[d at DCC] Please do not repost media articles [...]

[Hendrik]

At 05:29 +0900 6/08/27, Russell McOrmond wrote:
>   You can want the law to say something, but that is entirely different
>from whether the law says what you want it to say.
>
>   That being said, whether a Canadian court would decide it is legal or
>not, republishing of media article (of reasonable size -- ignoring the
>"Non" special case) is not allowed in this forum.  This specific rule
>for this forum isn't something up for debate, even if our various
>differing legal interpretations is.

Hi, i think it is (as a minimum) a matter of courtesy to follow the express
guidelines that any host - in thise case the meaning is "human host" - puts
on whatever event, forum, mailing list, etc., s/he his hosting, if one
chooses to participate. If someone makes a mistake in that context - OK,
that can happen. But otherwise there is no need to discuss the matter,
IMpnsHO.

Having said that, i'd take a small detour to make a comment on "reasonable"
in the context of copyright. I have, over the years, joined several forums
that are "closed" - they require membership (even if no pay is involved)
and their contents is not available on publicly accessible sites or in
archives (well, one of them recently added an RSS feed, which makes SOME of
the information publicly accessible, and i will bring up this issue with
them). In the context of those non-pubic forums, i think one can reasonably
(maybe not legally - but that is another point i will not address here)
claim that reposting a complete newspaper article is not the same as
republishing it - any disagreement here would require a discussion on what
"public" and "publish" mean and NOT a discussion about copyright law or any
other law, UNLESS there are laws that define those terms that might apply
in this situation.

Branchin gout even a bit more, let me suggest that one of the big problems
with law (not just copyright law) in the last 2 centuries (in particular)
is the ongoing and ever increasing theft and piracy of public resources on
part of private entities. Whatever the law says, there are also moral and
social issues involved that cannot be addressed by, and must not be allowed
to become the sole domain of, lawmakers and lawyers alone.

As a philosopher and artist i have alwys followed my personal path of, as
the case may be, ignoring, circumventing, or resisting laws that i
found/find objectionable - this is something i do after careful
consideration (it is not as simple a matter of what i like or agree with at
a gut level, it requires careful reasoning and consideration for other
stakeholders), and it is something i do with the understanding that i am
taking a risk. Whether or not i draw others into the realm of such risk
requires negotiation, and where that is not possible, it is better to
refrain. Illustrating example: if i were to go to a demolition
demonstration against a military base (meaning a demonstration whose
purpose includes to attempt physical damage to the installation), then
there is a realistic chance of being attacked by MPs, so taking my little
children along would be inappropriate, considering the risk they would be
exposed to. Another example: if i were to send e-mail containing a detailed
article on repressive activities of the Chinese government to personal
friends in China who have not asked me for such information, this action
would be inappropriate, considering the risk they are facing.

That gets me back to the topic at hand: reposting articles from commercial
media carries a risk that i, personally often do not mind taking, but i
think it is in principle, on moral grounds, inappropriate to subject
Russell or others on this list to the risk such an activity brings with it.
With just a little bit of reflection or research all of us will be able to
come up with plenty of examples of how "agents provocateurs" have destroyed
the lives of people who were a thorn in the eye of some power holders but
could not be attacked openly, for whatever reason.

If i were in the same position as Russell, being a social and legal
activist and running a public list, i would consider reposting full
articles from commercial media a kind of attack, since it would put me at
risk to lose my fredom of doing what i am doing. I know this was not at all
the intent of what happened on this list, but it is something that i think
we SHOULD consider and keep in mind!

I am not taking about self-censorship: prudence and consideration for
others is not the same as self-censorship, and there are, fortunately, at
this time and in the current circumstances, many ways open to us to deal
with issues of censorship (notice please, how decisively certain prominent
media outlets in the US have rebuked various suggestions for
self-censorship - some of them clearly formulated as threats - that
emanated from high level politicians and opinion leaders in the US
recently).

Thanks for listening. :-)

Regards: Hendrik

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