Cook's Magazine Claims Web Is Public Domain 565
Isarian writes with a story, as reported on Gawker and many other places, that "Cooks Source Magazine is being raked over the coals today as word spreads about its theft of a recipe from Monica Gaudio, a recipe author who discovered her recipe has been published without her knowledge. When confronting the publisher of the offending magazine, she was told, 'But honestly Monica, the web is considered "public domain" and you should be happy we just didn't "lift" your whole article and put someone else's name on it!' In addition to the story passing around online, Cooks Source Magazine's Facebook page is being overwhelmed with posts by users glad to explain copyright law to the wayward publisher."
In other words (Score:4, Insightful)
It's alright if the copyright infringement is committed by a media company?
Re:In other words (Score:5, Insightful)
The outrage is because the rules aren't being applied equitably (which is NOT the same as equally). It is unacceptable to allow a publisher to steal material from another but have that same publisher sue others for doing likewise. Freedom has to be a two-way street.
(For those wondering about the difference between equal and equitable, the quotation people usually refer to regarding one law for the rich and another for the poor continues "neither are permitted to steal bread or sleep under bridges". Technically, that is equal. But since the rich do not need to do either, it is not equitable.)
Re:The web is public domain? (Score:5, Insightful)
Where is a $1.5M verdict when you need one?
Seriously, though, I'll bet half the folks complaining on Facebook have illegally downloaded music themselves.
Downloaded music, yes. Turned around and sold what they downloaded, no.
Re:In other words (Score:2, Insightful)
Exactly. Jammie Thomas is told to pay $1.5M for sharing music she didn't make money on, yet this guy makes money on IP infringement. That's not equality at all.
Re:The web is public domain? (Score:2, Insightful)
That doesn't matter at all. It's still infringement, just (I believe) potentially criminal.
Besides, people would sell downloaded music if they could get away with it -- but people won't buy it. In fact you'd see more illegal downloading if people could turn around and sell it.
Re:Recipes aren't necessarily copyrightable (Score:4, Insightful)
Is Slashdot on the side of the company or the author? Copyright law is constantly described as being "broken" around here, and posters are often on the side of music pirates and other pro-piracy entities, like Pirate Bay and the Pirate Party.
I suspect, however, that because a company made the violation, people will side with the author. Which suggests that it's really more about anti-corporatism than anti-copyright, which explains why people get up in arms over GPL code theft despite the double standard (the GPL is a copyright license).
Re:Actually... (Score:3, Insightful)
I can understand that logic. It should be impossible to copyright
1 egg
2 tps oil
etc
But the actual directions on what to do with that list can be very unique in wording, description, etc and should be copyrightable.
Re:The web is public domain? (Score:3, Insightful)
So now we're saying it's okay to pirate but not sell what you pirate? Why is one act okay but the other not?
Re:copyright is not compatible with internet (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:The web is public domain? (Score:2, Insightful)
So now we're saying it's okay to pirate but not sell what you pirate? Why is one act okay but the other not?
See the whole "personal use" argument. In some countries (not the USA) it has been specifically codified into law that personal use is acceptable.
Even in the USA the laws are very different if you profit from infringement vs not.
Re:Recipes aren't necessarily copyrightable (Score:5, Insightful)
Is Slashdot on the side of the company or the author? Copyright law is constantly described as being "broken" around here, and posters are often on the side of music pirates and other pro-piracy entities, like Pirate Bay and the Pirate Party.
Neither. Copyright law isn't as broke as the justice system that overcompensates for infringement. The infringee in this case asked for $130 donation to a college, a very reasonable sum. Patent law is broken, but the only problem with copyright isn't the concept. Copyright laws are what prevent Cisco from just lifting the Linux kernel and using it without contributing back the changes. Copyright laws themselves are not bad and protect authors. It is the idea that a corporation can own a copyright and have it extended into infinity (See Disney). Or infringement can be punished with a financial death sentence (See RIAA). Even those that pirate aren't against copyrights. Hell, they just don't care.
What is exceptional is that the magazine publisher had come to the conclusion that everything on the internets was public domain. That clearly indicates that they likely have an entire business built on infringing copyrights. Using other peoples work to make a profit. This is very different than hitting thepiratebay to get a copy of Stargate Universe.
