Are Anonymous Comments Evil?

from the hell-no dept

This sort of debate comes up every so often among folks who run news/commentary sites, and it seems to have boiled over again recently, as a bunch of newspapers/blogging folks got into a nice little discussion on the goodness or evilness of anonymous comments. Not surprisingly, I side with Mathew Ingram on this one. Since we began, we've always allowed anonymous comments, and, for the most part, find that we've benefited tremendously from allowing that sort of level of speech.

Does this mean we prefer people comment anonymously? Not at all. In fact, we try to encourage people to identify themselves in some manner, but we generally do so by providing greater and greater benefits for those who have verified accounts (with a lot more on the way). However, we recognize that there are times when there are benefits to having people comment anonymously, and we see no reason to take away those benefits.

Does this mean that people don't abuse this privilege? Again, not at all. However, it is actually quite rare that anonymous commenters abuse their ability to be anonymous. It does happen at times, and, in our opinion, there are ways to deal with this that don't involve banning anonymous commenters at all. Some of these methods we have not implemented yet, but we're working hard on them (and, yes, this blog post will hopefully act as a push to those doing the coding...).

Techdirt gets an awful lot of comments, and we've been at this for a long time. We've seen no evidence that anonymous comments, by themselves, are a problem. You can have an occasional annoying commenter at times, but on the whole, the quality of the discussions we see in the comments here is much better than on many other sites that do not allow anonymous comments, and seem to stall out with just a few comments on each story (even on sites that get a lot more traffic than us).

There is a bit of a balancing act that needs to go on. At times, people start demanding we moderate comments (when a particularly annoying commenter hijacks a thread, for example), but then, when a legitimate commenter accidentally gets his or her comment caught in our spam filter, suddenly they get angry and ask "how dare you moderate comments!" Of course, as we explain, if you have a legitimate comment and it gets caught, we free it up within a few hours. If your comment is blatant spam, however, it gets deleted -- and at times, we have noted that "pure trolling" is spam (i.e., comments that don't advertise anything commercial, but are so far off-topic that they are designed solely to send the discussion off-topic). We will never block commenters just because you disagree, however, no matter how wrong you might be or are anonymous. We did have an issue for a while, where our UI confused some commenters into submitting totally blank comments (which automatically get held as spam) because two submit buttons could be seen, and some people clicked the wrong one -- but we recently fixed the comment UI to solve this. Unfortunately, this did confuse some people, including some people who accused us of moderating legit comments, and we apologize for that UI confusion.

On the whole, we have a pretty great community of folks around here -- including those of you who I regularly disagree with. It makes for a fun conversation. Sure, every so often, an immature person tries to cause trouble, but those are few and far between, and it's not because they're anonymous, but because they're jerks. The vast majority of our anonymous commenters (even those we disagree with) add value to the conversation, and blocking them completely seems counterproductive.

Filed Under: anonymity, blogs, comments, news, websites

Williams Sonoma Nastygrams Blogger Who Helps People Build Their Own Furniture

from the furniture-pirates? dept

Brad Hubbard writes "I regularly read a blog called "Knock Off Wood" -- a site where a woman teaches readers how to build various designer-looking pieces of furniture at home for a lot less. It's the best kind of "maker" site - someone who is passionate about crafting, freely sharing their passion with a community of readers and everyone learns a little something. So when Williams Sonoma, Inc (owner of Pottery Barn and West Elm among others) sent them a legal nastygram, the owner of the site was entertained more than anything."

The company is alleging both trademark and copyright violations -- though it's difficult to see either one holding up. Unfortunately the woman who runs the site decided it was easier to just cave in, but that's unfortunate. Doing so encourages more bullying. The trademark claims are ridiculous. They say that by mentioning specific product names, she's implying that "the website is somehow affiliated" with WSI. But, of course, any moron in a hurry knows that's not true. The whole site clearly states it's about making knock-off furniture. No one is going to go to this site and think it's actually affiliated with WSI, or any of the other brand name furniture companies.

The copyright claim is equally questionable. At issue is that she's using the copyrighted images of WSI's furniture as part of the blog posts about how to make that type of furniture. But that seems like it should be a clear cut case of fair use. If you run through the four factors of fair use, it's hard to see how this is infringement:

1. the purpose and character of your use
   
   The question here is if the use is somehow transformative or being used to build something new. But one of the questions usually asked in judging this factor is: "Was value added to the original by creating new information, new aesthetics, new insights and understandings?" It seems like an entire blog post around how to build that kind of furniture certainly qualifies. This one is in favor of fair use.
   
