I've read the above "Inqusitr" tale with staggering unease. Surely, something else than Google's alleged conscious-but-unannounced policy shift must be accounting for the disappearing blogposts. But then I don't blog about music, I don't blog at all, so what do I know about possible Bloggle and RIAA lawyers' surreptitious "understanding." In the end I can but concurr in its conclusion; to wit:
"If this story is true then I think that Google has a lot to answer for. I hope for their sake this is wrong because if not, it will show to everyone that Google is definitely the new evil." |
If I understand it correctly they are only deleting posts which have copyrighted music attached to it, but I still don't get why they don't only delete the music. |
David, that's not the impression I got; there's no explicit mention there of the affected being posts with music attachments *only*; moreover, there's some unclear blogger's quote "Im not leaking albums, not putting up three mp3s. JUST THE ONE THEY WANTED" the "one" here being the official promotional mp3-track for an album released into the open by "them" – the press-release-spewing PR arms of the very same music labels whose other, legal arms are doing the thumbscrews routine [-by-Google-proxy], in cahoots with the RIAA and other rights-holding bodies.
I went back to L.A. Weekly's post by Jeff Weiss on which the Inquistr piece obviously was based, and found it much enlightening.
So my final impression is of Google's heavy-handedness in this matter, perhaps underlined by some newfound(?) unwillingness to have its TOS reinterpreted acc. to some wide-but-common-abuse "standards," rather than as they were meant to be taken, i.e. literarly... (= already that a monumental task, as any post-deconstructivist of any flavour will testify....). Ergo, Google's a little evil by choice, no question about it.
L.A. Weekly "Google's New Killer App? Why Are Music Bloggers' Posts Disappearing, and Who Is Deleting Them?"
» [...] the golden age of the guerrilla blogger posting whatever they want is coming to an end [...] Eventually, there will be software in place within all the major blog platforms [MT,WP and Blogger] where, if youre trying to post an infringing content, you wont be able to publish. At least, thats the direction [blogging] seems to be heading.«
http://www.laweekly.com/2009-02-05/music/google-39-s-new-killer-app-why-are-music-bloggers-39-posts-disappearing-and-who-is-deleting-them/all |
Rick Klau clarifies the make-sure-your-blogger-email-is-valid bit, but doesn't even approach the key question, which is Google's removal of WHOLE BLOGPOSTS that may/ may not/ contain "DCMA-offending" elements – simply because their own guidelines, quoted below, speak of such as the smallest-uniquely-identifyable-granule units. Thus, if an original (=copy written/ owned by blogger) post carries a local link to local or remote copy of a "DCMA'd" music file, then the ENTIRE post, text, images and binary content, is subjected to takedown simply because its permalink in the smallest addressable unit in the blog?
(Indirectly it could also mean that, should the potentially-offending matter be given its own permalink [e.g. the mp3 item alone], it ?could? then be removed by Google without affecting surrounding descriptive text in preceding/ following no-binary-content posts?)
In either case – that's LAME. Sibling to EVIL in this context.
From http://www.google.com/blogger_dmca.html
1.Identify in sufficient detail the copyrighted work that you believe has been infringed upon. This post must include identification of the specific posts, as opposed to entire sites. Posts must be referenced by the permalink of the post. For example, The copyrighted work at issue is the text that appears on http:\johndoe.comtest2006_01_01.html#2106. [url intentionally corrupted to prevent BGF robot from enhancing it. __Ianf]
2. Identify the material that you claim is infringing the copyrighted work listed in item #1 above.
YOU MUST IDENTIFY EACH POST BY PERMALINK OR DATE THAT ALLEGEDLY CONTAINS THE INFRINGING MATERIAL. The permalink for a post is usually found by clicking on the timestamp of the post. For example, The blog where my copyrighted work is published on is http:\copyright.blogspot.comarchives2006_01_02_example.html
[ditto] |