Re:comments (Score:3, Insightful)
Slashdot: "Pirate Bay Back Online"
Zealot: "Yes! Take that, MPAA and RIAA. Copyright and intellectual property don't exist. Piracy isn't theft." (+5 Insightful)
Rabble-rouser: "But the GPL is a copyright license. GPL code is intellectual property. Doesn't anybody care about artists getting ripped off?" (-1 Flamebait)
Slashdot: "GPL Code Stolen By Some Company"
Zealot: "Why doesn't the FSF sue them for millions of dollars? This is an outrage. How dare they steal code, those thieves." (+5 Insightful)
Rabble-rouser: "You realize you have two contradictory, self-serving positions, right?" (-1 Troll)
Re:The web is public domain? (Score:5, Insightful)
No, we're saying it's not OK to pirate, and it's even worse to pirate and then sell it, and then suggest that the artist should pay us for the privilege.
Kind of like we say it's not OK to point a gun at someone, and it's even more not OK to shoot them, and it's especially not OK to then charge them for the bullet.
Re:The web is public domain? (Score:3, Insightful)
No, it is hypocritical. You’re trying to make money off what you took for free from somebody who created it and was trying to make money off it.
Re:The web is public domain? (Score:3, Insightful)
Just tell me; I hate guessing.
Re:It's not what they did as much (Score:5, Insightful)
Yeah. Some people have claimed that Slashdot's response is being hypocritical, however, the key differences are:
MPAA/RIAA sues individual who downloads a song for personal use for $insane_amount per track/video. Person in question did not engage in any commercial activity related to the downloaded item.
Some magazine steals a woman's article (not just the recipe, but the whole article word for word) and commences to use it as part of a commercial product (their magazine). Original author requests a $130 donation to a college and is denied.
Re:In other words (Score:3, Insightful)
Humans love justice. We are social creatures, and in order for society to work, people must play by the same set of rules. When they do not, our innate and genetically determined sense of social justice kicks in. Almost all humans feel a desire to act fairly towards others, and to punish those who do not act fairly, even if punishing the other harms ourselves.
Revenge is just a rather crude form of justice. It satisfies the instinct to punish unfairness. But there are more elegant and less harmful ways of achieving fairness and justice than crude revenge.
Re:In other words (Score:1, Insightful)
But you're just creating a double standard yourself as well. Either "information just wants to be free" applies to everyone or it doesn't apply to anything. If you're going to claim that it's okay to infringe copyrights to RIAA music or MPAA movies, then it has to also be acceptable for these big companies to violate anyone else's copyrights.
Re:The web is public domain? (Score:1, Insightful)
No actually it doesn't, and that's what you don't see. People do sell things because they can; it's not always because they think they have an exclusive right to sell something.
You can go and resell a packaged GPL project if you want to, but you can't legally prevent them from obtaining the source code to it. In fact this example actually happens, and people do make money off of it.
So you would have a point, IF someone re-published his recipe text, and he sued them in turn (or he asked them to take it down).
Re:The web is public domain? (Score:1, Insightful)
Oh, and since the guy claimed he thought the Internet was public domain (lol) then of course he had no illusions over the exclusivity of the content. Anyone could take it in that case, unless he made modifications to it - but if he republished it on the Internet, then again, he would lose any protection, by his own logic.
Re:Oh no! (Score:3, Insightful)
Your effort to learn how to do something and how to convey that information and the time and expense actually to convey the information is worth nothing to you? No matter how much it's worth at retail?
That's fine.
Print this out and sign it:
I, (insert your real name here), hereby donate all prior, current, and future works created by me to the public domain in perpetuity.
Signed, ___________
Dated _____________
Then have it notarized and mail it to the US Copyright office.
Go ahead. You said copyright meant nothing, make it legal as well as practical.
Re:The web is public domain? (Score:1, Insightful)
I was referring to the non-legal definition of "public domain"
There are two definitions of “public domain”, according to my dictionary. One is “land directly owned by the government”. The other is “the realm embracing property rights that belong to the community at large, are unprotected by copyright or patent, and are subject to appropriation by anyone”.
Should have made that more clear. Apologies.
