Originally Posted - December 26, 2006

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With the popularity of the computer, blogs have exploded on the scene with people creating online journals and diaries. While most blogs usually provide commentary or news on a particular subject, some blogs serve as personal diaries and allow unmonitored comments on those blogs.

The term blog is derived from "web log". The blog search engine Technorati was tracking nearly 60 million blogs as of November.

Blogs and forums are intended to provide a place for civil discussion and debate about various subjects of public interest and concern but when they're abusive and a certain handful of people domineer and bully the boards, forums like Topix and More Bad Cop News, blogs and forum become a cesspool for defamatory and profane comments, unpoliced, rife with rumor, falsehoods and misstatements.

Some crude blogs such as MoreBadCopsNews like to lift articles, often without attribution and without permission from various websites and have a loose interpretation of the doctrine of Fair Use. They also seem to feel that they are immune from defamation claims.

Some bloggers such as MoreBadCopsNews revel in hiding behind anonymity to engage in their defamation, spew forth vulgarities and attempt to discredit individuals. There's pros and cons to be said for posting anonymously but generally speaking, the editor or person maintaining the blog should make his identity known. Of course there's the argument of free speech for anonymous posters. People who have valid information about various subjects feel protected in candidly commenting about their companies, police agencies, bosses without fear of retaliation if they don't have to post their name.

But there's also a responsibility in posting on forums and message boards too. Posting anonymously doesn't give one free reign to ignore etiquette and common sense, you can't call print false information about people or businesses and expect to be legally protected.

As Liza Kessler states, a staff attorney at the Center for Democracy and Technology, individuals have always had to take responsibility for what they say, and that includes posters at Topix, AOL and More Bad Cop News and other forums. Just because the statement is made on the Internet, doesn't mean it's protected by the First Amendment if it's libelous.

One of the best articles about reckless postings on the internet. "Is Your Blog Exposing You To Legal Liability" was written by Lawrence Savell and appeared in the online journal.   www.law.com
http://www.law.com/jsp/llf/PubArticleLLF.jsp?id=1166695602960

Mr. Savell, a counsel in the New York office of Chadbourne & Parker, concentrating on products liability and media law points out that defamation is a major issue relating to blogs. He says that while definitions vary from state to state, generally speaking a defamatory statement is a false and disparaging statement about another that causes injury to reputation or in some cases causes emotional distress. "It is a communication that exposes people to hatred, ridicule, more than a simple joke or satire, or contempt; lowers them in the esteem of others, causes them to be shunned or injures them in their business.

MoreBadCopNews seems to take great glee in doing that as well as posters at Topix who hide behind such screen names as "Unreal", Franknfurter" and "Dreamer". Post something they don't agree with they instantly launch a personal attack. They seem to feel insulated from legal liability by hiding behind anonymity. Anyone who asks blogs or forums to stop lifting material without permission becomes subject of defamation such as at MoreBadCopNews whose entire site is prefaced on using the work of others and offering nothing original except crass comments.

The issue of defamation has been well established and it's incumbent on the operator of the blog to insure that defamation does not occur and if its determined that a false derogatory statement was posted, a prompt correction or clarification comparable to the original posting is suggested to help reduce potential damages, Savell says.

The issue of who can be held liable for defamatory statements posted on a message board, forum or blog is still being decided in the courts. If the blog "editor" is the person responsible for the posting, the liability is his but if a third party posts a defamatory statement on a message board or forum, at least the California Supreme Court has ruled that "plaintiffs who contend they were defamed in an Internet posting may only seek recovery from the original source of the statement. While people may feel that they are insulated by hiding behind screen names, a simple subpoena to the forum operator or blog editor will force them to reveal the poster's real name and address for legal purposes.

As Mr. Savell points out, just because you claim it's your opinion doesn't protect you if your "opinion" contains false "facts". "Calling something an opinion does not make it so, and words like "I think" or "I believe" do not necessarily assure protection for what follows", Savell says. "A statement may be actionable to the extent it implies a false assertion of fact". Statements may be protected if they are truly opinion and are not capable of being proven either true or false".

If a poster engages in a reckless disregard for the truth, he or she becomes liable for defamation.

One of the best articles read recently about defamation and libel and blogs was written by Jennifer Peterson, an associate at the Wisconsin law firm of LaFollette Godfrey and Kahn, which appeared in the March 2006 issue of Wisconsin Lawyer. Wisconsin Lawyer March 2006

In the article, she states that the standard for defamatory speech is the same whether the medium is paper or the Internet. A statement is defamatory if it "tends to harm one's reputation so as to lower him or her in the estimation of the community or to deter third persons for associating or dealing with him or her, Peterson explains.

Another major issue on the Internet is that of copyright and Fair Use.

In answering the question as to who owns the rights to the content, Mr. Savell states that material that is created by a person is solely owned by that person.

