Category: law

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Facebook’s Walled Garden a Gulag?

share on facebookOn February 4 Facebook revised their Terms of Service, removing a clause stating that user content would no longer be under license to Facebook.

Well, now the terms indicate that anything you ever upload or share to your facebook profile — regardless of whether your account is active — is Facebook’s property to do whatever they want with.

UPDATE: Facebook did an about face and reverted to its previous ToS per a blog post on feb 17.

Did anyone receive notification to review the new Terms of Service before someone finally stumbled upon it — an outrageous 11 days after the fact? What if major publishers decide to boycott by removing “share on facebook” links? That’s not happening, not with the increasing traffic these blogs/sites receive via Facebook referrals.

This is the Internet, folks, and this is nothing new and hardly a surprise from Facebook — it was only a matter of time that they reworded the terms of content ownership (check out my previous posts on Facebook privacy here, here, and here).

If you’re someone who openly shares details and content on the Internet (as I do), you’re only fooling yourself if you believe said content cannot be “stolen” or used against you. Think you’re pre-February 4th content is protected (if you have since deleted your Facebook profile? Not likely. Facebook is the model for a walled garden online network. Now we’ll see how far they go with their power to abuse, sell, sublicense and manipulate user data and content.

The key passages of the ToS are below (new ToS / old ToS)

Continue reading “Facebook’s Walled Garden a Gulag?”

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Internet Radio Bill Passes House Unanimously, Senate Next

SaveNetRadio.orgGreat news for WOOZradio, Pandora and all other net radio broadcasters. Though this bill doesn’t entirely spell things out re: the future of net radio (at least in terms of WOOZ and our streaming via Live365) it is a positive step toward a solution that will keep net radio alive after many contentious months following the CRB’s unfair ruling in March 2007.

The key — the National Association of Broadcasters has rolled over:

The real deciding factor came when Rep. Howard Berman (D-Calif.) met with members of the NAB. They told him that they feared their Web competitors would get a deal done first. Under the terms of the legislation, SoundExchange, the body that collects royalties and is part of the Recording Industry Association of America, has until Dec. 15 to negotiate a new rate. The NAB apparently was worried that the deadline didn’t give the organization enough time to strike its own royalty agreement.

“Berman said ‘Fine, we’ll extend the date until Feb. 15, which gives you two more months to talk,'” said one music-industry source with knowledge of the discussions. “There isn’t anything in the act that prevents traditional broadcasters from reaching their own royalty rate.”

That did the trick, according to the source. Dennis Wharton, an NAB spokesman confirmed Saturday night that the NAB met with Berman and that the deadline was extended. He said the trade organization has dropped its opposition in both houses of Congress.

You can listen to netZoo Internet Radio station — WOOZradio commercial free (for a small monthly fee that cuts into our royalty payments) by clicking here. Or listen w/ commercials for free.

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Recent Videos on Copyright Reform

An interesting request appeared on my desk this morning to put the 2007, Danish-produced video Good Copy, Bad Copy onto DVD. I was surprised I haden’t seen it yet — it’s quite good, and includes interviews with Girl Talk and Danger Mouse, music by RJD2, Santogold and more. Entertaining! Check it. Oddly, it doesn’t appear to explicitly be Creative Commons licensed or otherwise (which under U.S. law indicates that it is “all rights reserved” by default) however it is available for download in multiple formats via Blip.tv.

Also check out the most recent (I think) Creative Commons vid on CC and Commerce from November 2007: Continue reading “Recent Videos on Copyright Reform”