Will incorporating now protect me from threats from before I incorporate?

[csdude55]

One minor thing to add: I have never made any money at all from posting these news headlines, so it had absolutely no financial benefit to me. And, obviously, I never claimed them as my own: there's even a prominent "News provided by..." caption.

The only reason I ever used the feed in the first place was because my content was all text, which was kinda boring looking.

 

[adjusterjack]

It's frustrating because it all seems like nonsense with no legal merit. Their complaint should be with Yahoo publishing their data in the feed, not with the people that use the feed and have no idea that they have a complaint >:-(

No matter how try to spin it, you are using, without consent, material created by others.

Material with which they have the right to exclusive use.

That's why copyright laws exist.

I have never made any money at all from posting these news headlines,

Then shut it down and stop doing it.

 

[quincy]

Mods: I'm fine with my previous post being deleted completely, I'd rather not risk them finding it and linking it back to me.

I'm in a tough position where the money simply is not there to hire a copyright attorney... not that there's one within 200 miles of me, anyway. And it really doesn't matter what they're willing to settle for, the money simply is not there!

And I truly can't imagine how I was supposed to have known that the publisher was in the Yahoo feed, much less that they didn't want subscribers to that feed to see their data. It appears to me that every person in the US that uses the Yahoo feed would be open to the same lawsuit. And since I have no way of obtaining a list of all publishers that are in there, how could I possibly contact each of them at this point to make sure it's OK?

It's frustrating because it all seems like nonsense with no legal merit. Their complaint should be with Yahoo publishing their data in the feed, not with the people that use the feed and have no idea that they have a complaint >:-(

I have deleted most of my quote of your previous post to reduce your worry. The moderator should see that you want that particular post to be deleted.

I am afraid that your business has crossed into an area of copyright law where the legalities of republishing RSS feeds are still being debated.

RSS is basically a format used to access published material and the published material is presumed to be copyright-protected. An RSS feed allows for a copyright holder to make their copyright-protected material easily available to syndicators - but it does not itself permit syndication and it does not grant anyone any rights to use the copyrighted material. That grant of rights must come from the holder of the copyright.

The recommendation here, as it generally will be, is to get permission from the copyright holders prior to publication of any of their rights-protected material. Permission is best if it is in writing, and often will be granted in the form of a license to use.

If you have a law school within easy traveling distance of you, you might want to call the school to see if there is a friendly IP professor there willing to take some time to talk to you about the demand letters you have received. Because this is still somewhat of an evolving area of copyright law, your situation might peak his/her interest.

Edit to add: Because the letters you are receiving are not coming from the copyright holders but from a law firm purportedly representing the copyright holders, I recommend you request that the firm provide you with proof that the copyright holders assigned to the firm the right to pursue the infringement on their behalf. You should not pay just because this firm says you need to, in other words.

 

[csdude55]

No matter how try to spin it, you are using, without consent, material created by others.

Material with which they have the right to exclusive use.

That's why copyright laws exist.

Don't get me wrong here, I'm not arguing with you all, just frustrated at the situation. From my perspective (and I suspect most people that would use an RSS feed), if they didn't want their data to be used then they wouldn't submit it to a public RSS feed! It's mere existence implies consent, and if not then it would appear that the RSS provider would be at fault.

At the very least, a cease-and-desist would make a lot more sense: tell me I'm doing something wrong, and I'll fix it. But demanding tons of money and putting me out of business is way overboard.

Then shut it down and stop doing it.

That's easier said than done, removing it would require a major rebuild of the 60 homepages. Which would seem unnecessary, since as I said before many publishers over the years have thanked us for the free traffic!

I've removed the offended publisher, of course, but that doesn't undo 15 years of usage.

 

[csdude55]

The recommendation here, as it generally will be, is to get permission from the copyright holders prior to publication of any of their rights-protected material. Permission is best if it is in writing, and often will be granted in the form of a license to use.

Interestingly, I can't find any list of publishers that Yahoo includes in their feed! Which means that I wouldn't even know who to ask :-/ And I can only assume that they'll add other publishers without warning, and I would have no way of knowing when that happens.