In this case, “more clear” = correct terminology; it was unclear because it was incorrect.
Re:It's not what they did as much (Score:3, Insightful)
as how they responded. They were rude and insulting and she just asked for a donation to a local college. To respond in the way they did anyone would be upset and, out of principal, take legal action. They could have just said, sure we'll make the $130 donation and be happy, but they had to insult her instead. The magazine should donate 10 times the amount and fire the editor.
What is even worse is the discussions that are going on the magazines Facebook page. Someone posted her actual address (taken down) to homophobic AIDS filled rants. I know it might seem odd but maybe the editor legimately thought the Internet was public domain and is now paying for her mistake. But the personal attacks is just childish
Re:In other words (Score:5, Insightful)
Right, but the country started out with the express intention of NOT having two sets of rules. So I feel it is important to point out that we have failed in that respect, so that we may attempt to correct our failure and hold everyone accountable in the same way.
Re:The web is public domain? (Score:1, Insightful)
This is a website that regularly posts Pirate Party updates and alerts its readers when Pirate Bay goes down. People are implying that it's acceptable to pirate, as long as you're not an evil corporation that's selling it for its own financial gain. We're supposed to turn the other cheek if someone downloads episodes of Stargate because it's harmless. If a corporation violates someone's copyright, however, it's a bigger deal because they're selling it for profit to fulfill their own selfish motives. But that's just as self-serving as someone watching an episode of Stargate.
Downloading an album for you to listen to is just as selfish as downloading someone's recipe and selling it for money. In both cases, you're pirating for personal gain. In fact, the person who downloaded the album from Pirate Bay is distributing the album to countless others who will also not compensate the artist, via their torrent client. It's all the same selfish desire for personal gain with nothing given to someone in return. The financial gain just happens to stir anti-corporate feelings, which makes it feel like a bigger deal.
Re:The web is public domain? (Score:1, Insightful)
So he hasn't done anything yet to make us suspect he is a hypocrite or has he? That was my point.
Some people just dream up these semi-elaborate and nonsensical (not to mention illegal) plots to make any money they can in life. Kind of like low-latency trading actually. Doesn't mean it's necessarily hypocritical. I'm all for calling it deplorable and possibly immoral though.
"Information wants to be free" (Score:3, Insightful)
But don't you nerds always tell us that information wants to be free? I'm not seeing the outrage here.
That phrase does not mean what you think it means.
Re:Oh no! (Score:1, Insightful)
Oh really. So you write a book and its perfectly OK for some one to republish the book in their own name to make a profit by getting rid of that stupid law?
I am tired of people whining about unfair laws when they don't understand the very nature of what they are talking about. If you think movies, music, books, code, inventions should all be given away freely then please try and earn a living making movies, music, books, code, or inventions. Maybe after a few years of people taking credit for everything you do you might change your mind.
Nothing is restricting this information, what is being restricted is some company trying to make money off of someone else's intellectual property. The original IP was available online so it is accessible by anybody, but then someone decides to publish a magazine for profit that took this IP without credit or compensation. The magazine could have easily contacted the original writer and simply got permission to republish the article, not everyone protecting IP is a dick, they are just average people trying to earn a living sharing a little bit of knowledge.
Why are words and data subject perfectly acceptable to steal, but if you car is stolen are you going to just shrug your shoulders? Are people going to tell you what a stupid law there is that protects your car from being stolen?
Comment removed (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:The web is public domain? (Score:5, Insightful)
As someone who works in media, I'm not one who agrees with the "It's OK to pirate as long as you don't sell it" philosophy. Perhaps I'm in the /. minority, but I don't have any pirated software/media on my computer.
Now I'm not here to be on a high horse and tell the pirates how much they suck even if I thought that, which I don't. And I'm certainly not going to defend the RIAA, which needs to be smacked down hard.
Is piracy copyright infringement? Yes. You can come up with all the justifications you want about how it's not stealing. And you're right. It's not. It's copyright infringement, and I do think that people deserve to be paid for their work. I don't work for free at my job, and I don't expect you to work for free either, even if you record a song I really want to put on my mp3 player. No matter how you justify it, it's still wrong, just like I'm wrong when I speed even though I justify it by saying that everyone else is doing it.
