Jeff Beall’s Comments

• Nov 16th, 2009 @ 5:02pm

  Re: Re: Re: That's the law

  on Britney Spears, Justin Timberlake, Others Sued For Patent Infringement For Appearing Larger Than Life
  So if I take a picture of you with a camera that infringes a patent then you are guilty of voilating the patent? They did not use the screen then venue did.
• Oct 29th, 2009 @ 6:30am

  (untitled comment)

  on GateHouse Media Strikes Again: Claims Headlines, Ledes Are Covered By Copyright, Threatens Forum
  I think that GateHouse maybe right on this one. They have a rather open TOS/TOU and is licensed via the Creative Commons, "Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Work". The issue is not that they are linking to stories on the site, but that they are basically doing a cut and paste of the entire story. This doesn't drive users to GateHouse but only serves as content for MassCops.
  
  Below is the GateHouse TOS for linking to the site.
  
  Unless otherwise prohibited under these Terms of Use, you are permitted to create hyperlinks to the content on the Website (including “deep linking” to articles or pages within site), provided that (1) the hyperlink text accurately describes the content as it appears on the Website, (2) no “scraping” of the content by any means (i.e., extracting content from the Website and reformatting it, aggregating it with other content or redistributing it other than in its complete originally displayed format), (3) under no circumstances may you "frame" the Website or any of its content or copy portions of the Website to a server, except as part of an Internet service provider's incidental caching of pages and (4) each page within the Website must be displayed in full (including all trademarks, branding, advertising and promotional materials), unaltered without any accompanying frame, border, margin, design, branding, trademark, advertising or promotional materials not originally displayed on the page within the Website. We reserve the right at any time in our sole discretion to revoke this permission generally, or your right to use specific links. If you have any questions regarding these linking policies you may contact us, or if you wish to link in a manner not authorized in these Terms of Use, you must get our prior written permission (see Contact Us below).
  
  Sounds fair to me
• Jul 27th, 2009 @ 4:08pm

  Re:

  on Is The NY Times Looking To CwF + RtB?

  If they put up a news delay system, and the offer to let people see the news earlier (heh?), then they are forward thinkers?

  Well yes. If you were using their content for research or reference you will still have full access. The idea is to promote the freedom of information exchange and ideas, not to keep publishers from making money. If you value the resource you get to see it first, if you don't see the value you get to see the information as well just a little later.
• Jul 27th, 2009 @ 3:42pm

  No New York Times for a Year

  on Is The NY Times Looking To CwF + RtB?
  So how much to get them to shut for year (a la TechDirt's $100,000,000).
  But seriously I think this is a valid idea, I read Tech Dirt all the time (Google Feed) so I ponied up a few buck today.
  If it will work for a rag like this why not the NYT?
• Jul 27th, 2009 @ 9:15am

  But CL shares the blame (as standup4yourRights)

  on And Of Course: Grandstanding Anti-Craigslist Politicians Still Not Satisfied
  But part of the blame is CL's caving in. You make yourself a target when you look easy. I would understand if they were a small private blog and it would cost them their financial future. But they are a business and they make more than enough money to stand against this type of harassment. I feel that larger companies like this have a duty to stand up for their rights, for by doing this it makes it harder for the government to use the same tactics against the individual. People have been blaming the judicial branch for this, but that is just the point. The law says that CL is not responsible for user generated content as part of the safe harbor portion of the CDA. CL has never let the lawsuits go forward for the courts to judge. A good slap down from the courts is just what these AG's need, btw the AG office is not part of Judicatory Branch . CL is not the only one to blame, MySpace caved to Blumenthal in 2007; MySpace turned over a list of 5,000 names, including 100 from Connecticut though there was no legal reason to do so.
• May 7th, 2009 @ 8:45am

  using the computer to solicit prostitution (as Clear your cache)

  on Guy Convicted Of Hacking For Uploading Naked Picture Of Himself
  The prostitution charge most likely came from the email found as outlined in the brief "Detective Dollison located 703 pornographic photos and several sexually explicit e-mails in which appellant was soliciting services from a dominatrix named Madam Patrice". I would wonder however if he used company email or another provider (i.e. Gmail) to send those messages. If he use an external email system then you could say that the access of gmail in and of itself was not a violation of the authorized use, since if it was everyone that used an external mail client at work would be open to the same prosecution.