"Copyright infringement is a serious concern…both in terms of the potential use of others' intellectual property on your blog", Mr. Savell states. In other words, you can't lift someone else's intellectual property and post it on your blog, claiming Fair Use. Savell says that "you have to make sure that you only use on your blog material that you own, which you have permission to use or which falls under the scope of fair use".

MoreBadCopNews, take heed.

"Bear in mind that you could be on the hook for infringing material that is posted onto your blog by others. There are ways to deal with this -- or at least to try to reduce the scope of damages potentially recoverable", Savell says. "One is to have an express agreement with posters that states that they are representing that they have the right to post the content they post. But that can only take you so far and does not prevent you from being found responsible in a suit by the true owner. There may be a "safe harbor" exception from offending user posts under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act if the blog can be considered an Internet service provider (which is questionable), which would require the blog operator to remove infringing content once notified of the problem.

"Fair use is a privilege allowing others than the copyright owner to use copyrighted material in a reasonable manner without the owner's consent. There is a balancing of interests, including the purpose and character of the use, the nature of the copyrighted work, the proportion that was "taken" and the economic impact of the taking (the extent to which the use may diminish the value of the original work). Common examples of fair use include criticism (obviously, a staple of blog communications), educational use and parody".

Generally speaking, you can't take an entire copyrighted article from someone and reprint it on your blog without the author's permission, claiming you can do so under "Fair Use". That's not Fair Use, that's copyright infringement and theft of intellectual property.

The legal definition of copyright infringement is the unauthorized use of copyrighted material in a manner that violates one of the copyright owner's exclusive rights, such as the right to reproduce or perform the copyrighted work, or to make derivative works that build upon it.

For some reason, people seem to think that they can lift for their own purposes articles that they find on the Internet, especially those that are clearly marked that they are copyright protected.

Wrong. It's a copyright violation and legally actionable. It's not "Fair Use", it's outright piracy. It doesn't make a difference if you give attribution or not, you've lifted the article without permission and are directing readers away from the original site of publication. The author of any article owns the exclusive rights to that article.

Legally, the author has the right to seek payment for the unauthorized use of the material. Stealing someone's entire work and claiming you're "educating" someone else by using it for your own purposes, directing traffic and readers away from the original source, is not "fair use".

Here's a very simple explanation of Fair Use from the Franklin Pierce Law Center. "Uses that advance public interests such as criticism, education or scholarship are favored -- particularly if little of another's work is copied. Uses that generate income or interfere with a copyright owner's income are not". That's exactly how MoreBadCopsNews maintains their entire web site, taking other people's work for their own purposes, interfering with the copyright owner's income.

There's nothing fair about taking someone's work without permission and directing traffic away from the author's income sources? Instead of just apologizing and saying it wouldn't happen again, AOL posters and in particular MoreBadNewsCops, who hides totally in anonymity, then unleashes malicious attacks because they were told they couldn't lift entire articles without any attribution.

Apparently the people at policecrimes.com and badcopnews.com can't read or maybe it's because they don't think the law applies to them. They like to point the finger at bad cops but stealing other people's work for their forums is a larceny too.

The policecrimes blog and forum administrator, who hides behind anonymity and calls him/herself Watcher, has decided that others' copyrighted work is their's to do with as they choose, directing traffic and income away from the original source.

The author of a work owns exclusive rights to that work. Copyright owners have the exclusive right to reproduce their copyrighted work and make certain uses of it. Anyone else who wishes to reproduce the copyrighted work, perform or display it publicly or distribute it, either in hard copy or by electronic transmission, must get the permission of the copyright owner to do so.

Information about copyright infringement and unauthorized use of intellectual property can be found at http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode17/usc_sup_01_17_10_5.html; the website for the U.S. Copyright Office http://www.copyright.gov/.

For information about copyright on the Internet, see http://www.fplc.edu/tfield/copynet.htm.

The penalties for copyright infringement, the theft of original work, are very harsh. The court can award up to $150,000 for each separate act of willful infringement. Willful infringement means that you knew you were infringing and you did it anyway.

U.S. Code, Title 17, Chapter 1, Section 106: Exclusive rights in copyrighted works:

Subject to sections 107 through 122, U.S.Code, the owner of copyright under this title has the exclusive rights to do and to authorize any of the following:

(1) to reproduce the copyrighted work in copies or phonorecords;

(2) to prepare derivative works based upon the copyrighted work;

(3) to distribute copies or phonorecords of the copyrighted work to the public by sale or other transfer of ownership, or by rental, lease, or lending;

(4) in the case of literary, musical, dramatic, and choreographic works, pantomimes, and motion pictures and other audiovisual works, to perform the copyrighted work publicly;

(5) in the case of literary, musical, dramatic, and choreographic works, pantomimes, and pictorial, graphic, or sculptural works, including the individual images of a motion picture or other audiovisual work, to display the copyrighted work publicly; and

(6) in the case of sound recordings, to perform the copyrighted work publicly by means of a digital audio transmission 12-26-06

© 2006 North Country Gazette