* * * * *
                                        
                                   Ownership
                                        
> Strong words. Indeed, The New York Times has repeatedly leapt to the
> defense of strong copyright protection. Back on July 29th, 2000, the
> paper's editorial, "Copyright in the Age of Napster," told its readers,
> correctly, that "the protection of copyright is vital to the health of a
> free and creative society" and that society benefits when, "the law assures
> that the creation of new art, writing or other intellectual property is
> rewarded."
> 
> But, in September 1999, a federal appeals court ruled for a group of
> writers, saying that the Times, along with other defendants, was guilty of
> stealing the copyrighted works of freelance writers by using our work
> without permission in electronic media (Tasini v. The New York Times).
> Though only a few media companies were defendants in the case, the
> precedent fingered the practices of virtually every major media company.
> And, in fact, copyright "protector" that it is, The Times, mainly through
> its website, is a virtual copyright infringement machine. Since our
> victory, it has continued to use legal maneuvering, which now includes a
> hearing before the U.S. Supreme Court, to avoid paying writers their fair
> share.
> 

Via NUblog, [1] The Hypocrisy of The New York Times [2]

I know, I'll just hand over my entire paycheck to … well … let's see … AOL
Time/Warner-Disney-CNN-Viacom-Sony. Or is it Disney-CNN-Viacom-AOL-
Time/Wanrer-Sony? I don't remember. But that's not important; what is is
passing on my paycheck to some huge comglomerate multinational corporation
because, well, gosh darn it, because they need it!

[1] http://www.contenu.nu/article.htm?id=28
[2] http://www.nwu.org/tvt/schypoc.htm

Email author at sean@conman.org

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