Re: Inquiry

Herring, Mark wrote:
> Two professors of business have written an article based upon a study of
> MySpace. A graduate student logged on and read various posts. The
> article is about advertisers and social networks. So far so good. But
> now the journal editors, after accepting the article, are fearful that
> the quoted postings (very, very few of the total possible) will make
> them liable. All the posts are anonymous “ A post to MySpace argued
> that “……”
>
>
>
> The journal has asked the authors for some evidence that this does not
> leave them open to a lawsuit. Any ideas? I have sent them 5 but want
> very much to hear what others have to say.
>

Let us assume that any country where such litigation might arise is a signatory to the Berne Convention.

Article 10(1) of the convention provides a mandatory exception:

"It shall be permissible to make quotations from a work which has already been lawfully made available to the public, provided that their making is compatible with fair practice, and their extent does not exceed that justified by the purpose"

all of which must be the case here, since if their extent does exceed that justified by the purpose, they have no place in the paper. There might be a further moot point as to whether posting on MySpace constitutes making available to the public in this context; I would suggest that it does - although one would need more information about the particular part of MySpace in which the posts first appeared.

Article 10(3), however, adds an acknowledgement requirement:

"Where use is made of works in accordance with the preceding paragraphs of this Article, mention shall be made of the source, and of the name of the author if it appears thereon."

I am not sure, therefore, whether simply crediting them as "A post to MySpace argued that...", would suffice, assuming that they were originally posted under a MySpace user name. It would be better to credit them as "MySpace user such-and-such posted:"; and it would be courteous, if not compulsory, to let them know through MySpace that their words have been used in such a way.

There may, however, be non-copyright issues to consider as well, such as the right to privacy in some jurisdictions.

-- 
Edward Barrow
Copyright Consultant
Copyright and Licensing blog: http://www.copyweb.co.uk/
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> MYHerring

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> Dean of Library Services

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> Dacus library

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