Comments on: Creative Splommons?

By: Pohdiskeleva Liftari » CC-lisenssit: miten epäkaupallista epäkaupallisen käytön pitää olla?

Wed, 04 Jan 2006 05:02:15 +0000

[...] Crooked Timberissä mietitään, mitä Creative commons-lisenssien “epäkaupallinen käyttö” itse asiassa tarkoittaa. Pohdiskelu on lähtenyt liikkeelle spammiblogien, ts. splogien tavasta käyttää CC-lisensoitua sisältöä uudelleen sellaisenaan, minkä lisenssi sinänsä sallii – tässä tapauksessa kuitenkin vain epäkaupallisessa tarkoituksessa. Mutta missä menee kaupallisuuden raja? Onko esimerkiksi Pohdiskeleva liftari voittoa tuottamattomine Google-mainoksineen kaupallinen sivusto? “What allows a blogger or web-publisher with incidental advertising to KNOW that they are a non-commercial user?” Avainsanat [...]

By: Seth Finkelstein

Seth Finkelstein — Tue, 03 Jan 2006 06:12:31 +0000

You’re correct, the spammers themselves don’t care about shaming. The information collected is for use by anti-spammers, to keep track of the various “spam gangs” and to put pressure on collaborators.

By: KCinDC

KCinDC — Mon, 02 Jan 2006 16:08:05 +0000

Is there any evidence at all that spammers are susceptible to shaming? Shame went out of fashion a long time before spammers hit the scene. Besides, their target audience isn’t going to be aware of whatever shaming is taking place, since they target only the extremely ignorant. Why would the spammers care what you have to say?

By: Seth Finkelstein

Seth Finkelstein — Mon, 02 Jan 2006 12:07:40 +0000

For organized spammer-shaming, see:

ROSKO

“The Register of Known Spam Operations (ROKSO) database collates information and evidence on known professional spam operations that have been terminated by a minimum of 3 Internet Service Providers for spam offenses.”

By: mitchell porter

mitchell porter — Mon, 02 Jan 2006 04:04:59 +0000

I have a question. Is there any organized attempt, anywhere, to determine who the spammers are, and to list their identities, and preserve the evidence, in an Internet Hall of Shame? I am sick of seeing people engaged in purely defensive behavior, coming up with technical hacks that make it difficult for the spammers to get through. Spamming itself should be universally regarded as shameful and destructive, and it should be a thing that happens once in a blue moon, rather than being a daily plague.

I append an email that I just sent to some comment spammers, Florida Internet Services, Inc.

“To: sales@floridanetservices.com

“Subject: Internet advertising

“To whom it may concern,

“It would appear that you have advertised a website of yours on the following page, using “comment spam” (see last comment):
http://pixnaps.blogspot.com/2005/07/transphysicalism-and-virtual-happiness.html

“It would also appear that you have no idea how utterly contemptible and destructive such a method of advertising is; because if you did, you would certainly not engage in it. Where to begin? The statement itself, as to how you ended up at the blog in question, is simply a lie. Do I even need to explain that lies are destructive? And now, thanks to technical progress, we have automatic lies, lies in the thousands, lies posted by machines to websites where human beings are trying to have a conversation.

“So. The very first thing to understand is that this is a new form of pollution that you are producing. The next thing to understand is that it is destroying the global reputation of Florida. I live on the other side of the world, and Florida to me is already synonymous with con artists, just because of all the comment spam that is coming from your state.

“The third thing to understand is that the Internet is unlikely to put up with this forever. Because of the novelty of the problem, people so far are focusing on defensive measures. But one day soon, they will get fed up, and start being proactive. They will want to know who the spammers are, why they do it, and they will try to humiliate them (or worse) by dragging their names through the mud in public, in order to deter others from ever engaging in the same destructive behavior. If – if – you get out of the game now, you may be spared that fate. Stick with it, and eventually you will be blacklisted for life by a cyberculture that has a very, very long memory.

“Yours sincerely,
Mitchell Porter”

By: David Moles

David Moles — Sun, 01 Jan 2006 23:23:30 +0000

What makes our site different than a splog is, among other things, that small sums we earn are definitely not the point. But I’m not sure how that could be legally codified.

Isn’t the more important difference (esp. for purposes of this discussion) that your content is original?

