No worries; I can see where you are comng from :)

But I do think you need to separate the practicalities from the principle; for example, while I'm not quite clear what you are proposing to do, could anyone argue that you are harming their interests?

To most people, that is the question that 'matters'.

Don't get me wrong; I do see the point you are making, and I was similarly infuriated when Google were taken to court over their cache, and won - their defence, as I recall, was the cache was 'temporary', and I think 'a few weeks' was mentioned. Tell that to the Marines! But while I don't agree with it, I'm really not going to lose sleep, as the alternative (Google losing the case) would have had the potential to be much more harmful (in my view). Laws are rarely 'right'; but you'll go mad worrying about it!

Quad you are so right... and I am half way to crazy town already ;)

I often find it useful to let these other sites bear the legal burden, by simply linking to them rather than embedding the content on my own page if I'm not sure of the legality. I link to YouTube, Geocities, Wikipedia, even archive.org. Then it becomes their problem.

Yes, you can theoretically be asked to take down such links if the copyright owner is feeling litigious, but in 8 years I have never been contacted in this regard. (Note that I'm not linking to pirated feature films or even MP3s; just to images and video clips with legitimate informational value.)

The problem is, that it's not about you, or me, or anybody else or what advantages anybody got - it's about a law which is not a both/and/perhaps - it is and it goes for everybody and everything - not when it suits you the best, or when it doesn't. But let's look a little deeper into the riddle of archive.org vs other copyright issues in the context provided above. Here's the purpose of archive.org:

"Open and free access to literature and other writings has long been considered essential to education and to the maintenance of an open society. Public and philanthropic enterprises have supported it through the ages."

That is what archive.org is about. Now, I will apply this to a random website who is not making commercial use of the works published (no advertising or revenue model in any form besides donations, which archive.org also depend on, but I might have some other revenue models on my website as in some corporate premium programs, but doesn't matter really - not much anyways, just my way of maintaining my image as a non-profit thing even though I need some heavy economic resources to keep this going) - take this as an example:

I have a website, and for the benefit of an open society and the free access to literature and other writings or media to be essential for education in whatever form it might appear - I will simply copy/paste every website or article or whatever I might come across without notifying or asking for permission - I will maintain their copyright notices, and other essential information which can identify them - but that's about it.

Now, if these other websites didn't want it to happen - they should have blocked my ip to begin with. It's not a copyright infringement - it's in the tos of my website and what my ehrm organization is about, if you don't want your contents on my website you can request it to be removed. Not like I care anyways.

You're saying that if another website, which wasn't as useful to you as archive.org did that in the way I just - you would say that they stole from you and not request it to be removed, but simply make a legal case out of it. But the ToS is the same, the purpose is the same, the methods are the same.. but somehow there's a difference, because of your perception of what is an advantage to you - and what isn't and you act accordingly. You don't mind google publishing snippets of your articles either, even though they're making a revenue off it - because it still benefits you.. and so it goes on...

Where is the limit? Perhaps there isn't one, and it's all in your head - all these rights, and laws, ethics, terms and copyright notices and so on - as long as they benefit you - you will cling to them and use them in accordance with what benefits you, not how it or things actually work out in the real world.

And where does Google fall into all of this?

Willingly or unwillingly Google is copying the whole site of yours into their servers and using it for a purpose namely Search. They have helped us all, yes, but legally where do they fall?

What is the original content Google has? Company profile?

Is this Google-specific ... or isn't that true for every search engine?

While not all SEs publicly display a cache, they all must have one, else a search would take forever!

RandomDot... I am done debating it's usefulness. We all can agree that it is useful. It deoasn't make it above the law.

jomaxx

Your solution is elegant and simple. While my pockets are hardly deep enough to make it worth anyones while I am not looking to invite litigation against myself.

Linking and leaving it to the landing page to sort it out seems great.

Now I wonder what happens if I make a copy of someones site from archive.org and then link archive.org as my source and point of reference? (just to further provoke the issue)

[edited by: Demaestro at 2:24 pm (utc) on Sep. 27, 2007]

I am not saying this is a good mantra, or that it is right at all...... but one thing we have learned from YouTub, Google, and others is that..... it is easier to beg for forgiveness then ask for permission.

Hahaha. That's right. YouTube gets away with copyright infringements because It's responsibility is just to remove copyrighted materials, and not to not upload copyrighted videos.

Plus of course Money.

So what else is new?

"If copyright law was enforced as strictly as people here seem to want, there would be no archive.org. Since we all seem to agree that archive.org is a good thing, it follows that we agree that strict enforcement of current copyright laws would deprive the internet of a valuable resource. "

Actually, if you really want Archive.org to have license, you can simply put it in your terms of use for your site. That would be a clear indication of your support for their work. Otherwise, they are breaking copyright law just the same as any other site, sort of.

They could fall into an issue of "Fair Use." Because the intent of their work is scholarly, and not for profit, it is possible that the courts would find them as a fair use exception, but it isn't a definite.

The major issues with copyright is if it is able to replace the original. That in and of itself would be difficult for archive.org to prove that they do not. Fortunately, they are not advertising such, so that is on their side.

The end result is Copyright law and most laws in the U.S. require YOU the webmaster/copyright owner to enforce your rights. If you want them to take something down, send a cease and desist letter and proceed. If you can't be bothered to enforce your rights, no one will enforce them for you.

A large site that copies content is just as likely if not more likely to get slapped on the hand as a smaller site.

Cheers,
Jeff

[edited by: encyclo at 11:15 am (utc) on Nov. 14, 2007]
[edit reason] no URLs thanks [/edit]

Demaestro, I can see your point somewhat. Perhaps archive.org should have to get permission instead of putting the burden on the site owner to deny them permission.

I haven't read through entire length of thread but there is one point I did not see mentioned.

The contents archived on archive .org are exact duplicates of what you have made. Videos uploaded to Youtube and similar sites on the other hand have been altered, altered quite a bit I might add. They in no way represent the original released by the studio or wherever they were copied from. Besides the other things mentioned such as financial loss your work has also lost its integrity.

Hey Jeff I read your article on safe harbor. Thanks for making it clear and concise without having to wade through pages and pages of material.

I have a question though: A site that allows user generated content....is it okay for this site to have adsense on their pages? Furthermore, it seems these video user generated content sites now display ads before the videos start.

Absolutely. Most people do not know why the heck they shouldn't post some things, such as sitcoms or movie clippings. What they don't understand is that they are violating the company policy plus optical media board standards. It's plain 'ol piracy.