Copyright

[dack]

Anyone clued up on website copyright issues?

I run several fourms and I've had an email from someone claiming copyright infringment on particular posts. Some of the posts are copies from articles on his website. However, his site closed several years ago and the information was obtained via archive.org.

I've googled some of the articles in dispute and found several copies on the web (including the BBC) so looks like he never owned some of the stuff in the first place. Other stuff he claims copyright to are extracts from a book.

So my question is, if someone emails me claiming copyright, how can I know if it's genuine or the copy is itself a copy form somewhere else? Is the owness upon them to prove that they actually created the work?

[Clippy]

From your own research you have ascertained that the works in question appear to be copyrighted by other individuals and not the person making the claim.

Knowing this, if it were me, I would remove them from the forums immediately.

Thereafter, I would contact the perceived copyright holders and confirm if this is the case and determine if you can reproduce the articles and, if so, if there is a cost involved.

IMO, if you are reproducing works on a public forum, then the onus is upon you to ensure you are legally allowed to do so.

You may be able to find additional information here.

[dack]

Cheers Clippy, good link, lots of info.

Most of the articles in question are from big sites like the BBC so I've amended the posts on my site to show the article as a quote with a link.

Yeh, it seems like as the forum owner, I'm responsible for all content and any objections will land with me.

[northernladuk]

To be honest at the slightest sniff of this type of thing just take it off. It really isn't worth the hassle. Unless the contect you put up is key to the running of your forum or will impact your user base then remove it. It's one thread and won't kill you.

They other option is not only the other guy taking legal action but if he is any kind of player on the net he can start bad mouthing your site which if he knows his stuff can rise up the rankings quickly and be a real thorn in your side. Probably won't affect you business or traffic wise but not nice if you like to sleep at night.

The other option is to offer credit to the guy who says it is his. If your site has good ranking and traffic it might suit you both to link to him and his work?

[MaryPoppins]

[QUOTE=northernladuk;1014406]Blah blah blahQUOTE]

Nice autosig

[northernladuk]

Thought you might like it

You missed your [/ on your closing quote in that mail as well

[dack]

To be honest at the slightest sniff of this type of thing just take it off. It really isn't worth the hassle. Unless the contect you put up is key to the running of your forum or will impact your user base then remove it. It's one thread and won't kill you.

They other option is not only the other guy taking legal action but if he is any kind of player on the net he can start bad mouthing your site which if he knows his stuff can rise up the rankings quickly and be a real thorn in your side. Probably won't affect you business or traffic wise but not nice if you like to sleep at night.

The other option is to offer credit to the guy who says it is his. If your site has good ranking and traffic it might suit you both to link to him and his work?

He has already threatened to bad mouth me and sent me a copy of what he 'claims' to have put on the web. He was credited with the work but his site was closed several years ago. The copy details were obtained via http://www.archive.org.

He got the hump cos I banned him for winding people up and dismissing my warnings.

Cheers for the advice, it seems the safest and quickest course of action is to simply to remove any contested material.

[northernladuk]

I am very pedantic about this as I had a similar problem a few years ago but unfortunately picked on a bigger fish than me and had a lot of problems.

He could just be a bully mouthin off with the 'i am/know a lawyer' type but for me it's just not big enough to fight so take it off and sleep sound imo..

Good luck.

[ASB]

I am very pedantic about this as I had a similar problem a few years ago but unfortunately picked on a bigger fish than me and had a lot of problems.

He could just be a bully mouthin off with the 'i am/know a lawyer' type but for me it's just not big enough to fight so take it off and sleep sound imo..

Good luck.

You're probably quite right that it's not worth the hassle, but if the item is in the public domain does that not give a right for partial reproduction on the grounds of fair comment?