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Copyfraud - removing works from the public domain

by xiaophil
12 replies
An interesting article about how some well known heavyweight corporations are claiming copyright on materials and effectively removing them from the public domain.

According to the article it's easy and anyone can do it.

Fancy claiming a classic novel?

Copyfraud: Poisoning the public domain ? The Register

Let me know if it works.
#copyfraud #domain #public #removing #works
  • Profile picture of the author bgmacaw
    Disney has be doing this crapola for decades, it's just that it's online today.
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  • Profile picture of the author Josh Anderson
    That article is a bunch of hooey. It is full of purposeful misinformation and deception on the part of the AUTHOR of the article.

    Its entire premise is to push forward an agenda to restrict the use of Public Domain works for profit.

    In other words the agenda of that article is exactly what the author is pretending to be against... the Author wishes to restrict the use of Public Domain materials for profit.

    They made up the term copyfraud to try and poison the well.

    As Professor Mazzone says, "Copyright law suffers from a basic defect: the law's strong protections for copyrights are not balanced by explicit protections for the public domain."
    That is a quote from the article and it is total baloney.

    Once the text is in the public domain it is always in the public domain. So in other words if they obtained an original copy of a public domain work and digitized the text of it into a text file and then formatted it however they wanted it they are protected under the law.

    In their article they complain about companies that went to the expense of scanning works that these companies are offering only exerpts and then pointing people to amazon to buy the rest of the book.

    The author of the article complains about how terrible it is that someone had to buy the physical copy of the book because the company that scanned it and hosted it failed to include all the text online.

    SO WHAT.

    The author is nothing more than a freebie seeking whiner who wants companies, at their expense, to be forced to include the entire text of a public domain work which they funded the scanning and serving of online and he also wants those companies to not be allowed to profit from it.

    That is NOT what the public domain is about.

    If the author of the article went out and found the same original public domain book and scanned it himself he could do whatever he wanted with it.

    No one could stop him.

    The article is a joke and the complaints of someone who either does not understand the law and people's rights to profit from public domain works or he wants to twist the law to disallow commercial use of public domain works.

    It appears he is trying to skew the reasoning of his readers more toward the second with his hidden agenda.

    If this incorrect legal reasoning were used to interpret and enforce the law in regards to public domain it would actually destroy what it was intended for... innovation and dissemination of information.

    The motivation for commercial entities which have the resources to purchase, scan, reproduce, and distribute rare, expensive, and hard to find public domain works is that they can profit from it. They have larger reach and distribution channels.

    This helps save and disseminate knowledge and fuels innovation.

    The author of this article has the gall to call it copyfraud when an exceedingly rare text that he claims was previously unavailable to the public was scanned and made available by a commercial company whom without the work would remain in obscurity.
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    • Profile picture of the author braver55b
      Originally Posted by Josh Anderson View Post

      That article is a bunch of hooey. It is full of purposeful misinformation and deception on the part of the AUTHOR of the article.

      Its entire premise is to push forward an agenda to restrict the use of Public Domain works for profit.

      In other words the agenda of that article is exactly what the author is pretending to be against... the Author wishes to restrict the use of Public Domain materials for profit.

      They made up the term copyfraud to try and poison the well.

      That is a quote from the article and it is total baloney.

      Once the text is in the public domain it is always in the public domain. So in other words if they obtained an original copy of a public domain work and digitized the text of it into a text file and then formatted it however they wanted it they are protected under the law.

      In their article they complain about companies that went to the expense of scanning works that these companies are offering only exerpts and then pointing people to amazon to buy the rest of the book.

      The author of the article complains about how terrible it is that someone had to buy the physical copy of the book because the company that scanned it and hosted it failed to include all the text online.

      SO WHAT.

      The author is nothing more than a freebie seeking whiner who wants companies, at their expense, to be forced to include the entire text of a public domain work which they funded the scanning and serving of online and he also wants those companies to not be allowed to profit from it.

      That is NOT what the public domain is about.

      If the author of the article went out and found the same original public domain book and scanned it himself he could do whatever he wanted with it.

      No one could stop him.

