42 (nineteen years ago) link
That is so absurd.
― Andrew (enneff), Thursday, 24 June 2004 01:56 (nineteen years ago) link
― ken c (ken c), Thursday, 24 June 2004 02:00 (nineteen years ago) link
― ken c (ken c), Thursday, 24 June 2004 02:03 (nineteen years ago) link
How come? If I suddenly found that ILX was a direct reason for me getting a $1,000 excess bandwidth bill (and normal use of pix of mine doesnt worry me, I might add), I'd be shitty at that; if I was quoted in a printed copy of something no one will make money let alone profit from, it wouldnt bother me at all.
And I am a published writer. I also have works of mine online. Someone could potentially take those and make a book of it on cafepress without asking me. But I still wouldnt be pissed off - because it still says I wrote it (assuming nothings been changed, as I assume here also), and no one else is making money off my work. Net result, I get more exposure, which any writer wants.
I know thats not the point here though, but still. Anyway this has all become a bit silly.
― Trayce (trayce), Thursday, 24 June 2004 02:04 (nineteen years ago) link
To make an analogy (and I hate making analogies between the 'real world' and the internet simply because they are always both limited and misunderstood) it's a bit like this: the publishing of a web page is akin to providing a series of little packages in a storefront. Each package contains either an image, a slab of text, or layout instructions. There's one package labelled "pick me first!" which usually contains information on what's in the other packets, and how to assemble a 'front page' from a collection of image packets and text packets. Each of these packages must be taken separately and assembled by the viewer.
Complaining about image leeches is akin to this shop owner saying "Hey! You can't just buy that image packet! Sure, I'm providing it here, but you're supposed to use it in conjunction with these other packets over there!" There are 'real world' ways in which this store owner can enforce his packets are taken in specific groupings, just as there are ways image leeching can be prevented online. (it is ridiculously simple technically to prevent images from being linked from other sites, it's just most people would rather complain and whinge than try to solve the problem)
Ugh, that was rather unclear but I hope it makes my position known.
― Andrew (enneff), Thursday, 24 June 2004 02:04 (nineteen years ago) link
― RJG (RJG), Thursday, 24 June 2004 02:07 (nineteen years ago) link
― hstencil (hstencil), Thursday, 24 June 2004 02:09 (nineteen years ago) link
This book hurts no one. There is no potential for it to cause harm - it costs no poster income (as copyright infringement is designed to protect), and it doesn't increase public exposure (as everything included in the book is already public and Googlable).
Thus, bandwidth-leeching is inherently more harmful and thus worse than this book, because the former has the potential to do harm, where the latter doesn't.
Neither is something the average ILX poster needs to worry about, but saying that one is irrelevant to the other, or that image-leeching pales in comparison to this doesn't hold a lot of water.
― miloauckerman (miloauckerman), Thursday, 24 June 2004 02:12 (nineteen years ago) link
― miloauckerman (miloauckerman), Thursday, 24 June 2004 02:15 (nineteen years ago) link
Monetary damage is a visceral thing, yes. And reputational damage, among other things, is harder to prove, yes. But the latter can lead to the former.
Bandwidth-leeching can be easily controlled by your hypothetical site's owner. ILX threads published through Cafe Press cannot. The one thing to Mark's credit is that, even though he didn't ask beforehand, he at least notified ILX. What if ILX is not so lucky next time?
Anyway, clearly there's never going to be a consensus on this, and I disagree with a few things on here, but there's nothing more to be said than that, really.
― hstencil (hstencil), Thursday, 24 June 2004 02:18 (nineteen years ago) link
― VengaDan Perry (Dan Perry), Thursday, 24 June 2004 02:21 (nineteen years ago) link
If the comments were edited or altered in the book, that would be one thing. But a straight copy wouldn't raise any issues, as the words poss. causing damage to someone's reputation continue to exist at ILX.
― miloauckerman (miloauckerman), Thursday, 24 June 2004 02:24 (nineteen years ago) link
― hstencil (hstencil), Thursday, 24 June 2004 02:28 (nineteen years ago) link
A couple totally irrelevant things I'm still confused by: (a) Tep, the whole "charging for binding" thing is ridiculous; even above the fact that they don't sell blank books, I'm guessing we've both run enough profit/loss statements on print-on-demand books to know that price point leaves as much profit as any publisher. It may not be much, and who knows what percentage kicks to Mark, but it's a book for sale like anything else. (b) Reprinting those particular threads may not be likely to inflict monetary harm on anyone, but I can think of instances where the precedent certainly could: I've noticed time and again that a lot of the paid critics on ILM wind up gussying up things they've said on the forum for use in paid articles. There are also people over there whose words, based on their reputations alone, are inherently sellable, and therefore maybe worth protecting, in whatever limited way.
In any case: a whole lot of people have made the point on here that this particular book is completely meaningless and won't be bought by anyone except as a joke and so on. Which, sure, fine. The point here is one of principle, which is why I'm loving the slippery-slope pics. Throw the copyright rule out the window and I'll be the first one sitting in DaCapo's lobby with my edited-down "Selected Conversations Between Several Music Critics Whose Books You've Paid to Read Before."
― nabiscothingy, Thursday, 24 June 2004 02:34 (nineteen years ago) link
Well then no one would know, no one would buy it, and no fighting!