   
2. the nature of the copyrighted work
   
   Well, they're photographs, but they were used in catalogs and such, not for sale. So that would seem to, again, lend to a fair use ruling. The original purpose of the photos was that they were to be seen widely.
   
   
3. the amount and substantiality of the portion taken
   
   Indeed, it sounds like the "entire" photo was used, so you might be able to weigh this factor against fair use, but not necessarily. As we've seen in multiple lawsuits, even if you're using the entirety of the work, it can be considered fair use if the purpose is so completely different from the original -- which, in this case, is definitely true.
   
   
4. the effect of the use upon the potential market.
   
   Now, some might argue that the use here might harm the market for WSI furniture since it's teaching people how to build their own, but that shouldn't apply here. The test is for the potential market of the copyrighted work. That is, this factor should not take into account the impact on the market for the furniture itself, but just on the market for the photographs. And it's difficult to see any harm done here at all.

So going through all of that, it's difficult to see how this isn't a clear cut fair use case. Unfortunately, as mentioned, the woman didn't want to fight the legal battle and agreed to just take down the images and mentions of WSI. However, she is amused that a housewife in Alaska has brought out the legal attack dogs of a giant retailer.

Filed Under: blogs, copyright, furniture, knockoffs, makers, trademark
Companies: williams sonoma

How Much Money Can You Make For Others, Rather Than Yourself?

from the it's-not-all-about-me dept

Andrew Dubber points us to an interesting post by musician Steve Lawson, where he talks about how he usually uses his blog and other social media accounts to write about others' music rather than always talking about his own, noting that he can probably help others make more money than he can make for himself. And there's a reason for that: if you're posting about something you love that you think is awesome, people take it seriously. If you're posting about yourself as being awesome, people think you're an egomaniac.

This is a really good way of thinking about things -- and highlights an issue that goes way beyond just music. It's why so many corporate blogs suck. Because they just talk about their own company, and appear to be propaganda. But it also highlights another important point: the value of passed links. We've noted in the past that when people pass around links (or music or books or whatever) it's the person who's doing the passing whose reputation is at stake. And, because of that, we tend to trust people passing links to others much more than people just promoting their own stuff. And this doesn't need to be reciprocal. Steve notes that he just blogs about music he likes -- and sometimes he hears from the musicians saying it resulted in a spike in earnings somehow, and that's great.

To some extent, this also explains some of our position on things like ad blockers. Sites telling visitors who use ad blockers that they're not welcome are shoving aside visitors who very well may pass on a link that has tremendous value. The viewpoint held by sites like that seems to undervalue passed links, believing the only true value is in the immediate and direct ad impression. But when you focus on just letting people experience whatever cool stuff you're creating, some of them will pass it on to others, and that "vote" in your favor may be incredibly valuable.

So, while Steve focuses on the point of helping others make more money, if you're doing cool stuff, it's worth remembering that a lot of that stuff comes back around (in even more valuable ways). One of the problems we see with so many anti-consumer businesses is that they feel the need to directly monetize every user/visitor/listener, rather than recognizing that the mislabeled "freeloaders" can pay it back in ways that greatly outweigh any sort of direct payment opportunity.

Filed Under: blogs, music industry

Horror Blogger Threatened With Defamation And Copyright Lawsuits After Writing An Open Letter To Horror Magazine

from the now-that's-horrifying dept

It's amazing how some people seem to think that basic criticism is defamatory. We recently wrote about how the editor of a journal that published a review of a legal book is now facing a defamation lawsuit in France, even though the book review was just a typical book review (and only slightly negative). Now, Robert Ring points us to the news of a "horror" blogger who wrote a somewhat critical "open letter" to the horror magazine Gorezone, complaining about the apparent grammar and spelling problems in the magazine combined with what the blogger felt was rather sexist content. Frankly, the open letter isn't even that critical. It's one blogger's opinion with some constructive criticism.

In response, however, after the blogger's comments were flooded with angry responses (allegedly a bunch all came from the same IP address, which is connected with Gorezone), Gorezone threatened legal action for both defamation and copyright infringement. Apparently, this would be in the UK, where (as we know all too well) defamation laws are pretty ridiculous. Even so, it's difficult to see how anything in the original post is libelous. As for the copyright infringement, the blogger had used (but has since taken down) an image of a recent cover of Gorezone to prove his point. It's difficult to see how this would be considered infringement as well, as the blog post was clearly commenting on the image, and certainly wasn't competing with Gorezone. Of course, again, this is UK law, but there is the concept of fair use/fair dealing in the UK, and it's difficult to see how this wouldn't be covered.