Which puts me in that bad position of having to rebuild 60 homepages to replace Yahoo with something that I can license, as @adjusterjack said. But that doesn't undo the previous damage, so I'm closing the door after the burglar escaped, so to speak.

If you have a law school within easy traveling distance of you, you might want to call the school to see if there is a friendly IP professor there willing to take some time to talk to you about the demand letters you have received. Because this is still somewhat of an evolving area of copyright law, your situation might peak his/her interest.

I'm afraid not, I'm in a rural area and the closest law school or attorney that handles anything beyond speeding tickets and real estate is on the other side of the state :-O

Edit to add: Because the letters you are receiving are not coming from the copyright holders but from a law firm purportedly representing the copyright holders, I recommend you request that the firm provide you with proof that the copyright holders assigned to the firm the right to pursue the infringement on their behalf. You should not pay just because this firm says you need to, in other words.

Are you suggesting doing this NOW, or waiting until they've at least sent a certified letter? At this point I've only received emails and regular $0.50 letters.

 

[quincy]

... if they didn't want their data to be used then they wouldn't submit it to a public RSS feed! It's mere existence implies consent ...

At the very least, a cease-and-desist would make a lot more sense: tell me I'm doing something wrong, and I'll fix it. But demanding tons of money and putting me out of business is way overboard.

... many publishers over the years have thanked us for the free traffic!

I've removed the offended publisher, of course, but that doesn't undo 15 years of usage.

“It’s mere existence implies consent” has no merit and is a legally dangerous way to operate. Much if not most of what you see and read on the internet is rights-protected. If you did not create it, it is not yours to do with what you please.

It is best to think of internet content like products you see in a store. These products exist, you can see them, but you cannot take them without purchasing them first. A copyright holder’s product is their creative and original work and comes with a price tag, which might be a payment from a publisher to syndicate this work (provide it to others) or a payment for a license to use this work.

... Which puts me in that bad position of having to rebuild 60 homepages ... But that doesn't undo the previous damage ... Are you suggesting doing this NOW, or waiting until they've at least sent a certified letter? At this point I've only received emails and regular $0.50 letters.

Yes, you are in the position of rebuilding your business with content that legally belongs to you, whether you create this content yourself or get permission to use someone else’s creation.

Removing infringing material is a positive and necessary step but only works to mitigate any damage that has already occurred.

I am not telling you to do anything. I am recommending you have the demand letters personally reviewed by an IP attorney in your area to determine what you should do.

A copyright holder is entitled to compensation for infringement on their copyrights but you need to learn first whether the one demanding payment has the right to demand payment - whether the one demanding payment is the copyright holder or the one demanding payment has been assigned the right by the copyright holder to enforce the copyrights. The law firm that has contacted you should not be presumed to have these rights.

Second, you need to determine if any rights have actually been infringed. This requires research by an IP professional and cannot be accomplished on an Internet forum. You need your business and website content personally reviewed and the demand letters personally reviewed and the state of the law as it relates to your uses of others’ content personally reviewed. As I said earlier, there are still some questions about this particular area of the law. .

Unfortunately, personal reviews exceed the scope of this forum so we can only offer information and our opinions, based on the limited information a poster provides. What a poster does with this information and our opinions is up to them.

 

[csdude55]

I don't mean to distract from the topic, which has been well answered But I couldn't resist replying to this comment:

It is best to think of internet content like products you see in a store. These products exist, you can see them, but you cannot take them without purchasing them first. A copyright holder’s product is their creative and original work and comes with a price tag, which might be a payment from a publisher to syndicate this work (provide it to others) or a payment for a license to use this work.

From my perspective (not legal at all, just what feels like common sense), having their data published in a public RSS feed that has no apparent licensing requirements or warnings that a separate license may be required feels more like... a store with a bunch of products in a box, and a sign that says, "Free, Take One". Then years later, the manufacturer of the products decide to sue the people that took one.

Obviously a judge might feel different, I'm just saying that this is how it feels from my perspective.

It's my understanding that, in my state, either party in a civil suit can request a jury. If it goes that far then that might be what I do, appealing to the "common sense" of it all.

