Bad News Vegas

[LSanders]

Thanks, DBR, for the link about the disgrace in the desert.

I don't know which entity's more pathetic ... Leech-like Righthaven (gotta love the irony of the name) that seems to operate under the mantra that no right's too big or small to be infringed as long as a buck can be made ... Or, the ludicrous embodiment of cutting off the nose to spite the face, otherwise known as the Las Vegas Review-Journal (LVRJ).

LVRJ? Are you kidding? Who's ever heard of them? And, as you rightly state, who will ever hear of them in the future once this flurry subsides?

I suppose the best justice will be in the slow death and destruction of each of Righthaven's clients who don't seem to understand that EXPOSURE for a media outlet is a GOOD thing. My advice to LVRJ is to stop publishing altogether (which, under the keen leadership of its management team seems inevitable) because paper can be photocopied!!!!!!!!!

To the management team, who really knows how to put the jerk into knee-jerk, I have to tip my hat. You really showed those meanies at LocalsLoveVegas.com, et al, what tough guys you are. God forbid a volunteer for the local Make-A-Wish Foundation stumbles across a nugget of journalistic gold from LVRJ ............. Sorry. I sometimes crack myself up ............... and innocently includes it in the monthly newsletter alongside the story about the 3-year-old dying of liver cancer who desperately wanted her own Elmo doll. You're going down, Make-a-Wish Foundation! Righthaven's on the job!!!!!!!!!!

Oh, and yes, LVRJ management, you can borrow the hat I use for tipping once the bankruptcy court shutters your offices so you'll have something to place on the sidewalk. Two things: (1) You must PROMISE to disinfect it before you return it ... AND ... (2) Be very careful not to use any other hobo's shtick. Otherwise, you'll receive an unannounced visit from the process servers for Bumhaven. Those boys play hardball. At least, until the hot soup is served.

[brevity]

I'll never understand why someone starts a thread based on something in DBR and fails to link to it. DBR's front page article was here (http://www.dukebasketballreport.com/articles/?p=35278), and it linked to this (http://bigjournalism.com/rfutrell/2010/09/10/righthaven-lawsuits-a-chilling-effect-on-the-blogosphere/).

Basically, the Las Vegas daily newspaper has contracted with a company that will sue any website that shares original content -- even if properly attributed and linked -- as a copyright violation, flying in the face of all fair use precedent.

I live in Las Vegas, and the Review-Journal fulfills the purpose of a daily paper for people who feel they still need a daily paper in their lives. Local interest, national wire reports, sports betting lines, coupons. They've absorbed the near-dead rival paper, the Sun, into an 8-page section. Not surprisingly, those are the best 8 pages they print. There is some relevant content on its website, but the websites of the local TV stations are far more reliable and contain better reporting (when they report at all -- the Las Vegas news scene mimics that of Los Angeles, so it's celeb-obsessed).

But back to my point: the Review-Journal does try to meet the requirements of its mission statement, which I quote below:

[deleted by mods]

[sue71, esq]

I live in Las Vegas, and the Review-Journal fulfills the purpose of a daily paper for people who feel they still need a daily paper in their lives. Local interest, national wire reports, sports betting lines, coupons. They've absorbed the near-dead rival paper, the Sun, into an 8-page section. Not surprisingly, those are the best 8 pages they print. There is some relevant content on its website, but the websites of the local TV stations are far more reliable and contain better reporting (when they report at all -- the Las Vegas news scene mimics that of Los Angeles, so it's celeb-obsessed).


Their biggest "draw" if you will, is Norm's column (it's all about who was seen where and when and blah blah celebrity blah blah). Feh.

[cf-62]

I'll never understand why someone starts a thread based on something in DBR and fails to link to it. DBR's front page article was here (http://www.dukebasketballreport.com/articles/?p=35278), and it linked to this (http://bigjournalism.com/rfutrell/2010/09/10/righthaven-lawsuits-a-chilling-effect-on-the-blogosphere/).

Basically, the Las Vegas daily newspaper has contracted with a company that will sue any website that shares original content -- even if properly attributed and linked -- as a copyright violation, flying in the face of all fair use precedent.

I live in Las Vegas, and the Review-Journal fulfills the purpose of a daily paper for people who feel they still need a daily paper in their lives. Local interest, national wire reports, sports betting lines, coupons. They've absorbed the near-dead rival paper, the Sun, into an 8-page section. Not surprisingly, those are the best 8 pages they print. There is some relevant content on its website, but the websites of the local TV stations are far more reliable and contain better reporting (when they report at all -- the Las Vegas news scene mimics that of Los Angeles, so it's celeb-obsessed).

But back to my point: the Review-Journal does try to meet the requirements of its mission statement, which I quote below:

[deleted by mods]

Okay -- wait a second. Just because you attribute an online article to a publisher does not give you the right to "re-publish" it, even if you're a blogger.

I think these guys are being less than human with these lawsuits, but I have a hard time expressing sympathy for bloggers, who get ad revenue for their sites, re-publishing an article, which means readers won't go to the original site - for which THAT company / publisher gets ad revenue.

Every lawsuit I saw was for "re-publishing" content, not linking.

As the control point for 2 companies' web sites, I can tell you that I would not consider replicating copy from a linked site as my right. In fact, if I did it, I would expect a C&D letter within minutes of an article being discovered.

