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Pinterest, We Have a Problem

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Re: Pinterest, We Have a Problem

#51

Post by jfarmer »

I have one direct comment and one meta-comment about the issue of Pinteret and copyright.

First, I see no issue with their Terms of Service. That language is 100% cover-your-ass boilerplate, and any site that allows people to upload content will have a similar clause in their ToS. Facebook, YouTube, SoundCloud, etc. all do.

See, e.g., section 6.C of YouTube's ToS: http://www.youtube.com/static?gl=US&template=terms

If you find people are sharing your copyrighted material on Pinterest you should file a DMCA claim with them. That's how the mechanism is designed to work, for better or worse.

Second, when you react viscerally to what Pinterest is doing or enabling, think carefully about your opinion of YouTube. With respect to content, is there a substantive difference between these early days of Pinterest and the early days of YouTube?

The MPAA is probably saying, "See? You don't like it when it happens to you, either."

Re: Pinterest, We Have a Problem

#52

Post by andrewfelix »

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…

>Absolutely any and every product you use has ridiculous Terms of Service.

I've been using vi.sualize.us for quite some time. It has a very similar service to Pinterest but much better ToS. Have a read http://vi.sualize.us/help/terms/

Re: Pinterest, We Have a Problem

#53

Post by kevinpet »

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…

No, it's time to start saying "hey, that looks like a great service, but I'm absolutely not using it until you offer it on legal terms that I find acceptable".

Re: Pinterest, We Have a Problem

#54

Post by waitwhat »

icebraining wrote: post #36
zaroth wrote: post #25

Speaking of the DMCA Safe Harbor... Images on Pinterest, in some cases, were not even uploaded from a user's hard drive; they were pulled in via a the 'Pin It' button ( http://pinterest.com/about/goodies/ ) In this case, Pinterest even acknowledges that the images are not the property of the user, "When you pin from a website, we automatically grab the source link so we can credit the original creator." I'll bet the…

In this case, Pinterest even acknowledges that the images are not the property of the user, "When you pin from a website, we automatically grab the source link so we can credit the original creator." And that's fine - their ToS says you need to be either the copyright holder or have consent from the copyright holder. For example, if I "pin" a CC licensed image, I have such consent.

their ToS says you need to be either the copyright holder or have consent from the copyright holder.

I've seen warez sites with exactly the same disclaimer. It didn't work for them either.

Re: Pinterest, We Have a Problem

#55

Post by aiscott »

I'm an amateur photographer, and I wasn't too concerned about this until I read that by Pinning something, their TOS says I am granting them rights to sell my work.

I don't like that very much.

  By making available any Member Content through the Site,
  Application or Services, you hereby grant to Cold Brew Labs
  a worldwide, irrevocable, perpetual, non-exclusive, 
  transferable, royalty-free license, with the right to 
  sublicense, to use, copy, adapt, modify, distribute, license,
  sell, transfer, publicly display, publicly perform,
  transmit, stream, broadcast, access, view, and otherwise 
  exploit such Member Content only on, through or by means of
  the Site, Application or Services.
The rest just seems like standard CYA stuff.

Re: Pinterest, We Have a Problem

#56

Post by eurleif »

elithrar wrote: post #34
maqr wrote: post #29

Maybe all the buzz about Pinterest is because so many people think that finding an image online makes it publicly redistributable. "Pinning" is just another way of sharing. I get the impression that there's much wider public acceptance of sharing (pirating?) pictures than music, movies, or software. I don't have a good answer as to why this might be, but I'd be curious what HN thinks.

> I get the impression that there's much wider public acceptance of sharing (pirating?) pictures than music, movies, or software. I don't have a good answer as to why this might be, but I'd be curious what HN thinks. Anecdotally, it's because photographs and images are seen as "easier to reproduce" (whether this is true or not is another matter), and therefore possibly easier to justify by those doing the sharing. Th…

Perhaps it's also that photos seem less valuable than songs or movies, since pretty much anyone can take a decent photo? (Decent by the person's own standards, at least; maybe not by a professional photographer's.)

Re: Pinterest, We Have a Problem

#57

Post by mlinsey »

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…

Flickr enables their users to mark their images as not-sharable, which now includes disabling anyone from sharing the images on Pinterest: http://venturebeat.com/2012/02/24/flickr-pinterest-pin/

Legally (IANAL but my understanding is), Pinterest only needs to comply with DMCA takedown requests. Instead they are being proactive and allow people to tag images as "nopin", vastly reducing the need for tedious or unreliable monitoring of Pinterest for copyrighted content, as content owners must do for almost every other sharing site. That's a good thing, and they should be applauded for it.

I suspect you might dislike the opt-out vs. opt-in nature of the nopin system, but new technologies have been accused of facilitating the death of copyright ever since the invention of the radio, but it turned out that most of those inventions created a lot of value for the world and for creators who adapt to the new medium.

Re: Pinterest, We Have a Problem

#58

Post by mikeknoop »

So here is a thought. I presume the article is mostly critical of the terms based on comments here. But consider a service without any "ownership" terms, etc. Two scenarios:

1. When a user "pins" an image elsewhere online, the image is downloaded by Pinterest to their server. When other users browse Pinterest, it is served directly by Pinterest's servers.

2. When a user "pins" an image elsewhere online, the image URL is saved by Pinterest to their server. When other users browse Pinterest, they are downloading the image directly from the original source.

Scenario (1) I see legal issues with. But scenario (2)? Isn't Pinterest simply providing a link (ala a search engine)? Moreover, isn't this just how the internet works?

Surely this has come up before yet I am having trouble finding a similar case.

Re: Pinterest, We Have a Problem

#59

Post by icebraining »

hristov wrote: post #44
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 mi…

Do you really think any other content submission service - Youtube, Flickr, etc - doesn't have a disclaimer like this? That they make themselves liable for what their users submit?

And how is this abusive? Why should they be held liable for what their users do?

From Youtube's ToS:

    To the extent permitted by applicable law, you agree to defend,
    indemnify and hold harmless YouTube, its parent corporation, officers,
    directors, employees and agents, from and against any and all claims,
    damages, obligations, losses, liabilities, costs or debt, and expenses
    (including but not limited to attorney's fees) arising from: (i) your use
    of and access to the Service; (ii) your violation of any term of these
    Terms of Service; (iii) your violation of any third party right, including
    without limitation any copyright, property, or privacy right; or (iv) any
    claim that your Content caused damage to a third party. This defense
    and indemnification obligation will survive these Terms of Service and
    your use of the Service.

Re: Pinterest, We Have a Problem

#60

Post by dangrossman »

ajross wrote: post #42
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 idea…

> No one freaked out over /r/pics,

/r/pics is just a collection of links to images; it does not reproduce or redistribute the images.

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