Either way, thanks for all of the replies! I'm glad that I found this forum

 

[quincy]

I don't mean to distract from the topic, which has been well answered But I couldn't resist replying to this comment:



From my perspective (not legal at all, just what feels like common sense), having their data published in a public RSS feed that has no apparent licensing requirements or warnings that a separate license may be required feels more like... a store with a bunch of products in a box, and a sign that says, "Free, Take One". Then years later, the manufacturer of the products decide to sue the people that took one.

Obviously a judge might feel different, I'm just saying that this is how it feels from my perspective.

It's my understanding that, in my state, either party in a civil suit can request a jury. If it goes that far then that might be what I do, appealing to the "common sense" of it all.

Either way, thanks for all of the replies! I'm glad that I found this forum

You unfortunately share the opinion of too many others that, if it’s on the internet, it should be free. That opinion fuels many intellectual property lawsuits.

The defendants in these infringement lawsuits do not always fare very well - and to get to the point of a judge/jury deciding whether or not a use is infringing can be extremely costly for all parties involved.

If your matter winds up in court before judge and jury, please remember that cases are not decided on “common sense” but on the laws as written and by the evidence presented that supports the contention that these laws were violated. In other words, if you hope to defeat a claim of infringement, you will need a better defense than “common sense.”

 

[adjusterjack]

having their data published in a public RSS feed that has no apparent licensing requirements or warnings that a separate license may be required feels more like... a store with a bunch of products in a box, and a sign that says, "Free, Take One". Then years later, the manufacturer of the products decide to sue the people that took one.

That's an absolutely ridiculous comparison.

 

[quincy]

That's an absolutely ridiculous comparison.

Too many people do not understand copyright laws. They often find it difficult to accept that the creator of original works is legally entitled to compensation for use of these works.

If K-12 teachers today didn’t have enough to do already (and for too little pay), it would be nice if there could be lessons taught on laws likely to affect the students in the future, with copyright laws being among those taught.

 

[csdude55]

I don't disagree with you guys (non-gender specific intended) at all, Google Images definitely complicated things! I see WAY too many times where someone will search for an image, see it on Google, and think that it's public domain.

But that's not what I was doing.

What I don't really understand is, when Yahoo publishes a public feed and says that it's free for public use, how I was to know that one day one of their publishers would decide that they didn't want their picture used... but would still submit their data to the feed?

From my perspective, that's where the common sense thing comes in. When I began using this feed sometime before 2010 (the earliest I could verify using archive.org), there was no mention of limitation or a license other than giving credit where it was due (which I did). I'm not even sure if there was any concept of a license for content in 2010! So if the publisher changed their policy after that, but their image still showed up in the RSS feed that was still publicly accessible, how would I have ever known that I needed to do something different with the feed? Am I suppose to look at every publisher in the public feed on a regular basis and research to see if they've changed their policy?

I get what you're saying: from a legal perspective, this is a tough defense. But it's the truth, and if what I was doing was acceptable in 2010 (or earlier) and there was no way for anyone to tell me otherwise, then how could I reasonably be expected to have known that one publisher had changed their policy? It makes no sense to punish me for doing something that was an acceptable and common practice when I did it.

 

[csdude55]

Going back to the original topic of protection, though.

My girlfriend has a savings account with my name as a co-signer. If I'm sued and lose, is her savings account at risk?

I also have a small eTrade account, just a few hundred dollars in it pre-COVID. Is it also at risk? It's not a huge amount of money, but if someone's just going to steal it then I'd rather liquidate it and use it towards my bills :-/

 

[quincy]

Going back to the original topic of protection, though.

My girlfriend has a savings account with my name as a co-signer. If I'm sued and lose, is her savings account at risk?

I also have a small eTrade account, just a few hundred dollars in it pre-COVID. Is it also at risk? It's not a huge amount of money, but if someone's just going to steal it then I'd rather liquidate it and use it towards my bills :-/

Your eTrade account can be liquidated to satisfy a court order or judgment. Your girlfriend’s account could be vulnerable to a judgment against you depending on how you are listed on the account (e.g., co-signer, authorized user, joint account holder).

Again, I recommend you review all details with an IP attorney in your area.