Thank you!

Check out the post to find out! Happy Reading!

What about when there are several contributors who are subject to a final decision by the main editor, like I’m a writer for Social Media Law Student and I am subject to a final decision by Rex Gradeless. Are the writers for SMLS, co-authors, joint authors, or independent contractors entitled to all rights in our own work? How does copyright law define who owns SMLS and what rights contributors have?

The Seventh Circuit recognized this problem in Gaiman v. McFarlande (360 F. 3d 644) when it held that Neil Gaiman, a comic book script writer, sued Todd McFarlane, an illustrator of comic book characters for Copyright Infringement. Gaiman was a contracted employee who McFarlane hired to create a script for an issue of The Spawn. Needless to say, the court found that Gaiman and McFarlane had to work together to creator the characters in the comic book and without one author’s creative work, the whole entire work would not have existed. The court ultimatey held a joint authorship in the work and were both entitled to rights under Copyright law.

From this analysis, I can pressume that if I work with the author of a blog on a post, we are co-authors because without both of our input, the entire whole would not be realized. So, if Rex Gradeless and I sat down and came up with concepts for a blog post then we both input ideas, opinions and changes, this would be a joint work and therefore subject to joint authorship. However, Rex and I don’t sit down each week when I write my blog contributions, but he does edit all of the blog contributions. Does Rex own rights in my contributions?

In Community for Creative Non-Violent v. Reid (490 U.S. 730), the Supreme Court held that an artist, Reid, hired by an organization, the CCNV, was entitled to joint authorship of a statute he designed and created for CCNV. The court reasoned that Reid was an independent contractor and not CCNV’s employee, therefore he was not subject to “work for hire” status under Copyright Law. The court reasoned that CCNV did not provide Reid with any of the benefits or opportunities it had provided its other employees and therefore could not claim sole rights in the statute. The court also reasoned that CCNV did not have sole control over the creation of the statute but accepted input and contributions made by Reid. The court stated this was sufficine to allow Reid the opportunity to rights of co-authorship.

When looking at the concept of Copyright in this sense I wonder if a court would evaluate the entire whole or each individual article. For example, without my contributions to SMLS, SMLS would still exist. However, the whole of the website would not be realized as it is today without my contributions. But without Rex’s editing, would my contributions as a whole be all that different from their current state?

It’s important to note that I do not have any rights of authorship in SMLS. I own only what I post, even if edited by Rex. If I had control and access to change parts of the website then my statuts as a writer with rights solely in my work would change. Whereas, if Rex removed paragraphs from my articles and added his own input, his rights in my work would change as well. However, Rex changes very little in my posts and I do not have any control or access to changing SMLS as a website. But I think it’s interesting to note how easily the lines of authorship, joint authorship and co-authorship can be blurred when you work in a collaborative, contributory setting. Any thoughts?

I am so excited about my recent discovery. Jing.com allows users to capture, narrate and explain from their computer screens in five minute flash videos for free! The free version allows users to upload their video Screencast.com and share it with the world via a link, embedded on their blog, or via an email. Pretty cool stuff if you ask me.

I personally have invested the $14.95 per year for the paid version which allows users to save videos to MPEG-4 formats and edit them in iMovie, QuickTime (on Snow Leopard) and upload videos to YouTube. The paid for version also allows a user to capture screen views and has webcam capabilities built in. (This is a really nice feature for presentations and tutorials.)

I’m pretty excited about my discovery so I am going to give you all a quick tutorial of my new favorite program, OmniGraffle. (Think MS Visio but for your Mac and with some awesome features.) I am still learning OmniGraffle, so I thought it would be fun to show a video of some of Jing’s capabilities while narrating.

I’d also like to offer some congrats to Apple with the release of Snow Leopard. I purchased Snow Leopard this weekend and I’ve seen a big improvement overall of my MacBook’s performance. I love the new QuickTime and I keep discovering tiny little cool things built into the new OS I was not expecting. So yay Apple!

P.S. I just turned in my Herzog Paper and I really think I should be celebrating…

Here’s what Google has said:

Today we’re adding a new experiment to Google Labs: Google Fast Flip, accessible at fastflip.googlelabs.com. Fast Flip is a new reading experience that combines the best elements of print and online articles. Like a print magazine, Fast Flip lets you browse sequentially through bundles of recent news, headlines and popular topics, as well as feeds from individual top publishers. As the name suggests, flipping through content is very fast, so you can quickly look through a lot of pages until you find something interesting. At the same time, we provide aggregation and search over many top newspapers and magazines, and the ability to share content with your friends and community. Fast Flip also personalizes the experience for you, by taking cues from selections you make to show you more content from sources, topics and journalists that you seem to like. In short, you get fast browsing, natural magazine-style navigation, recommendations from friends and other members of the community and a selection of content that is serendipitous and personalized.

From a legal perspective, this new product is ingenious. Part of the problem with Google News is that it’s an aggregation service that aggregates the headlines, photos and story line leads of an article from a published website and shares it with the world. The problem is that the writers and publishers of those stories have complained that Google is infringing on their copyrights and taking the “heart” of their story. However, Google has argued that it increases readership to publishers by allowing them to click on links which direct the reader to the publisher’s website. There have been some nasty legal battles over content and Google has settled with a number of publishers to license out their headlines, photos, and storyline leads. But I think Google might have found a way around copyright infringement with this new technology.

As you can see, Google has allowed the entire page with its advertisements viewable. Google has stated that it’s partnered with the New York Times, The Washington Post, Salon, Fast Company, ProPublica and Newsweek to provide information. Google and its partners will share the revenue from the advertisements. Google hopes this will allow readers to read content faster and generate greater revenue for ads. By partnering with publishers, Google is combating the base for publisher’s argument over Google News. Publishers were arguing that Google hindered advertisement revenue sales by taking the “heart” of their stories and publishing it on their news aggregator, Google News. Overall, if Google Fast Flip catches on, it could replace Google News.

Google Fast Flip is customizable, sortable and easy to use. You can sort news by a variety of topics, by news publisher, by topic or even by just read what Google Recommends. It feels just like a scrolling newspaper! It’s really incredible!

What do you think? Thoughts?

I wish I could say my adventures as a law student have brought such good to the world, but honestly, they’ve brought more self-induced headaches than anything. haha. I get great satisfaction from seeing my friends become good people and do great things. Tressa has inspired me to look at my law degree as not just another set of letters behind my name but as a way of giving back in whatever way I can. I may love IT & Privacy Law and it may have very little to do with changing the world, but ultimately I am determined to find a way for technology to touch the lives of everyone. I really do believe it can and it will bridge the gaps between economic, cultural, communication and societal barriers. I know the “what” of my hopes and beliefs, I just wish I knew the “how”.

Thank you Tressa for inspiring me to ask the right questions.

Enjoy!