      The article is a joke and the complaints of someone who either does not understand the law and people's rights to profit from public domain works or he wants to twist the law to disallow commercial use of public domain works.

      It appears he is trying to skew the reasoning of his readers more toward the second with his hidden agenda.

      If this incorrect legal reasoning were used to interpret and enforce the law in regards to public domain it would actually destroy what it was intended for... innovation and dissemination of information.

      The motivation for commercial entities which have the resources to purchase, scan, reproduce, and distribute rare, expensive, and hard to find public domain works is that they can profit from it. They have larger reach and distribution channels.

      This helps save and disseminate knowledge and fuels innovation.

      The author of this article has the gall to call it copyfraud when an exceedingly rare text that he claims was previously unavailable to the public was scanned and made available by a commercial company whom without the work would remain in obscurity.
      Josh You Are Right.

      If a person takes the time and expense to make a public domain work customized or value added and wants to profit from it. There is no reason he or she should not do so.

      That person sounds like a class envy socialist.
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      • Profile picture of the author Josh Anderson
        Originally Posted by braver55b View Post

        Josh You Are Right.

        If a person takes the time and expense to make a public domain work customized or value added and wants to profit from it. There is no reason he or she should not do so.

        That person sounds like a class envy socialist.
        That same author wants to block you and I from profiting from the Public Domain which is our right under the law.

        For example if I take a public domain text in its entirety and record it as an audio book I can copyright the audio book under the law.

        If I take a public domain text and add new commentary and/or new original illustrations etc then those would be copyrightable under the law and anyone who took, copied, and distributed those works would be infringing.

        However, the original text is still in the public domain and no one is limiting the public from using the original text only from copying and distributing the derivative works and copyrightable additions like new illustrations which are protected under the law.
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        • Profile picture of the author bgmacaw
          Originally Posted by Josh Anderson View Post

          If I take a public domain text and add new commentary and/or new original illustrations etc then those would be copyrightable under the law and anyone who took, copied, and distributed those works would be infringing.

          However, the original text is still in the public domain and no one is limiting the public from using the original text only from copying and distributing the derivative works and copyrightable additions like new illustrations which are protected under the law.
          This is how Disney does it with Snow White and so forth. The original fairy tales are still public domain but the new images and changes to the story line are copyrighted by Disney.
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      • Profile picture of the author xiaophil
        Wow, I thought this might be a touchy subject but never expected such a heated response. Good one.

        I'm uncertain on this one so for the moment will play the devil's advocate.

        Originally Posted by Josh Anderson View Post

        In their article they complain about companies that went to the expense of scanning works that these companies are offering only exerpts and then pointing people to amazon to buy the rest of the book.
        My understanding was that Google has scanned the book but doesn't offer the full text version because the publisher claims copyright on the entire work, even though the original (identical) text is in the public domain. Did I misunderstand something or isn't that the entire crux of copyfraud?

        Is it the knowledge that's in the public domain or the image of the words on the page?

        Originally Posted by braver55b View Post

        If a person takes the time and expense to make a public domain work customized or value added and wants to profit from it. There is no reason he or she should not do so.
        I think the point isn't so much about republishing a public domain based work for profit, but rather that if you were to copyright the "new" work then this would restricting the rights of those you sell too, as it would appear that they are not free to do the same even when the content is identical.

        I know GPL isn't PD but to me it seems a bit like designing a cover for a Linux CD and then claiming to own the entire contents.

        This article might taste a bit of "sour grapes" and I think the problem could be explained better. There's a legal studies paper available by Jason Mazzone that goes into more detail:

        http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.c...ract_id=787244

        ...false copyright claims, which are often accompanied by threatened litigation for reproducing a work without the owner's permission, result in users seeking licenses and paying fees to reproduce works that are free for everyone to use.


        Isn't it ridiculous to suggest that it is illegal to copy some words from a republished book but perfectly fine to copy the exact same words from the original?
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        • Profile picture of the author Josh Anderson
          My understanding was that Google has scanned the book but doesn't offer the full text version because the publisher claims copyright on the entire work,
          Nope, that is not the complaint at all. The complaint is that Google is only publishing excerpts and monetizing it by sending people to get the rest of the text via a copy they have to purchase.