― Trayce (trayce), Thursday, 24 June 2004 02:41 (nineteen years ago) link
If professional critics are even vaguely considering using something as a money-making effort, they shouldn't be posting it or talking about it on a public forum to start with. The concept of stealing someone else's work wholesale has been around since, I dunno, Guttenberg. (Steve)
If you took a "selected conversations" book to a commercial publisher or stood to profit off of the content - which CafePress technically doesn't, as I read it - then you'd have to pay the "several music critics" to start with, and everyone wins.
― miloauckerman (miloauckerman), Thursday, 24 June 2004 02:41 (nineteen years ago) link
― hstencil (hstencil), Thursday, 24 June 2004 02:42 (nineteen years ago) link
14 cents per unit, I think he said; if and only if it adds up to more than $25.
It's a printing service, not a publisher. It's ridiculous to see it as anything else, independent of how you feel about Mark's using the service. Sure, they make a profit -- again, so does Kinko's, so does a Xerox machine, etc.
If you honestly can't see the difference between this and a book from a publisher ... then I really don't have any interest in putting anything after the ellipsis.
― Tep (ktepi), Thursday, 24 June 2004 02:44 (nineteen years ago) link
Jesus, Milo, you don't have to go to fucking law school to see the precedent: Milo's just republished, wholesale, in a different context, copyrighted works that people have not permitted him to take off of this server! If you allow that, you've just shattered whatever modicum of control the copyright is supposed to allow us!
― nabiscothingy, Thursday, 24 June 2004 02:47 (nineteen years ago) link
And if site-owners can be allowed, in milo's hypothetical, to use "I just didn't know any better" about their ignorance of image-link-blocking, we might as well say it's fair that site-posters can use "I just didn't know any better" about anything they post here. Obviously I'm not on the side of that.
― hstencil (hstencil), Thursday, 24 June 2004 02:47 (nineteen years ago) link
Except it's up there on the page right next to a bunch of other unrelated stuff which seems like it might possibly draw a crowd. Sure, most people probably wouldn't buy it on spec just cause it's next to a Beth Orton calendar...but you know, maybe it might happen.
― Sean Carruthers (SeanC), Thursday, 24 June 2004 02:48 (nineteen years ago) link
OTOH, I'd love to see people band together, like some of us did on a usenet group Im on, to contribute stories and poetry etc for a book we could work on and print up. Stuff written not here, not online at all - but FOR a book.
It seems there's people here with a talent for great ideas - we should use them constructively :)
― Trayce (trayce), Thursday, 24 June 2004 02:48 (nineteen years ago) link
― hstencil (hstencil), Thursday, 24 June 2004 02:51 (nineteen years ago) link
The odd superstitions touched upon were all prevalent among childrenand slaves in the West at the period of this story--that is to say,thirty or forty years ago.
Although my book is intended mainly for the entertainment of boys andgirls, I hope it will not be shunned by men and women on that account,for part of my plan has been to try to pleasantly remind adults of whatthey once were themselves, and of how they felt and thought and talked,and what queer enterprises they sometimes engaged in.
THE AUTHOR.
HARTFORD, 1876.
― Ian c=====8 (orion), Thursday, 24 June 2004 02:51 (nineteen years ago) link
― Ian c=====8 (orion), Thursday, 24 June 2004 02:52 (nineteen years ago) link
― hstencil (hstencil), Thursday, 24 June 2004 02:52 (nineteen years ago) link
― Ian c=====8 (orion), Thursday, 24 June 2004 02:53 (nineteen years ago) link
― Ian c=====8 (orion), Thursday, 24 June 2004 02:54 (nineteen years ago) link
" I'd like to see you try it."
Those are my favorite parts.
― roxymuzak (roxymuzak), Thursday, 24 June 2004 02:54 (nineteen years ago) link
― hstencil (hstencil), Thursday, 24 June 2004 02:54 (nineteen years ago) link
And Tep, I'm starting to wonder why you're even attached to this printing vs. publishing thing; what possible difference does it make, rights-wise? When the end result is a bound volume that costs $18 to buy, it makes very little difference whether it's got an ISBN on it; whether it's CafePress that does the inking or RR Donnelley, it's the same product.
I dunno, I care very little about this particular book, but I've typed a whole lot of text into this box and I very very strongly prefer that none of it goes anywhere else without my knowledge and permission.
― nabiscothingy, Thursday, 24 June 2004 02:54 (nineteen years ago) link
― Ian c=====8 (orion), Thursday, 24 June 2004 02:56 (nineteen years ago) link
Precedent was set centuries ago (when was the first set of letters published? the first posthumous diary?) and precedent for overtly commercial ventures doesn't matter.
You really have to stretch to worry about ILX posts as "copyrighted works." Which screams "I want to be upset about this but don't really have a good reason" to me.
Except it's up there on the page right next to a bunch of other unrelated stuff which seems like it might possibly draw a crowd. Sure, most people probably wouldn't buy it on spec just cause it's next to a Beth Orton calendar...but you know, maybe it might happen.As with the hypothetical "selected conversations" book (if some ILM writers were smart they'd get together, edit a half-dozen threads and sell it together - I'd actually buy one of those), if it becomes a profitable, commercial enterprise
But it wasn't, and it was never going to be.
― miloauckerman (miloauckerman), Thursday, 24 June 2004 02:57 (nineteen years ago) link
The printing v. publishing difference is key. As a publishing company, CafePress is liable for the content of the works. As a printer, it's not. They're charging Mark $17.96 per book, so they make the profit of a publisher, but legally avoid the troubles.
― miloauckerman (miloauckerman), Thursday, 24 June 2004 02:59 (nineteen years ago) link
― hstencil (hstencil), Thursday, 24 June 2004 03:01 (nineteen years ago) link