Ziff Davis To Website: License To Link, Updated

An anonymous reader writes "Apparently Ziff Davis is threatening pocketpctools.com with legal action for posting a snippet from and link to a Ziff Davis story. Is it just me, or is this sort of the IDEA of the internet? From pocketpctools.com: 'We are currently being threatened with legal action by a large organization that produces news stories (I am trying to find out if I am "allowed" to post the emails they have sent me). A while back (about a month and 70 posts ago), one of our admins posted a story that introduced you to one of their stories. Needless to say, there was a small editorial about the said story, a short quote from the story, a link to, and full credit given to them for the story.'" Update: 08/08 23:55 GMT by S : To clarify, Ziff Davis/EWeek (and not ZDNet, as the submitter and linked story suggest) are involved in this story. Update: 08/09 02:08 GMT by T : Matthew Rothenberg of eWEEK writes with a clarification (below); it seems like this is just a tempest in a teapot, and linkers can breathe easy.

Rothenberg writes: "Hey! I'm the executive editor in charge of eWEEK.com -- and before this situation unravels any farther, I need to make a couple of quick clarifications about our reprint policy:

While I haven't gotten all the details about what happened, this legal warning to PocketPCTools seems to be a result of miscommunication within our company. We understand and embrace the principles under which sites such as PocketPCTools link to and excerpt our content. There are plenty of occasions when a professional media company needs to question the wholesale appropriation of its content or the use of its marks. From everything I understand about the PocketPCTools case so far, this is NOT one of those occasions!

We're moving to correct the situation now ... PocketPCTools was apparently acting within the appropriate bounds of Web etiquette -- actually, doing us a favor by sending us the traffic -- and Ziff Davis was apparently mistaken in issuing this warning.

My personal apologies to anyone inconvenienced by this error. We're investigating the situation now and will act accordingly."

Blogs

[Scalli0n]

I'm going to make a very obvious statement and ask what this means for blogs. If you can strongarm anyone into un-linking something, then where will blogs be able to go?

Also, what the hell was ZDNet thinking, the folks at pocketpctools.com were sending them traffic!

Why use legal means?

[Anonymous Coward]

There are easy technical means to stop people from linking to you. You check the referer header, and if it's from a site you don't like... you block it! Yes, a few people will have blank/fake referers, but they are in the minority.

Example... Mozilla's Bugzilla doesn't want Mozilla to link to their bugs, so they block them [mozilla.org]! Easy.

Wankers.

[Aldric]

I say boycott ZD until they stop smoking crack.

Is this really a big deal?

[TROLLCmdrTaco2]

After reading Slashdot for a while, I get the impression that these things happen all the time, and most of them are due to an overeager employee/lawyer who can be easily shut up with a polite letter pointing out why you aren't breaking the law, or, if that doesn't work, then a letter from a law firm which says the same. This isn't DeCSS-like infringement

It's unfortunate you have to do this, but this kind of stupidity seems like something web-authors will have to live with no matter what kind of copyright laws your country has.

I think the most important thing is just to know that this happens, and not to panic.

Purpose of the internet?

[JeffSh]

What's it matter what the internet was designed to do? It's the duty of corporations to bend laws and technological infrastructure to suit their own needs, right? ZD is only doing what any good corporation looking out for their shareholder's interests would do. /sarcasm

Absurd

[PabloJones]

This is absurd. If it's just a snippet of information from the website, given proper credit to the source, what could be the problem?

What happens when Google News takes the first sentence of one of their news stories and uses it on their front page?

The point of making news is for people to actually read it (along with the ads displayed along side it). Barring access to this news doesn't make much business sense. Sounds to me like Ziff-Davis has an overzealous legal team, which acts in self-interest rather in the interest of the company as a whole.

What's in their robots.txt file?

[Stephen Samuel]

We should send an email to Google, Yahoo, MSN et al. telling them to remove all link to ZD-Net sites.

That and otherwise stop linking to them altogether.

Not Likly...

[Demanche]

I'm sure ZDNet itself has links to other news sources in many places... maybe they should set a standard and pay some royalties to those sites also .. ;)

It's Fair Use . . .

[HrothgarReborn]

I thnk pocketpctools has a pretty solid stance. If they cannot give a short quote with a reference then why is it legal for me to do the same in a research paper? How will anyone ever be able to do a book review? This type of useage is what makes research and debate possible. I mean Bush can quote Kerry (and often does) in order to make a logical debate, and he does not need a license from Kerry. This is an example of our failed system, where corporate thugs can make any demand and win because the system is too difficult and costly to use to defend one own legitimate rights.

PS Any one who laughs at Bush being logical should get -1 offtopic. Of course, I should get +5 funny for saying it :)

Re:Blogs

[siliconjunkie]

I think the result would be similar to the P2P situation: There are simply so many individuals out there that it makes litigation far too cumbersome to be comprehensive. Entities that believe their "rights" are infringed by linking would either have to go after the "worst offernders", a la the MPAA/RIAA vs. P2P clients, or just freekin' get over it and realize that the internet has spawned new ways of disseminating information and that they must evolve or be subject to de-evolution.

I would *hope* that modern industry is capable of the latter, but sometimes I wonder.

Re:Blogs

[siliconjunkie]

While I agree with the gist of your post, what you fail to acknowledge is that blogs of the nature you are referring to simply aren't bookmarked/linked to/visited again.

While there are many good blogs out there with unique, original content, there are also many blogs that are creative in the way that they cross-reference and explore a given topic by linking to several external sources and providing insight into how those sources are connected philosphically/intellectualy/topically/whatever. On a good day, I would say Slashdot is a good example of that concept.