          The article also complains that photos that should be in the public domain are not verified as being so and therefore not licensed by companies distributing them for public use.

          This is a dumb argument because if the photo is in the public domain you can just take it and use it. You don't need some third party company to give you permission or take the liability of researching, verifying, and licensing it to you as such.

          The article also complains about cases where infringement was committed and gives no reason to believe that infringement was not committed in those cases. If the work being copied and distributed were just the plain text (not images of pages or exact copied images of a book) found in the original public domain work and if that work were actually in the public domain there would have been no claim.

          The article offers no basis in law to back up the claims nor does it offer any concrete examples of works that are actually in the public domain being removed from the public domain or treated as copyrighted.

          What the author does it try to manipulate you into believing that is happening by implying it, using the word "copyfraud," which is not a legal term, and relying on the reader's limited understanding of the law to try and make it sound like there is a valid legal argument which there is not.

          Isn't it ridiculous to suggest that it is illegal to copy some words from a republished book but perfectly fine to copy the exact same words from the original?
          It certainly is. In fact you CAN copy the exact words that are in the public domain whether from the original text or the new work word for word.

          The key is that the words you can copy and use only include the original public domain words. If there is significant additional works in it such as illustration and special formatting you may not use that.

          For example if someone took a public domain work and then painted the words in calligraphy and the copy you took was an actual image (photo or scanned) of the calligraphy work that could be considered copyright infringement because the calligraphy work itself is considered a work that is copyrightable.

          But if you read the calligraphy which was simply written copying the original public domain text and you typed those words word for word then the words themselves are free to use.

          Nothing in that article you linked to claimed that Google was claiming copyright on the works.

          In fact even the companies publishing the public domain works in hard copy and putting a copyright on the book itself are not doing anything wrong.

          They do not have to specify what it is in the work that they are copyrighting to include a copyright notice.

          This does not mean that all of the work is copyrightable. The original text, from the original public domain work, is still in the public domain.

          Only additional new content things like illustrations, commentary, additional new chapters, foot notes, special formatting, forwards and introductions written new, the cover art etc are copyrightable.

          Also just because a work is in the public domain does not mean you cannot be sued by some company trying to claim copyright on it.

          It just means you have a legal defensible position if the parts of the work, and the way you are using those parts, constitutes public domain use.

          Unfortunately the article in question is not about the law at all. It is about how the author wants the law to be interpreted. It is also about his feeling that corporations like Google should not be allowed to use the Public Domain in the way that they are.

          The author would like to see the law modified to restrict our rights to use the Public Domain for profit and require us to use it in the ways he feels it should be used including forcing Google to display the entire text instead of sending people to buy the commercially printed complete text.

          Its a smear campaign concealed in a fake legal argument that is not based in legal precedent but rather how the author wishes the law would be written and interpreted so as to restrict commercial use of public domain works.

          This article might taste a bit of "sour grapes" and I think the problem could be explained better. There's a legal studies paper available by Jason Mazzone that goes into more detail:

          http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.c...ract_id=787244
          Even worse.

          If this guy had his way it would be harder for companies to use public domain works in one of the great beneficial ways that they are legally guaranteed to us for our use... commercially in the form of creating derivative works and claiming copyright to those portions of the derivative works which are truly copyrightable under the law.

          This guy is almost worse than Disney which successfully lobbied for and helped push laws through that extended copyrights and limited our access to works that would at this time be in the public domain had Disney not been so set on protecting their own assets as to disregard what impact their campaign to change the law would have on our own access to public domain works.

          Read what he is proposing and if you are an avid publisher of public domain works and derivative works created from public domain materials (which I have been for years) ask your self if you would continue to benefit from your free and unencumbered use of public domain works if he had his way? Ask your self if you would continue to feel comfortable taking the risk of using public domain materials if his ridiculous arguments were written into law (which they are not)?

          Do you want more liability when using public domain works? Do you want to have your rights to use Public Domain works diminished? Do you want the public do be able to sue you over your use of public domain works?

          That is what he is proposing.