By: Rob Rickner

Rob Rickner — Sun, 01 Jan 2006 20:03:57 +0000

Another point. Defining commercial advantage using the tax-code wouldn’t be helpful. Really, the only difference between a for-profit and non-profit corporation is whether you can distribute assets to your shareholders (or members). I think the license, or at least the people who use it, think that non-commercial prohibits more activity than the tax-code definition would allow.

By: Rob Rickner

Rob Rickner — Sun, 01 Jan 2006 19:58:17 +0000

The question you’ve asked isn’t quite on the mark. There is no actual defined meaning to this set of particular words. For the most part, we won’t be sure what they actually mean without some case law. So, the real question is – how would a court interpret the license. If they followed the fair-use cases, non-commercial would be defined very broadly. In fact, any site using CC material next to blog-ads could be infringing. Then again, the license seems to grant more leeway than fair-use does.

As for intent, that would be useless. If you could actually prodduce evidence of someone saying, “I’m using this for commercial purposes”, that would be great evidence. However, intent will usually be inferred from the particular uses. In effect, any inquiry into intent will just come down to whether the actual use of the CC’d material is “commercial”.

By: Peter

Peter — Sun, 01 Jan 2006 19:32:48 +0000

Wikipedia has been guilty of something similar—lifting entire web-pages of mine, on which is clearly stated that the contents are copyright and not be used without my prior permission. When I have complained they have removed the offending pages, but because they have a free-reuse policy, my pages have already been copied onto multiple other sites. I wonder if this is how Wikipedia grew so fast?

By: John Holbo

John Holbo — Sun, 01 Jan 2006 19:01:33 +0000

Marsha, you are wrong to imply that anyone could owe Creative Commons anything. They just provide the legal verbiage. They aren’t parties to the dispute. On the other hand, you are right that it isn’t really reasonable to expect the application of CC to be utterly free of vagueness.

By: Stephen Spear

Stephen Spear — Sun, 01 Jan 2006 18:56:44 +0000

If “commercial advantage” is intended to mean for-profit commercial activity, then it should be possible to define this fairly precisely using the U.S. Tax Code’s definition of non-profit activities, which can include money-making (and ~~raising) activities that support the non~~profit organization’s activities, including compensation of employees, investment in infrastructure and so on.

By: marsha

marsha — Sun, 01 Jan 2006 18:56:04 +0000

oh and if:book can go after the splog cause it owns it’s actual words but probably won’t be worth it.

By: marsha

marsha — Sun, 01 Jan 2006 18:54:41 +0000

Alot of this stuff is boilerplate that doesn’t quite fit the new world.

The word “intent” is ambiguous but it has to be. We write law for human beings and human beings are ambiguous. If, for some reason, Creative Commons doesn’t like the way you are getting money off your site they have footing to take you to court. In court you offer your evidence for your intent.

This post is now evidence. You clearly are saying your intent is to write, not make loads of money.

Judge or jury will then decide if you are a big fake making unheard of millions without compensating poor CC or if you are a poor boy being abused by megacorp Creative Commons.

I figure splogs will be treated like spam and junk mail. You block what you can and avoid what you can’t. Again, we’re human beings-those who can do, those who can’t make money off those who can.

And if money is being made off a splog CC could absolutely sue them for copyright infringement.

By: John Holbo

John Holbo — Sun, 01 Jan 2006 18:52:50 +0000

Apologies to Matt for not noticing his comment was waiting in queue until after I made the update.

By: Tom

Tom — Sun, 01 Jan 2006 18:24:52 +0000

I haven’t the foggiest how to solve this problem (and I do think it is a problem) but I am pretty sure that “intent” can’t be part of the solution. You already raise several of the issues in your post, but there are other ones too. So, just to hit that whack that particular mole on the head:

What about the budding academic (maybe even on CT?) who is using a blog as a way of raising a profile and thereby improving their career prospects? Commercial intent or not?

What about bloggers employed elsewhere who blog as an adjunct to their job? Or as part of their job? Or, as is often the case, somewhere in between? Commercial or not?

What about group blogs shared among some people who already have income from somewhere else and some who don’t (and therefore need the money)?

In short, wherever you invoke “intent” there is a danger of creating a gentlemen/players kind of class distinction between the grubby commercials and those who pursue loftier goals, and I’m sure that’s not what you are looking for.