Copyright infringement is wrong, and illegal. Should the RIAA be allowed to direct the prosecution of pirates? No. Should they be allowed to have what amounts to their own police force that conducts raids to catch the pirates? Certainly not. Should you be fined 65 grand per file? Hell no. They sell them for a buck. You owe them a buck. You then owe damages totaling whatever your state's damages for a misdemeanor are set to as your punishment. This is all gonna amount to around 500 bucks at worst. That's plenty. It's a deterrent without being ridiculously over the top.
But my original point stands. Piracy is wrong. It's more wrong to turn around and sell what you pirated. It's even more wrong to do it and then suggest that the creator of the content owes you money for the privilege of having her work stolen and published without permission.
Re:In other words (Score:2, Insightful)
Which is why patent and copyright law is so important. They are the only things that give the little guy any claim to profit from their labors.
If there was no copyright the RIAA would just be paying their musicians even less (aka nothing).
Re:Recipes aren't necessarily copyrightable (Score:5, Insightful)
Copyright law is constantly described as being "broken" around here ...
If you take training in business communications, you come across this notion of the 10 minute reader, the 3 minute reader, and the 1 minute reader, although I think the pyramid has undergone an increase in pay grade or two since the advent of Twitter (the one minute reader, the 10 second reader, and the 3 second reader). If you think the voices around here complaining about copyright are some kind of consensus, you've yet to discover word wrap. Yours is three-second reader daily digest.
Among the three-minute readers, copyright is considered a cornerstone of the intellectual property economy. Complaints have more to do with the current implementation, starting with the Mickey Mouse copyright extension act, and extending to predatory enforcement by RIAA and the MPAA, including the collection of revenue on blank media.
Among the ten-minute readers, there are acknowledgments that services such as Google Books change the parameters of the copyright act as it used to exist (when it was reasonably balanced), and issues about the ownership and generativity of culture in the form of mash-ups and parody. There are no clear answers to these questions yet. It's a work in progress, and the ground is still shifting under our feet.
I watched "Control Room" last night. An extra feature interview tells the story about a conversation with some smart-ass Arab cab driver (possibly an under-employed physicist) in a country other than Iraq where the cab driver acknowledged that not everyone was happy with their own statuary, and suggesting that Iraq option would be just fine, if perhaps "we could skip the bombing and go straight to the looting". This is the attitude of people who think that the current implementation of copyright is so broken, we should nix it altogether.
Try reading past the word wrap some day. The real argument is whether copyright can be saved from the lobbyists. This is a special case of whether democracy can be saved from the lobbyists, but that topic is too broad to lead to constructive discussion.
Re:comments (Score:3, Insightful)
Most people make a clear distinction between personal use (an activity which is entirely legal in jurisdictions such as mine) and business models based on systematic use of others' work without permission or compensation.
Evidently you don't make that distinction, hence your tendency to treat the two issues as one and then claim that everyone else is being hypocritical.
What's wrong with Disney-length copyrights (Score:5, Insightful)
As for Disney extending copyright on Mickey Mouse, why shouldn't they be allowed to do that if they're still making money off of Mickey Mouse? I've never heard a convincing argument why Mickey Mouse should be taken away from them if he's still a viable property. The original copyright lengths were decided in an era before long-term mass media, and laws change to reflect changing circumstances.
And what's the convincing argument that copyright should be extended to a period long enough to protect Disney's assets? Why should they retain exclusive cultural domain over something Walt Disney created over 80 years ago? "Because they can make money from it" is not a sufficient reason in my opinion.
It seems to me that there has to be a reasonable limit. The protections of copyright exist to provide incentive to creators to make new work, to give them the protections they need to profit from it. But if an artwork rises in prominence to the point where it is well remembered a lifetime later - I think that's beyond what any single company should have the ability to control. That's a cultural institution.
Without some kind of hard limit, exclusivity extends perpetually, and culture itself becomes a thing subject to domination by those with the greatest back-catalog of assets. Any new work becomes subject to scrutiny: does this new song use any bits of melody that can be traced back to another artist's work? The barest traces of influence become grounds to demand tribute to the media god who, in times scarcely remembered, created something that happened to turn out to be a hit. There has to be a limit. And of course there is a limit, except for the fact that they keep changing it every time it threatens Disney's assets.