          He is no advocate for Public Domain rights... he is a oponent who is arguing that the use of public domain and the rights of derivative work authors and those using public domain works for commercial purposes should be limited.
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    • Profile picture of the author Dan C. Rinnert
      Originally Posted by Josh Anderson View Post

      Its entire premise is to push forward an agenda to restrict the use of Public Domain works for profit.
      That would seem to be the case.

      The public domain provides a very useful balance against copyright-restricted works. I cannot, for example, sell a copy of a Harry Potter book. I can, however, sell a copy of The Red Badge of Courage.

      Granted, The Red Badge of Courage probably has a smaller market than the Harry Potter books and probably every major publisher has an imprint where they are selling The Red Badge of Courage so I have a lot of competition as well.

      However, the big guys will be focusing on marketing their Harry Potter or equivalent books, while I can focus on The Red Badge of Courage. I don't have to sell millions of copies to make it worth my while. I can even put together a "classics" series of books with The Red Badge of Courage and comparable books.

      I can establish myself in a small niche and build myself up into a bigger publisher.

      The motivation for commercial entities which have the resources to purchase, scan, reproduce, and distribute rare, expensive, and hard to find public domain works is that they can profit from it. They have larger reach and distribution channels.

      This helps save and disseminate knowledge and fuels innovation.

      The author of this article has the gall to call it copyfraud when an exceedingly rare text that he claims was previously unavailable to the public was scanned and made available by a commercial company whom without the work would remain in obscurity.
      Exactly. Using The Red Badge of Courage again as an example, that's a relatively popular one. It will sell. So, big publishers know that there is profit in it. That's why they'll have imprints selling copies of it. At the very least, they'll have school marketers, where the book is frequently assigned reading.

      So, while a small publisher may also publish The Red Badge of Courage, they have to look for ways to stand out. As I mentioned, they can heavily market it or they can put it together in a "classic" series or whatnot. They can carve out a small corner of the market with it.

      But, even so, it can be an uphill battle.

      That's why an obscure public domain work is the "Holy Grail" for the small publisher. They can take it, update it (or publish it as-is) and market it. And, for a while, they may even have exclusivity simply because the book is hard to find or no one found a way to make it interesting or people felt it was too outdated.

      So, a small, clever publisher brings new life to something that had fallen into obscurity.

      That small publisher could pick up an old public domain book for $10, scan it, update it and sell it. Let's say he sells it as an eBook for $7 and only sells 100 copies. That's $690 he made. Granted, that's not much, but for someone small that might make it worthwhile. If he does one book a month, and does no better than 100 copies with each, he's still getting an extra $690 a month for basically a day's work.

      And, if he could sell 500 copies or 1000 or more, so much the better, right?

      But, what big publisher is going to want to spend time looking for obscure books to make a few hundred or even a few thousand dollars? A lot of publishers aren't going to do that. Heck, there are a lot of books still under copyright protection that are out-of-print and no one's publishing them! If publishers don't have the incentive to publish books they may already still have the rights to, what is the incentive to publish older books that anyone can publish?

      And, what is the incentive to the small publisher if the profit motive is taken away?
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  • Profile picture of the author seasoned
    Public domain rights are PUBLIC DOMAIN! From time to time, someone WILL try to "poison" it, but it could theoretically be argued that they have CONTRIBUTED to the public domain and the use of that info is in GOOD FAITH!

    A good example of this is the lousy effort by SCO! They took a work that was ESSENTIALLY public domain! WORSE YET, the copyright was held by ANOTHER, and they POISONED it! They LATER tried to sue anyone, using contributed code, of copyright infringement! RIDICULOUS! It was hauled through the courts, and the KEPT LOSING! They eventually went bankrupt, and some idiot paid them to go on with their case.

    Obviously, they have STILL lost! Their goal was to OBLITERATE the Linux market! They FAILED! Why they are still around, I will never know.

    Steve

    Of course, if you buy something, and it is obviously different, you could be accused of copyright infringement if you copy it. With disney, most of the value is in the EXPRESSION, NOT the storyline. Disney started out, and still mostly is, a presentation company that specialized in animation. Heck, most of the earlier presentations didn't have much of a story AT ALL!
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