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Pinterest, We Have a Problem

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Re: Pinterest, We Have a Problem

#41

Post by icebraining »

freehunter wrote: post #30
edwinnathaniel wrote: post #9

Watermark the pictures in your blog? By the way, I found out that you can watermark all of your images that you're about to upload to Picasa Web via Picasa Desktop (there's an option to do that before you Sync to Web). I found that feature very useful if you organize your pictures using Picasa (and show them on your blog).

Problem is, copyright is implied on the part of the creator. It does not need to be applied for, nor is there any requirement for a copyright notice. Just because you didn't watermark your image doesn't mean the copyright now belongs to Pintrest (or imgur, or Google+, or Facebook, etc) because people who didn't hold the copyright and didn't have the standing to give it away posted it.

And that's why you can send a DMCA takedown request and they'll have to take it down. I fail to see the problem here.

Re: Pinterest, We Have a Problem

#42

Post by ajross »

xn wrote: post #32

If posting an image with a comment is fair use, then arguably the combination of the image and the comment constitute the Member Content for which the poster is claiming ownership. If I publish a review of a work of art, including a reproduction of the work, in a magazine, my copyright would cover the entire article including the reproduction. I wouldn't be claiming copyright on the original work.

That's pretty much how I see it too. Yes, you own the review, which includes the right to the image for the fair use purposes of explaining the review only. There is no transitive right if you sell that review to use the image for any other purpose.

I too find this insane. If anything qualifies for fair use, surely pinterest does. "Hey look at this cool thing!" is about as close as I can imagine to the platonic ideal of discussing a copyrighted work.

No one freaked out over /r/pics, so what's the deal here? I hesitate to point out that pinterest differs mostly in the gender demographics of the user base, but... yeah.

Re: Pinterest, We Have a Problem

#43

Post by why-el »

Alex3917 wrote: post #23

So you're claiming that pinterest should pay your legal bills for you? That's ridiculous. If you upload a photo that's copyrighted by someone else and get sued, why should pinterest foot the bill for that? There is no way the service would ever be viable under those conditions, because it would create an enormous moral hazard.

There is no moral hazard when they are claiming the right to sell material that might be copyrighted.

Re: Pinterest, We Have a Problem

#44

Post by hristov »

yuvadam wrote: post #3

Oh please, not again. Absolutely any and every product you use has ridiculous Terms of Service. These documents are drafted up by lawyers. Their job is not to please the end users who care to read through the legalese. Their job is to create a document that will protect the product vendor in court, if and when the time comes. Lets put an end to finding eccentricities in ToSs/EULAs, it's getting kind of redundant. If…

These are not eccentricities, this is serious stuff. Last time I checked US law allowed for damages of up o $150 000 per violation for copyright infringement. This EULA includes an indemnification and hold harmless clause, which means that if pinterest gets sued for something you upload you get pay for their defense and for any judgments if they loose.

So if this EULA holds up, it means it can easily expose you to millions of dollars of damages. Yes there are many exploitative EULAs out there but this is the first one I have seen that can get easily get you on the hook for millions of dollars for an innocuous action.

Re: Pinterest, We Have a Problem

#45

Post by anothermachine »

mtgentry wrote: post #12

'The “pin” button remains inactive until the user types something. Anything. Might this count as “criticizing” or “commenting”?' Interesting. I'd like to see a court case further define what constitutes a "comment" on the web. Other sites do this too, for example Buzzfeed.com's entire business model is based on taking content from bloggers and then hosting it on their own site, without providing any kind of insightfu…

"commenting" is only one aspect of fair use, and it generally is interpreted to mean "copying a small snippet as an example" or "reproducing a low-resolution copy for reference" to provide context.

Another aspect of fair use is "not depriving the owner of their own commercial use of the work".

Re: Pinterest, We Have a Problem

#46

Post by anothermachine »

freehunter wrote: post #30
edwinnathaniel wrote: post #9

Watermark the pictures in your blog? By the way, I found out that you can watermark all of your images that you're about to upload to Picasa Web via Picasa Desktop (there's an option to do that before you Sync to Web). I found that feature very useful if you organize your pictures using Picasa (and show them on your blog).

Problem is, copyright is implied on the part of the creator. It does not need to be applied for, nor is there any requirement for a copyright notice. Just because you didn't watermark your image doesn't mean the copyright now belongs to Pintrest (or imgur, or Google+, or Facebook, etc) because people who didn't hold the copyright and didn't have the standing to give it away posted it.

the watermark isn't for legal purposes, it is for communication and content-devaluation purposes

Re: Pinterest, We Have a Problem

#47

Post by timdorr »

OneBytePerGreen wrote: post #18

Pinterest has a market valuation of > 200 million dollars... 30%+ of its images are flickr images... ... 99%+ of which are "All Rights Reserved". How many ... page views, ... new subscribers, ... and $$$ have the most-pinned flickr images generated for pinterest, with the author not seeing a single cent... not even having the satisfaction of seeing their popularity on pinterest reflect in their flickr stats? And: Pin…

To be fair, Flickr has implemented the ability to opt out of "pinning" via a setting: http://www.flickr.com/account/prefs/sharing?from=privacy This adds the "nopin" meta tag to your pages automatically.

However, to be even more fair, the burden was on Flickr to implement this, not Pinterest. Pinterest is still encouraging copyright violation.

Re: Pinterest, We Have a Problem

#48

Post by icebraining »

viraptor wrote: post #33
brador wrote: post #6

Could this argument also apply to sites like Readability? Since it removes advertising (hence income for the writers) from articles.

I don't think so, unless readability grants itself rights to reproduce and sell every article that passes through its engine. Does it?

Maybe not sell, but they it'd be impossible for Readability to work without reproducing the articles.

Re: Pinterest, We Have a Problem

#50

Post by aiscott »

freehunter wrote: post #30
edwinnathaniel wrote: post #9

Watermark the pictures in your blog? By the way, I found out that you can watermark all of your images that you're about to upload to Picasa Web via Picasa Desktop (there's an option to do that before you Sync to Web). I found that feature very useful if you organize your pictures using Picasa (and show them on your blog).

Problem is, copyright is implied on the part of the creator. It does not need to be applied for, nor is there any requirement for a copyright notice. Just because you didn't watermark your image doesn't mean the copyright now belongs to Pintrest (or imgur, or Google+, or Facebook, etc) because people who didn't hold the copyright and didn't have the standing to give it away posted it.

This is true, but if you want to receive statutory damages for copyright infringement, you have to have registered your copyright.

http://www.copyright.gov/help/faq/faq-general.html#register

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