I don't want a system that so heavily favors established powers. New players should have the power to create without fear of being litigated out of existence because they were influenced by a piece of work that influenced a huge chunk of the world's population for generations.
Re:In other words (Score:3, Insightful)
Copyright, yes. Moral rights like attribution, no. The two aren't necessarily together, and in EU law they're quite well separated.
Re:In other words (Score:3, Insightful)
Admittedly in most parts of the world, the lower classes aren't nearly as ignorant of their own self interest as in America.
Re:comments (Score:3, Insightful)
Additionally, there is no internal inconsistency in the stances we've got. While some are calling for full abolition of IP, the more common complaint is that it's prone to abuse and the rewards are grossly out of line with the actual harm done leaving some organizations like the RIAA to use it instead of normal business tactics.
Re:The web is public domain? (Score:3, Insightful)
There's only so far that this paradoxical duality of private and public property rights can be carried. Ultimately as technology stretches the current legal, social and philosophical landscape to its limit, something will have to give.
The essential issue here is not the recipe or where it was gleaned from. The central issue is that perhaps only 2 or 3 kilobytes of data is being protected by a strong legal monopoly, in perpetuity, without any formal notice, contract, or written agreement of any kind, and furthermore this data crumb is being made freely available worldwide to anyone, again without any written notice or agreement of any description. The internet is stretching copyright law to its limit and sooner or later, the whole concept is going to become farcical, particularly in cases like this.
You may not like it, but data is worth essentially nothing nowadays. You may consider that unfair and that it will affect those who make their living off producing content--and I would agree with you on both counts. But at the end of the day, technology has done for data what it did to steel and paper; brought the cost of an expensive good to down dramatically, only in this case, the cost is plummeting to zero. The worthlessness of 2-3KB of data is becoming an indisputable and publically accepted fact which our legal and economic systems cannot long withstand.
The age of commercial content and content producers is coming to an end. Cooks are going to have to go back to cooking food for a living. And the rest of us are going to have to go back to actually making things--real tangible things--again.
Re:The web is public domain? (Score:3, Insightful)
Putting "limited" in scale (Score:5, Insightful)
The Statute of Anne [wikipedia.org] was passed in 1710, three hundred years ago, and formed the foundation of US copyright law, with some sections used verbatim. This Statute stipulated copyright terms of 14 years, renewable for a second 14 if the author was still alive. Within this broader context, it seems clear that the concept of a limited copyright term meant "limited" in terms of something within a human scale, and, importantly, bounded by the life of the original author. Instead, what we have now is a de facto unlimited copyright term, with copyrights held not by the original author, but rather by faceless and essentially immortal corporations.
Bringing up 5000 years as a "limited" copyright term, while pedantically correct, is completely irrelevant within this context of copyright on a human scale. And, within this context, Disney (among many others) has egregiously overstepped any morally or historically defensible bounds.
Cheers,
Re:Recipes aren't necessarily copyrightable (Score:3, Insightful)
Which suggests that it's really more about anti-corporatism than anti-copyright, which explains why people get up in arms over GPL code theft despite the double standard (the GPL is a copyright license).
No, that's what you want to see. They are very consistent in the Fair Use idea, such that GPL violations for free are mostly ignored, while GPL violations for profit get people up in arms. But you have your own pet ideas of what should be "right" that don't agree with the general stance here, so you make up stuff to make it look like communism or somehow contradictory when it seems to clearly consistent and mostly fair how the slashdot drones come down on any one story.
Re:Recipes aren't necessarily copyrightable (Score:3, Insightful)
The original copyright lengths were decided in an era before long-term mass media, and laws change to reflect changing circumstances.
Here, we agree. It's so much easier to bring something to market and make your profit quickly, the limits should be about 1/10th what they were when the Constitution was written.
Re:In other words (Score:2, Insightful)
But, the battle cry of the so-called "file sharers", who are in fact copyright infringers just like the magazine in question, is just "information wants to be free".
So, if copyright applies in this case, why doesn't it apply to movies and music being "shared" on the internet?
