Re: [DL] DRC Article Submission Problems

[Allan Seyberth <darious@darious.com>]

How about everybody calm down. . . 

(and it wouldn't be a bad idea to remove the unnecessary portions of your emails when replying - a one or two line response has no need to be followed by 100 lines of previously posted material)

Now - I am no lawyer, but at looking at the "fine print", it would seem to be written to protect both the author of the work and the website controllers, and in my (non-legally trained) opinion is intended to be fair to both parties - the website is providing webspace and some web design for the value of the content submitted by the author - in return the author is getting free exposure at what may become a useful traffic hub  - but the author can't then turn around and sue the website for hosting that material in the first place.

What is missing from the fine print is the explicit details of what happens when the author (aka reviewer) wishes to pull his material from the DRC, either for print publication or even if the author wishes to place that material on his or someone's else's website.  And that is where the rub comes in.

Joey - according the contract you agreed to when you submitted your material - you can't revoke the website's right to host your article.  It's still your stuff - but you agreed to the condition that the DRC keeps the rights to electronic publishing.  

TANSTAFFL - the coin you pay for your "free" exposure is the surrendering of part of your rights over that material.  And if you weren't smart enough to read and understand the fine print before agreeing to the contract - that's your mistake and now your problem.  Take it for a learning lesson and a cheap one at that.

And quite frankly, you can look at this website as the information age version of grubstaking - where the store owner (webmaster) would provide supplies up front to miners (authors), knowing that most of them aren't going to score big but that the percentage returned on the one or two that do makes the whole thing worthwhile.

Unless, of course, said miner then attempts to weasel out of their agreements.


That is the harshest version of how this can be interpreted.


A more likely interpretation is that the website owner would be loath to irritate and chase away future submitters by refusing to remove an article that one author want's gone.

Here's a reality check for a couple of you - anything on the web already has a lower intrinsic value to a publisher - why would they want to sink money into selling something that the customer base can get already get for free?  Why would you expect someone to sink money into a project that is already hampered from being able to break even due to 25%-50%- or even 75% of the target market audience not needing to buy it in the first place?

Anyway - I see that Marcus has already amended his legalese, so this whole point is moot, anyway.



-------------------
Allan Seyberth
darious@darious.com

Don't be so open-minded your brains fall out.