The beauty of a well-crafted blog is that it can elaborate and further external articles so that the "whole is greater than the sum of it's parts"

I agree that there are MANY blogs out there like you illustrate in your post, but these blogs are avoided by those who appreciate what a good blog (original content or not) have to offer.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Z-D's Within Their Rights, But Being Stupid

[reallocate]

There is no absolute yardstick for fair use. The law doesn't specify that quoting anything below a specific percentage of a copyrighted work is fair use, or that anything above is not.

That's why copyright is a civil, not criminal issue. Ziff-Davis probably sends these letters to hundreds of sites every year. (And, it seems to work. When was the last time you saw someone pointing, regularly, to Z-D sites?) Most sites lack the money and means to challenge Z-D in court. Z-D knows they might lose a Fair Use case, but also knows that the recipients won't take them to court. Hence the letters.

It's a silly thing to do -- driving away potential traffic -- but Z-D has the right to do this. And, they will keep on doing it until someone takes them to court and wins.

Re:Blogs

[FFFish]

Just want to say THIS IS WHAT MAKES A DIFFERENCE!

Y'all see how easy it is to become an activist and make changes for the better? It takes so very little effort, and makes such a big difference!

Traffic = good

[xgamer04]

Um, nobody (I think) has posted this yet, so here goes...

I always thought that linking to your website was a GOOD thing, especially when it's your JOB that's depending upon people visiting your site. If all websites started doing this, search engines would be out of business and nobody would be able to find anything on the web.

Re:So, in simple terms, the story summary is wrong

[idlemachine]

"Grammar-Nazi"? So identifying the right party when you're setting out to villify someone is a grammar issue now?

It amazes me the sheer level of pedantry that goes on here...and how quickly being right stops being important as soon as you're wrong...

Re:Blogs

[Pharmboy]

I think the key to a successful writing campaign is to be:

1) Polite
2) Respectful
3) Objective
4) To the point
5) Request a reply
6) Use your real name and city/state and send from the same email address they can reply to.

Name or quote your sources, express your concerns, DONT assume it is correct, GENTLY explain what you are considering in response to their actions if true, and give them the opportunity to explain. Remain objective and fair if you want a response, or at least to have your letter actually read by someone that matters. I am sure many can do a better job of writing this letter, but thats great: do it and send it.

I really DONT know if this article is true, so assuming would not serve anyone anyway, and just make me look like an ass for being wrong and loud. Fake articles HAVE happened before, after all. What matters is NOT "I will unsubscribe", but "I have reason to question your companies ethics or actions" since most people are not subscribers anyway. You should always act like you really WANT to hear their opinion or side of the story, even though it is unlikely you will get a reply. These are the letters that get read in the boardroom.

You will never know if your particular letter made "the" difference but it doesn't matter. The sheer volume of intellegent, thoughtful and concerned letters speak for themselves.

Re:Absurd

[PabloJones]

However, according to Jakob Nielsen, deep linking is good linking [useit.com].

If it's a pain in the ass for users to find what they want on the site, then people aren't going to want to use it. And if they prevent others from deep linking, they are only going to lose visitors that may well go beyond the deep-linked page, browsing the site if they find it interesting, while at the same time viewing ads.

The chances are that the people clicking through from the PocketPCTools weren't going to know about or have the inclination to go to eWeek in the first place. So in this case, they are getting visitors, a vast majority of which would not have visited eWeek without this link.

And if they wanted, they could probably redirect all deep link click-throughs to go to the eWeek main page if they felt particularly hostile (which it seems they do).

Re:Blogs

[c1ay]

...and just stop linking to them at all... pretend they don't exist, less linkage and (maybe) less visitors. That would certainly lower their ranking on Google...

Re:If the content's protected

[Alsee]

the legal principle is sound

A web link is nothing but a written address.

Then the reporters and editors and publishers should be thrown in prison for "contributing to people distributing illegal material" every time they print the address of a crackhouse or the address of any other illegal activity. Making a written address itself illegal is a very very dangerous precedent. Not only would it make the New York Times illegal for publishing addresses of illegal activity, but it is also quite a mess because the owners of that location can always change the content of that location from cookies to cocaine.

-

Re:Blogs

[Have Blue]

The second key to a successful writing campaign is do not use email. Get off your ass, print out a letter on real paper, put it in an envelope, pay for a stamp, and mail it to them. Everyone knows how easy it is to create thousands of emails; a physical letter carries far more weight and represents proportionately more outrage to the recipient.

Maybe I'm just a cynic at heart...

[Anonymous Coward]

But I have this nagging feeling that only about 1/4 of the story is here.

Yeah, I know, ZDnet is a corporation therefore it's evil and should be burninated, but, for a community that's supposedly based on questioning the Conventional Wisdom, there's a rigid adherence to the dogma that:

1. All corporations are evil.
2. Copyrights are all wrong. All knowledge is public domain.
3. Except knowledge about you. In that case, it's an evil plot by an all-knowing group of shadowy government agencies.
4. Any claim by a web site must be true, if it adheres to Sacred Teachings #1-3.
5. Based upon these indisputable facts, the EC (evil corporation) must be punished.
6. This justifies ignoring all intellectual property laws, with, of course, the sole exception of Sacred Truth #3.

Re:Boss of eWEEK.com here ...

[Antaeus Feldspar]

Well, it's good to see you to take that stance. I don't think you can blame people for thinking that you really were pressing for an absurd level of absolute, fair-use-need-not-apply control over all your content -- since many publishers have taken exactly that absurd of a stance.