As the link above suggests, this sounds like a SLAPP situation, where the magazine doesn't like the criticism it's received, and its response is to threaten the blogger to try to bully him into taking down the content. We see this all too often, and it's why the world needs more anti-SLAPP protections and laws.

Filed Under: blogs, copyright, defamation, horror, reviews
Companies: gorezine

If A Blogger Links To The New Paywalled NY Times, And It Leads To A Subscription, Will The NYT Pay The Blogger?

from the questions,-questions... dept

Felix Salmon wrote up a blog post recently that details just how amazingly confused the NY Times appears to be about its new plan for a paywall. Apparently, the paywall will even include the NYTimes' blog sites -- which even the WSJ tends to keep outside of its paywall. As Salmon notes, this could drive some of the NYT's more popular bloggers to go elsewhere. But where it gets really confusing is that the NYT's execs seem to go back and forth over whether or not links into NYT articles from other sites (such as blogs) will count against the "quota" that leads to the paywall. Sometimes they say it won't count, except when they say it will count. Basically, it sounds like they don't know, but they're so afraid of people sneaking in that there will be at least some limit.

But this leads to a rather fascinating question that one of Salmon's readers asks in the comments (unfortunately, it looks like Reuters doesn't let you link directly to comments): if a blog post drives traffic to the NY Times, and that counts against the quota of "free" articles, leading users to eventually sign up for the paywall, will the blogger get a cut of the paywall fee? After all, isn't part of the argument from newspapers upset with aggregators that they're getting some sort of "free ride"? Wouldn't the same apply in reverse? If newspapers, such as the NY Times, are getting direct revenue from an action initiated by a blogger, then by the newspapers' own convoluted logic, don't those newspapers owe money to the bloggers?

Filed Under: blogs, paywalls
Companies: nytimes

Tech Journalist Recommends Suing Google Over Spam Blogs?

from the uh,-tom,-what? dept

I like reporter Tom Foremski and have linked to his stories in the past. I've never met the man, but we've emailed a few times in the past. But everyone has those days when they write something they clearly haven't thought much about, and it looks like Tom had one of those days recently. Dark Helmet alerts us to a short blog post that Foremski did for ZDNet that is all kinds of awful. The main focus is on suggesting that you turn in colleagues using unauthorized software to the SIIA to try to claim a $1 million prize. This is a really sleazy process used by the SIIA and the BSA for years. Perhaps you can forgive Tom for not knowing much about how these organizations work, but plenty of other reporters have detailed how these organizations bully companies who can't figure out how to produce the exact evidence that these organizations demand as "proof." These organizations are just nasty, often harming small businesses just because they can't find their specific licensing agreement on a legitimately purchased software application. Encouraging this kind of behavior is not a good idea, Tom.

And, of course, that claim that there's a "$1 million prize" is great for headlines, like the one Tom wrote, but the details always tell a different story. The real "prizes" are "up to $1 million." A few years back, we asked for proof that the BSA actually paid out a million dollar prize, and offered a similarly termed "up to $1 million" reward for anyone who could prove that the BSA paid someone $1 million. Of course, they couldn't, because these groups don't actually pay that much. In fact, in the year after we asked for proof of the $1 million prize, the BSA actually paid out a grand total of $136,000 to 42 different people -- an average of about $3,200. Putting the $1 million prize in the headline is playing into their bogus claims. It's the sort of thing that reporters shouldn't be doing. Let them put out their bogus press releases, but reporters should be debunking them.

Finally, in trying to explain why this is a good idea, Tom makes an odd and totally misapplied analogy:

I know that ZDNet for example, faces problems with its content being scraped and illegally being used on web sites that try to make money by running Google ads next to it. It's often difficult to stop that practice because it's tough to track down the owners.

But if SIIA went after Google, because it profits from illegal use of copyrighted content, then that would go a long way to stamping out that practice.

First off, we face the same "problem" here at Techdirt, with lots of sites scraping our content and putting it on other sites plastered with Google ads. Except, that we know it's not actually a "problem." Most of those sites get very little, if any, traffic, and search engines are smart enough these days to put the originator higher up in the results. The ad views on these sites aren't costing the original site any revenue. And, if they actually are getting any traffic, it doesn't take long for people to realize the original source and start going there instead. This isn't a "problem."

Second, what the hell does scraping sites have to do with turning your colleagues in for using unlicensed software? The two are totally different situations and have nothing to do with each other.