[CameronBornAndBred]

Okay -- wait a second. Just because you attribute an online article to a publisher does not give you the right to "re-publish" it, even if you're a blogger.

Very true, even DBR discourages posters from quoting too much from articles in their posts. I wonder how much these people actually posted from the articles. If it's only a sentence or two, then it's beyond ludicrous. If they posted the whole article, or even a decent sized portion of it, then they have a valid argument. It's still a scary idea though, all these Righthaven guys are doing is buying the rights to the stories and then trying to make money by suing someone for infringement. That's the only reason they are buying the rights in the first place, not so they can go off and republish them. Talk about one hell of a business model.

[alteran]

Very true, even DBR discourages posters from quoting too much from articles in their posts. I wonder how much these people actually posted from the articles. If it's only a sentence or two, then it's beyond ludicrous. If they posted the whole article, or even a decent sized portion of it, then they have a valid argument. It's still a scary idea though, all these Righthaven guys are doing is buying the rights to the stories and then trying to make money by suing someone for infringement. That's the only reason they are buying the rights in the first place, not so they can go off and republish them. Talk about one hell of a business model.

In one case, they sued a guy because someone in a forum on his site pasted part of an article in a post. The DMCA's Safe Harbor provision explicitly says that you are not liable for that kind of infringement if you honor a DMCA takedown request. Of course, these, ahem, entrepreneurs never sent a takedown request. My understanding is that if the request is not made, you cannot prevail against them for infringement.

Of course, it's going to cost you a lot of money to get to this point.

There is simply no good faith with these guys at all.

[cf-62]

In one case, they sued a guy because someone in a forum on his site pasted part of an article in a post. The DMCA's Safe Harbor provision explicitly says that you are not liable for that kind of infringement if you honor a DMCA takedown request. Of course, these, ahem, entrepreneurs never sent a takedown request. My understanding is that if the request is not made, you cannot prevail against them for infringement.

Of course, it's going to cost you a lot of money to get to this point.

There is simply no good faith with these guys at all.

To protect the "innocent" I know for a fact that the going settlement rate for a national services company is $3,000. What that meant was that if you sent an official demand letter over an alleged mis-deed against you, with a demand for $3000 or less, the company would just write a check and send over an agreement.

Even frivolous suits take about $3,000 to get dismissed. I think that's why you see that one of the sites settled for $2,100. It's worth it.

[alteran]

To protect the "innocent" I know for a fact that the going settlement rate for a national services company is $3,000. What that meant was that if you sent an official demand letter over an alleged mis-deed against you, with a demand for $3000 or less, the company would just write a check and send over an agreement.

Even frivolous suits take about $3,000 to get dismissed. I think that's why you see that one of the sites settled for $2,100. It's worth it.

I'm sure that's correct. My original reading of your prior post was that you were saying there was some ethical legitimacy to the suits, because the sites were "republishing."

I'm getting the feeling there is not. This is a skeazy, bad faith operation. If it was in good faith they wouldn't be suing the guy because some random dude posted part of an article on a message board. They'd ask him to remove it.

[cf-62]

I'm sure that's correct. My original reading of your prior post was that you were saying there was some ethical legitimacy to the suits, because the sites were "republishing."

I'm getting the feeling there is not. This is a skeazy, bad faith operation. If it was in good faith they wouldn't be suing the guy because some random dude posted part of an article on a message board. They'd ask him to remove it.

No, I don't think there's merit to the suits. They're trash, designed to get a quick 4 digit settlement.

I do question, however, a blogger's "right" to republish content. Again, if I create some great content to drive users to my site, there are two specific behaviors I want:
A) I want a blogger to link to my site - preferable off a favorable review / comment
B) I want the blogger to NOT re-publish my piece. It does me absolutely no good if users can get the feed without coming to ******.com

[cf-62]

Here's an example of exactly what I'm talking about. Here is a link to a Yahoo UpShot story. Yahoo Upshot is a set of a few dozen bloggers that write random stories about specific topics.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/yblog_upshot/20100929/bs_yblog_upshot/swanky-new-vegas-hotels-death-ray-a-mild-inconvenience-for-some-guests

BUT the Las Vegas Review-Journal investigated the story, researched the story, and printed the story. Then the Upshot blogger takes all their work and publishes his "story" about it -- and because of the LV Journal-Review, searches on the hotel have spiked. But where are all those searches leading you? To this guy's Yahoo Blog. They don't even LINK to the LVJ-R, they just mention it.

That's just not right, DMAC or not.

I can already smell the lawsuit.

[-jk]

The EFF is fighting back (http://m.apnews.com/ap/db_11750/contentdetail.htm?contentguid=mJF69HYs).

-jk

[cf-62]

Sorry, but bloggers don't have the right to reproduce any article I write. They have the right to link to it, and to use a PART of it as a promotion of the link.

They should not be allowed to copy the work of my article as THEIR news story - to be paid by Yahoo - which then dominates searches for the topic of my story - and takes all the advertising dollars.

And that is what the LV J-R is really fighting here. I've seen some of these articles now that the lawsuits are about - and they would get F's in journalism class. They are plagiarism - and violate fair use ideals.

Yahoo is especially egregious in this practice as their "news" section is actually a set of bloggers - roflmao.