Just something that all store owners should be aware of.

http://www.loc.gov/copyright/legislation/dmca.pdf

Good Info - Thanks!

Ok, I have never been much of a book reader.
Does anyone want to summarize?
Thanks

Yada Yada

Man I wish they would write this stuff in english!

To much for me to handle. Any speed readers in the house?

Yeah, if someone could just kick up the specifics in laymans terms it would be greatly appreciated. I think you need to have a law degree to understand most of that stuff

The DMCA is really an overly broad, overly empowering piece of legislature which if effectively copyright infringement rules on steroids.

Basically, the end of the day summary is that if any form of content you use, whether it be text, graphic, audio, video, etc is not expressly permitted for use on your site (this extends past web sites by the way, but web sites are the best example), then you are potentially liable for the DMCA to be invoked.

It goes even further. Let's say I carry snow globes, and I take pictures of said snow globes from the manufacturers catalog and put them up on my web site to sell my product. Manuacturer decides they don't like this, so they go to their lawyers.

Next thing you know, their lawyer is sending letters of DMCA violation to not just us (), but to our provider, stating that content in question must be removed within "x" period of time or they will sue the customer, , and provider. Even better is that not only are we () compelled to comply, but our provider can within rights shut us down at will, with no reprecussions as they are simply obeying the nature and provisions of the DMCA. What is scary about this is that regardless of the claim, we are blameless, as is our provider until the legal matter is settled and even then we have an arbitrary amount of time to bring you back up, if ever.

This sounds really bad, and it is...I have dealt with one customer of ours who already had this happen although it was handled smoothly and to an amicable resolution (although their site was down for a week while they had to check and confirm the offending content was removed). I am not a lawyer, but I have looked into this a lot and there are many stories of how insane the DMCA is and how it's overly strict and broad provisions are being abused. The problem is that it will take a considerable effort to get anything changed on this law now that it is on the books (i.e. - time, money, and influence).

My personal advice for our merchants is to get a digital camera, take pictures of your merchandise, and use them. Not only should this completely CYA, but it will add a unique look to your product as compared to the same pictures everyone else has. And yes, let's say your wholesaler had the DMCA applied to them....believe it or not, you too are affected.

It's late and I am not in my best writing mode or frame of mind so I will leave any further discussion and commentary for tommorrow or the next day

Captain's Super Special Ultra Summary -
"DMCA Bad. People get sued. Use only your own original content and you should be good"

Leave it to AdminGuy to come thru... thanks!

The DMCA is one of the pieces of legislation that I am very strongly against though.

I do not think it is right for the U.S. to try and implement laws into place that require other countries to be bound by it (because it only adds to negative commentary on U.S. imperialistic practices, however unfounded), and most importantly copyright law is and had always been a civil matter, not a criminal one and I personally feel it should always remain a civil matter.


But ultimately the forums are not a place for political or ideological discussions....I do strongly encourage all over our customers reading the thread to do a little research though since as I mentioned, if you use any content that is in any form or fashion obtained from someone other than yourself, this act applies to you.

Well, that's just about everything then. (I hope other people named tim don't get offended and send me in).

What is your experience regarding actual exposure for infractions on the internet? I've seen some pretty big companies blattently er ... borrowing, text and images.

Jeez, you'd think a manufacture would aggressivly encourage people to use images of their product.

Thanks Admin, I had a feeling you would be the one doing the summarizing, LOL
Anyway, we actually use all our own pictures because they look better and are more detailed than the manufacturer pics.
But, I am with BrassUnicorn, I am not sure why a manufacturer would get in a hissy fit if a reseller is using their pics, it can only help grow the resellers business.
Everyone is sue happy these days, its the quickest and almost easiest way to get rich these days. Too many damn lazy U.S. citizens looking for the easy hand out!
How about working for a living!!!
Anyway, no more ranting, I just get bugged when I hear about lazy people taking advantage of us hard workers that actually work for our money.
I actually personally know a guy (that is a lawyer) that makes a living by sueing people who do work for him (work on his house, car, etc.). Nobody in town will work for him anymore, but I found out that he moves every couple of years to a new city/state to find new people to sue!!!
Welcome to the screwed up world.

Ah, the pros and cons of ©!

It's one of those one step forward, two steps back. While I agree that there needed to be changes to what was happening. I spend a great deal of time on the graphics, the catalogs and things which I put out for some of my clients and it used to just upset me to no end that people would right click and POOF, no money paid to me but my image was being used.

Back in the early days I watermarked everything, but then that was changed to a per image charge. As I produced more than 200 images per month this got expensive.

So I took the sick and tired, who cares, no matter what you do people will right click or simply ctrl c and ctrlv the images. So I charged my customers and said hooey until I saw them face to face. The lawyers want way more than a pretty chump change fee to send letters out. The best option I have found to date is to place the clients logo in a place where right clicking and trying to remove the small logo would cause image damage. This saved time in slicing and dicing and saved me the heartburn.

For merchants it's caused a great deal of trouble. Requesting the images which are allowable and or waiting for the corporate compliance teams to approve the use of their images takes upwards of 6 weeks (one case three months). For my clients I now tell them to schedule inventory changes six months ahead of time. This gives me two months to work out the design and codes and three months for compliance to approve their use and one month to take live and work out bugs.

This is difficult for those with a high volume of rotating stock and is not cost effective.

I have to agree with those who suggest clients get a good (notice I said good) digital camera. Make sure you have a graphics worker who can filter the images with limited degradation, go to the local University and take (audit) a photo merchandising course so that they don't look like mom or pop took the images and go from there.

The new laws were good in one way, very damaging and hard to manage from a merchant stand point, VERY DIFFICULT for manufacturers to clear images through their compliance departments. Created a new for of attorneys which I call the CLICK CHASERS (ambulance chasers). All in all, several manufacturers have raised their prices simply in order to hire their attorneys, hire compliance staff to manage the new work loads-----IT'S A NIGHTMARE!

Now that we have taken two steps back, could someone please get me a ladder so that we can raise above the new MUCK?