Re:In other words (Score:2, Insightful)
Ah, so it is OK for you to violate someone else's copyright as long as you don't do it for commercial use. Do you expect people to make content for you and everyone else for free? Would you spend millions of dollars to make a movie just to lose all that money?
Re:In other words (Score:1, Insightful)
Mmm. History [google.com] shows a different picture. Very convenient when the founders have the power to borrow money [usconstitution.net] and sell those subjects into default debt.
So, basically, the whole copyright issue is pointless (preferably) or a distraction (more likely) since, from the very beginning, the entire purpose of the government was to allow for the already financially wealthy to place an entire nation into indebted perpetual servitude. Is that not just the happiest thought you've ever faced reality with?
Re:In other words (Score:1, Insightful)
Well, It was not just that slaves were not equal. In many states, you also needed to own property to vote.
Re:The web is public domain? (Score:3, Insightful)
By whom? Information is still inherently valuable, just because you can get it for free doesn't make it worthless.
Re:The web is public domain? (Score:3, Insightful)
They sell them for a buck. You owe them a buck.
I personally would hold them responsible for a buck for each and every copy that was distributed. That could easily amount to thousands of dollars, but not likely hundreds of thousands except for cases of blatant and flagrant infringement (like running a well-known server that distributes all the music you can find). It would also be difficult to quantify, which is why they have the ridiculous dollar amount on the punishment.
I find it hard to believe that 80,000 people copied each of the 24 songs Jamie Thomas was convicted of distributing, yet that is what her punishment amounts to. I'd like to see a cap of $500-$1000 per item for non-criminal copyright infringement. The current limits ($90,000 per infringement, I believe) are only appropriate for criminal infringement, and should probably be higher in those cases anyway.
Anyway, you're not the only one who thinks piracy is wrong, and I doubt you're in the minority in that regard. You probably are in the minority regarding pirated works on your computer though.
Re:What's wrong with Disney-length copyrights (Score:3, Insightful)
Case in point: Music.
Soul Music was born when Ray Charles ripped off a gospel song by re-wording it. The gospel song he ripped off was a re-working of a prior gospel song. The original gospel songs were verbatim copies hymns set to new music.
At the time, none of this was copyright infringement. The song Ray Charles ripped off was never registered, and the copyright on the hymns upon which gospel was founded had expired.
With today's laws it would all be infringement. Hell the hymns would only just now be coming off copyright. There is no telling how much creativity in music we have lost because of this.
Advancement of the arts indeed!
Re:In other words (Score:5, Insightful)
Patent and copyright law need not be the "only things". They're only a means. There are other ways.
Those laws for the little people have been turned against us. They should go. In fact, 1 century ago big entertainment fought against copyright. They wanted to be able to use songs without paying for them. When they figured out they could instead own the songs, leveraging their advantages to obtain them for next to nothing, they changed their (ahem) tune.
Rather frequently, criminals gain control of a victim's weapon, using it against the owner. That's what patent and copyright feels like today. But because it's our knife, somehow we can't bear to part with it. We get ourselves robbed and stabbed, over and over, with our own weapons. Then the survivors among us watch helplessly while the mobsters use the take to put on a magnificent show of being successful citizens, wearing the best suits our money can buy, and hiring the best lawyers to get them out of trouble.
Re:Recipes aren't necessarily copyrightable (Score:3, Insightful)
"As for Disney extending copyright on Mickey Mouse, why shouldn't they be allowed to do that if they're still making money off of Mickey Mouse?"
Because they are stealing from the public. They fact they are still making money on it makes it worse, not better. When the copyright to the first Mickey Mouse movie was granted in 1928, the deal was that they would get sole ability to profit from it for about 50 years, and then it would belong to citizens of the US en masse. They reneged on that deal and stole from us. Every day that goes by there is both money and the product itself (for that like it or have kids that do) that is being withheld from the US public and handed over to a private company, in violation of the words of the Constitution, and also the letter of the law when the copyright was granted.
Re:The web is public domain? (Score:3, Insightful)
Your Cake is a lie.
Maybe, but the copyrighted recipe of the cake is the truth... As I'm sure the Recipe Industry Association of America will soon be communicating to Cooks Source Magazine.