Finally, if SIIA went after Google because it profits from illegal use of copyrighted content, the lawsuit would be thrown out of court as soon as Google's lawyers said "DMCA safe harbors." This is pretty basic stuff, and someone who's been a tech reporter for as long as Foremski should know better than to think that it's either legal or sensible to suggest that an organization sue a third party that profits off of the potentially infringing activity of someone else. As Dark Helmet noted with his submission:

This is 3rd party culpability, which is odd coming from a blogger and journalist. Has he ever ran a story about something illegal that was done? And did that publication have advertisements on it? So didn't he profit from the illegal activity? Shouldn't he have the FBI going after him for such illicit behavior?"

Again, Tom usually does pretty good work, so I'm going to chalk this up to a rushed post without putting much thought into what he was saying.

Filed Under: blogs, copying, copyright, software, spam
Companies: google, siia

Is There Any Way To Be A Music Blogger Without Risking Takedown?

from the not-really dept

Last week, we wrote twice about the Google music blog mess, which caused many people to falsely attack Google for its policies in dealing with takedown notices. While it is true that Google could do a better job in communicating and potentially in fighting for its users, the real problems are that the DMCA makes this very difficult for Google (and potentially very risky) and the big recording industry lawyers seem totally disconnected from what the same label marketing folks are doing.

Now, the EFF has weighed in to look at whether or not it's even possible for any music blogger to avoid this sort of scenario and has concluded that the answer is basically no, it's not. Many music bloggers jumped ship to other hosting firms, but as we noted in our original discussion on the topic, those other hosts will face the same exact issue when they start receiving takedown notices, and may be even less receptive to sticking up for music bloggers or less helpful in explaining to them how to file counternotices.

The EFF does shed some light on one interesting aspect of all of this. Many of the takedowns were filed by the IFPI, who seems to claim that the takedown notices are not technically DMCA takedowns since the IFPI is not a US-based organization, and thus, it doesn't need to follow the DMCA's rules (such as specifically designating which files are infringing):

Ordinarily, the party issueing the takedown notice would be required by US copyright law to specify which content is being accused. But, as an international organization headquartered in London, IFPI is arguing that it doesn't even need to play by the USA's rules. "We neither admit nor accept," they write, "...that Google is entitled to be served a notice in compliance with the DMCA." Translation: IFPI is essentially threatening to sue Google under some unspecified foreign law -- presumably one which lacks even the modest safe-harbor provisions available in the USA. It's no wonder Google felt the need to take drastic action to avoid liability, even at the expense of the resulting headaches and bad press.

While, yes, I can understand why Google might want to avoid yet another lawsuit in some foreign country (it's already dealing with a bunch of those), you would think that the company might be better off responding with a simple: "we are based in the US, the content you are complaining about is hosted on US servers, we abide by US law, and unless you follow the DMCA's rules for an official takedown notice, we will not be taking down the content."

Either way, the bigger (and more important) point is that pretty much anyone who blogs about music may face this sort of situation at some point or another -- even if you have explicit permission to post those tracks. The process that the IFPI, RIAA and others go through to demand takedowns is so automated and so disconnected from any marketing people (or common sense around marketing) that lots of people will receive them even though they should not. At some point, perhaps, the labels will recognize this is a mess of their own making, but it seems like we're still a long way from that day.

Filed Under: blogs, copyright, dmca, music blogging, takedowns

CBC: When We Said Blogs Would Need Permission To Quote Us, We Didn't Really Mean It

from the yeah-that's-clear dept

Late last week, a bunch of folks sent in stories about how the CBC up in Canada had new licensing terms for its content that suggested rather draconian (and ridiculous) rules that would apply to any quoting without permission. I didn't write about it then, because I sort of figured it was the usual situation where a new policy was put in place by people who didn't even bother to think about it or the implications of what they were saying and what it would mean. This is typical of people who just think of copyright as meaning "we own everything" and don't bother to understand the nuances of what copyright really means. Of course, after a lot of complaints the CBC is sorta, but not really, backtracking. They're saying that even though the actual rules say otherwise, bloggers can quote articles for free.

But, of course, all the CBC is really doing is showing that it does not seem to understand these issues at all. When it says something like this, you have to wonder:

"The objective is to bring some clarity and some consistency, and to ensure our brand is properly protected. The guiding principle is to have the rules of use and the restrictions of use as unambiguous as possible so people know what they're getting into when they use this stuff."

