Google And Twitter Tell Appeals Court That 'Hot News' Doctrine Is Obsolete

from the and-don't-repeat-that-without-paying-up dept

Tue, Jun 22nd 2010 4:40am — Mike Masnick

It looks like Google and Twitter have decided to weigh in on the closely watched lawsuit between TheFlyOnTheWall.com and Barclays, which has helped bring back the hot news doctrine, which creates an monopoly right on news reporting. This is quite worrisome for a whole variety of reasons, and as the appeals court considers the case, Google and Twitter have filed an amicus brief worrying about the implications of allowing the hot news doctrine to stand:

"News reporting always has been a complex ecosystem, where what is 'news' is often driven by certain influential news organizations, with others republishing or broadcasting those facts -- all to the benefit of the public," the companies said in the filing.

Google and Twitter argued that upholding the district court's decision would give those who obtained the news first strong incentives to block others from obtaining the same information.

Hoping to show how silly the concept is, they argue:

"How, for example, would a court pick a time period during which facts about the recent Times Square bombing attempt would be non-reportable by others?"

While I do worry about courts when it comes to copyright cases, the "hot news" doctrine is so far out there that I'll be surprised if the courts don't put it to rest for good. It's difficult to see how anyone can defend the hot news doctrine, and I'm hopeful that the courts will recognize that it has no place in the law.

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Filed Under: copyright, facts, first amendment, hot news, reporting
Companies: barclays, google, theflyonthewall.com, twitter

22 Comments

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abc gum, 22 Jun 2010 @ 5:30am

The whole idea of exclusive right to facts is repressive and doomed to failure.
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Anonymous Coward, 22 Jun 2010 @ 6:07am

Let me see if I'm getting this correctly: the Hot News implies that you can only get one opinion (the first) on a given subject? So if a republican/democrat newspaper is the first to report the war on Iraq, no other media can report it and we only get the pro/con opinion on it? How does that make sense?
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dude, 22 Jun 2010 @ 6:25am

It makes even less sense in a world when most major news happens in front of dozens of people. People blog/twitter/etc. news events all the time. When you apply the doctrine broadly, it's completely unworkable.

If you apply it solely to independently/fully researched feature articles, then I could see some potential worth in the principle behind it but when applied to breaking news in general it doesn't make sense.
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Anonymous Coward, 22 Jun 2010 @ 6:54am

Re:
no, the hot news doctrine says 'go get the news yourself'. everyone can report on the news, but they cannot replicate stories from other sources. they cannot just republish or re-use the content of others for a period of time (seems to be one news cycle).

there is no exclusive right to facts, only exclusive rights to the work of your own reporters. what google wants is the ability to republish in seconds what gets added to a newspapers website, or gets printed in the newspaper. they dont want to hire reporters, they just want to benefit from the efforts of others.
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out_of_the_blue, 22 Jun 2010 @ 7:09am

"recognize that it has no place in the law"
If you mean in the public interest, that's not relevant even for a hope: this is a battle between competing corporations for commercial gain. Both sides of course claim their *private* interests as good for the public, but outcome will probably be determined by the interests of the *state* to keep a lid on what's really happening.
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Anonymous Coward, 22 Jun 2010 @ 7:17am

Because I will profit from it, and you put in the work to consolidate it and investigate it and report it first, and its just a copy/paste away from being mine, I should be allowed to just take your work, relabel it as mine and profit.

Douche move Google.
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Anonymous Coward, 22 Jun 2010 @ 7:25am

Re: Re:
i feel like this is an egregious affront on freedom of speech. if you report on something that happened, i should be able to tell people it happened as well, without having to find some other source other than you. moreover, i could have other insight into the event and can tell others what i know and include what you said so it could have context.

Moreover, everyone benefits from the efforts of others. That in and of itself isn't morally wrong. Also, Google never has insisted it wants to become a news reporter so you're accusation is somewhat odd. Its just worried about other various repercussions a ruling in favor of the doctrine could have. I mean, it really is a silly doctrine, especially in this day and age.
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Anonymous Coward, 22 Jun 2010 @ 7:32am

Re:
so... if i missed a baseball game and somebody who was there told me the score... i suppose i should be required to wait before i'm able to tell anybody else the score. you're reasoning makes perfect sense. screw freedom of speech. and don't say that isn't news. cause then that implies 'news' has some sort of definition. and if it does have boundaries, who decides what is considered news? who decides who is considered a reporter? probably big news conglomerates who have been known to repeatedly break this 'hot news' doctrine with regards to bloggers.

so yes, google wants to make sure that a stupid rule isn't put in place that will have a huge detrimental effect on the internet.

its a douche move to assume there should be any limitations on freedom of speech, especially with respect to reporting extremely important news that could, in extreme circumstances, go so far as being life or death.

douche move, poster.
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PaulT (profile), 22 Jun 2010 @ 7:48am

Re:
"Douche move Google."

