Well, they didn’t adapt, that’s for sure. And for a modern-day variation on this scenario, look no further than the Associated Press.
In the Web 2.0 world, where bloggers often post snippets of other people’s work and then link to the full details, AP has gone the way of the cyber-dodo and filed multiple Digital Millennial Copyright Act (DMCA) takedown requests against bloggers.
The non-gobbledy-gook explanation: Claiming misuse of copyright, AP filed a complaint with the bloggers’ hosting companies. Because the DMCA is a guilty-until-proven-innocent law, the hosting companies had to comply.
Check out Mike Masnick‘s Techdirt analysis of the situation, a response to the AP by Rogers Cadenhead (one of the takedown-ees), and a pointedly funny response by Silicon Valley blogger Michael Arrington to get the full scoop.
Me, I think the whole thing about using a snippet in a blog and linking to the article is the high-tech equivalent of how we used to use footnotes and bibliographies, back in the days of secondary school. It’s a good thing no one from AP was sitting in any of my classrooms, waiting to sue me over a reference in a history paper, or takedown my final essay in civics. Sheesh, I’d have flunked if that were the case!
C’mon, AP. Adapt. Get with the new.
(Thanks to Kevin Skarritt at Acorn Creative for flagging the issue for us.)