But, of course, the rules didn't add clarity or making things unambiguous, they did the reverse. And, the CBC seems to be confused about the purpose of copyright law, when it says the goal is to "ensure our brand is properly protected." While that may be the purpose of trademark law, it's not the purpose of copyright law, and using copyright law for that purpose is a mistake that leads to these sorts of ugly situations.

The real issue here is that, once again, you have people making rules who think they understand what copyright is for, and they don't recognize what it really means at all. And that leads them to say things that make no sense, such as barring all use without permission. In this day and age, when there are so many open discussions on copyright, you would think that those making such a policy change would, at the very least, first explore some of the issues before making such a drastic change in policy.

Filed Under: blogs, canada, cbc, copyright, quoting
Companies: cbc

Google's Communication Problems Continue: Blogger Can't Get His Blog Turned Back On After Six Months

from the not-cool dept

For the last few months, we've been seeing more and more stories about Google's communication problems with users. This has always been something of an issue with Google -- which seems to prefer algorithms to humans whenever possible -- but we're seeing it so often, that I'm really beginning to wonder if this is a serious problem (or potential Achilles heel) for the company. It seems like Google could take some serious lessons from a company like Zappos that treats everyone like a human and goes to amazing lengths to resolve any problems. Instead, too often dealing with Google feels like tossing a request into a giant shiny white box where you may or may not ever hear back -- and, if you do hear back, it's unlikely to be particularly helpful.

For example, we've already talked about the problems many suddenly banned advertisers have had in getting any kind of explanation from Google (let alone any recourse). On top of that, there was the situation with users being locked out of their Google docs, with little communication from Google available. This is really potentially quite damaging. It gives the impression of a giant white wall between users and the company in an age where having some sort of human connection to a company is increasingly important. I recognize that Google has it in their DNA to be afraid of people gaming the system, but in shutting itself off from the world, it may be creating more problems for itself.

The latest example is instructive. Jack Yan alerts us to his own writeup of the struggle he's gone through to try to get Google to reinstate a blog it incorrectly deleted back in July. You can read the forum exchange that began in November (after many months of going through the regular official channels and being told to "wait 2 days" over and over again with nothing coming of it). Jack summarizes the forum exchange this way, with Google's explanation first, and his response in parentheses:

1. You probably didn't follow the suggestions. (Yes, I did.)
2. You didn't do it at the right time. (Yes, I did.)
3. Wait two days. (Waited, nothing happened.)
4. Wait till this afternoon. (Waited, nothing happened.)
5. There's no cache of it. (Yes, there is.)
6. You're not the owner of the site. (Owner steps in and says I am allowed to follow this up for him.)
7. There's no cache of it. (Yes, there is.)
8. I'll ignore the main link you give and focus on a second one that is less useful. (Look at the first one then.)
9. There's no cache of it. (Yes, there is.)
10. There's no cache of it. (Yes, there is.)
11. Your search term is not relevant to this. (But it shows you a cache of it.)

The exchange is incredibly frustrating to read, and I'm amazed that Jack remained as calm as he did through it all. In fact, he notes that Google itself had a cache of the site for a long time -- including when he kept submitting for reinstatement and getting told to wait two days. But now Google's own cache is gone, so he's pointing the Google folks to Yahoo's cache to prove the blog is not a spam blog. And Google's response appears to be nitpicking over the search term, rather than the cache itself, or looking for ways to get the blog back. I know plenty of folks who work at Google and care deeply about their products and how they're perceived, but I'm amazed at how badly the company seems to handle basic customer service issues like this one.

Filed Under: blogs, communications
Companies: google

Murdoch's The Times Accused Of Blatant Copying, Just As It Tells The World You Should Pay For News

from the oooops dept

Just this week, James Harding, the editor of The Times (of London), a paper owned by Rupert Murdoch, tried to explain why the news is worth paying for, as the paper starts to put up a new business model to get consumers to pay for news. Unfortunately, Harding apparently didn't get the message himself. As pointed out by Mathew Ingram, just days after making the case for paying for news, The Times has been accused of publishing an article that it copied without permission from a blog.

You can't make this stuff up.

Yes, just as Rupert Murdoch is calling aggregators (sites that simply summarize and link to stories) parasites (even as he owns a bunch of aggregators himself), one of his papers didn't aggregate, it flat out copied, without permission, a blog post that was written by Edgar Wright as a tribute to Edward Woodward, who recently passed away. The Times eventually put up a "clarification" online that had a link to the original site, but that hardly explains the original copying -- especially during the very week that they're trying to convince the world that news should be paid for....

Filed Under: blogs, copying, edgar wright, james harding, paywalls, rupert murdoch
Companies: news corp.