Considering that Google are the ones who always cite their source and force you to click on the originator to see the full story, why?
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Zach Seward, 22 Jun 2010 @ 7:51am

Amicus brief
I can't seem to find this brief in PACER. Would love to read the whole thing, if anyone has it.
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Richard (profile), 22 Jun 2010 @ 10:19am

Re: Re:
there is no exclusive right to facts, only exclusive rights to the work of your own reporters.
And how pray do you determine where factual information has been obtained from?

what google wants is the ability to republish in seconds what gets added to a newspapers website, or gets printed in the newspaper. they dont want to hire reporters, they just want to benefit from the efforts of others.

No they only want to report that "XXX is reporting that..."

which is if anything helpful to XXX.

The fact is that the newspapers are simply jealous of Google's success - which they could have had themselves - if the y had been clever enough. It is simply sour grapes.
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Anonymous Coward, 22 Jun 2010 @ 10:40am

Re: Re: Re:
sorry, google doesnt do that. they dont rewrite it, they just organize it onto a pretty page, present it as their own news, and then link people off for the stories. google isnt creating content, they are living off other peoples content. if they actually had to hire people to re-write the news and make new headlines, they wouldnt be in the news business, they would let it drop. they profit from the work of others without compensation.
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Anonymous Coward, 22 Jun 2010 @ 10:41am

Re: Re:
" NL RCMP heading to Toronto for G8/G20 summit
CBC.ca - ‎37 minutes ago‎
RCMP officers from Newfoundland and Labrador will be helping law enforcement in Toronto beef up security for the G8/G20 summit. 104 officers from the province will assist in providing security this week while world leaders meet in Toronto. "

what part of this did google write? answer: none. i dont have to go read the rest of the story, they already gave me enough.
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Anonymous Coward, 22 Jun 2010 @ 10:45am

Re: Re: Re:
That's a really shallow way of reading the news.
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Anonymous Coward, 22 Jun 2010 @ 11:15am

Re: Re: Re: Re:
What, precisely, is Google presenting as their own? Examples? Google doesn't give the news, they point to it. If you can prove otherwise, prove it.
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Jeremy7600 (profile), 22 Jun 2010 @ 11:35am

Re: Re: Re:
What? The part where they identify the source totally invalidates your entire argument. I wish you had something to add here, but you don't!
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Anonymous Coward, 22 Jun 2010 @ 4:02pm

Re: Re: Re: Re:
"they dont rewrite it, they just organize it onto a pretty page, present it as their own news, and then link people off for the stories. google isnt creating content, they are living off other peoples content."

And TAM makes stuff up, as usual.
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Anonymous Coward, 22 Jun 2010 @ 4:02pm

Re: Re: Re: Re:
News sites profit from the work of Google without compensating Google. Time to pay up.
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Anonymous Coward, 22 Jun 2010 @ 4:03pm

Re: Re: Re:
If the headline and lede provides you the entire story, the failure is in the reporting.
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Richard (profile), 23 Jun 2010 @ 2:52pm

Re: Re: Re: Re:
"sorry, google doesnt do that. they dont rewrite it, they just organize it onto a pretty page, present it as their own news, and then link people off for the stories. "

The republish the headline and a brief header - so you know what the story is about - then you need to go to the originator's page to read the story itself.

They do no more than a newsagent does when he organises his display - with different types of magazines and newspapers in separate sections.

The technology enables them to do this in more detail than the newsagent can - but make no mistake - by organising the data they are adding a huge amount of value - and that is what they make their money from. They are NOT taking value from anyone else they are creating their own new value.
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Anonymous Coward, 24 Jun 2010 @ 2:11pm

Re: Re: Re: Re:
Google doesn't give away anybody's content: they point people towards the news organizations making the news. All Google's News links link back to the people reporting them. Google gives them more hits. This whole thing is absurd.
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Gareth, 28 Jun 2010 @ 9:46am

Re: Re:
Sorry to disappont you but there are plenty of limits on free speech already. The scope of this case is being misrepresented here. No-one is trying to stop the spread of news. What they are trying to prevent is work being plagiarized almost as soon as it is published by others who have invested no time or effort in it. If those creating the news item don't get any protection against copying, why would they bother investing time and money in making the news item? Simple answer: they won't. Then everyone loses out.
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