| | Just for fun, last night I did a search on my name to find out what other people of my same name are up to. I found some very interesting people. I discovered a hockey player for Minnesota state who broke school records in the number of times she kept the puck from reaching the goal. I found a 7th grade math teacher (Wow! This feels like another part of myself staying on the path I left behind.). I found a woman who had won a contest.
But the fun discoveries quickly turned sour when I discovered that posts I had made to an e-mail list several years ago were included in an article and published in a print publication whose archives are now available on the internet. To make things worse, there were letters to the editor commenting about me.
I've done what I can about this. I've contacted the website owner and demanded that the article be removed. They are in breach of copyright because the author did not get my permission to use three entire posts I had made. I also attempted to contact the author and let him know that he is in breach of copyright and to reconsider using someone's words the next time he writes an article.
If the website refuses to remove the article, I don't know what I'll do. Is it really worth my energy to get an lawyer to send them a letter? Part of me screams YES! But the other part of me says, "The article was written over 10 years ago. What's the point now? And, doesn't this exceed the statute of limitations anyway?" The YES part of me wants this publication to take copyright more seriously. But after so much time, will they really care? They've gotten their use out of the article.
What frustrates me even more is that my words and, who knows, maybe even my art, could be "stolen" every day. I can't constantly search the net for my words or my art. I can't stop people from breaking copyright. So, what do I do? Do I stop putting my words and images up for display?
I couldn't stop writing blogs if I tried. I enjoy this too much. I couldn't stop participating in e-mail lists. I'd lose a lot of friendships and connections to awesome resources.
This leaves me with a feeling of helplessness. What are the individual citizens of the internet age to do to protect themselves? Nothing? I don't like that answer, but I have no other. |
| | Posted 3/30/2005 9:33 AM - 21 Views - 0 eProps - 0 comments
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