The Writer's Id Forum Plagerism and Copyright issues..

Are you paranoid of the free space? Do you worry of someone stealing your work when you publish it online? Do the Terms of Service concern you with losing the copyrights to your original work? Ever been tempted to steal? Do you limit what you post?

I myself am not paranoid; people steal from already years-old publications and classic works of art/literature all of the time. I myself have copyrights to my work through The Library of Congress, so people can take the trouble to thieve, but why would they want to? My voice is mine, and their voice is theirs, and if another writer is stealing the words of another, it is only because they do not have a voice of their own. And no one can tell them how to find it; it must be experienced through life.

I have a friend who refuses to submit her poetry to online journals because she fears plagerism. There are a lot of respectable journals online, so I think this is kinda' nuts. Still, she fells as though I am being the ridiculous one . . . As for all traditional fields of humanities, I think they are really going to have to learn to start utilizing the tools avaliable to them . . . few are. I think it's all about perceptions but the changes are inevitable . . . ::confused::

I just posted a thread similar to this in another forum here.

I wrote:

{Hi. I recently joined writers cafe and I saw this group and joined immediately. I am very interested in reviewing, and being reviewed by, other writers who write larger pieces. I currently am working on a book, and have written 15,000 words. I have this divided into 15 short-chapters which I am considering posting in my library.

I was just wondering about the legal implications of posting something on this sight that I hope will be published upon completion. I know that in the Terms & Conditions it says:

"with respect to Content you submit or make available for via the Service, you grant Aresta Enterprise a perpetual, irrevocable, world-wide, royalty free and non-exclusive license to use, distribute, reproduce, modify and publicly display such Content on the Service."

I know that , typically, when you sell a book the publisher buys "first world rights" or "first north American rights" or "first where-ever-you-live rights". I am concerned that the legal rights that this site gets through the above clause might case a problem with a contract that a publisher might present one of us with upon purchase of our work...

I also know that usually work made available to "members only" on sites falls under a different category than work posted and viewable by anyone. Is there an option to post so only members can read certain works in your library?

Basically, my question is: Does anyone here have experience or a link to some information regarding the legal implications of "posting online"? }

I am a little paranoid. I haven't yet posted anything online that I hope to get published in the traditional way, really only to avoid a problem in this area. I am working on a full-length memoir and my goal is to make a living off of my writing. The only reason I am holding out for paper publishing is the benefit$. At this point the major publishing houses simply pay more than any online publisher I have ever heard of.

I wanted to respond to some of the other questions in the thread, but i haven't mastered the quote thing yet... oh well, I've written more than enough already...

Quote:


I didn't like this little claim either . . . But then, ya know, if Aresta Enterprises goes and steals the right of an author to lay claim to his own work, I think they'd be in some deep s**t. I think they would have writers and therefore advertisers dropping from their site like flies. If someone write an awesome book, publishes it on writers cafe, and then proceeds to publish it with a publishing house and get paid for it - If writers cafe tried to pull the plug on this, they would be pulling the plug on certain site promotion. World Wide Web is a different sort of free publishing . . . I think there are variant rules occuring in the background that give us writers some sort of creative rights (of course, I don't know what they are exactly . . . and maybe I'm just fantasizing . . . ). I actually wrote these people an inquisitive letter about rights to materials upon starting this group . . . I didn't want them to freak out and think that I was using their site for my own profit and then yank my account . . . I reassured them that my efforts were purely research based and would be for their benefit (if I published anything). I never heard back from them. I wonder if they even pay any attention . . . It is my understanding that some people out here, wandering around in the cafe, know the rulers of the site personally . . . To me they remain myterious dark overlords . . . or maybe they're more like complacent parents (which, as we all know, having complacent parents is absolutely GREAT). ::biggrin::

It says in the clause the rights that Aresta reserves are non-exclusive. So, they couldn't stop someone from publishing their own work. But most publishers are uninterested in having rights simultaneously held by anyone other than another division of their own company. Why would they pay you to publish your book if instead of buying it, consumers could access it free somewhere else. There is also a difference between members only sites and open to the public sites, in the eyes of some publishers.

I personally would only post my major work here to have it work shopped, because I can't get to any writers workshops locally. It seems to me that if it is members only site it should be considered more closely linked to a workshop than a publishing house. Especially if it is one with the basis in reading and reviewing as this one is.

Where it ends up right now, I am using sites like this to meet other writers who might be willing to look at my work offline... emailed to them... and give me feedback that way... better safe than sorry, no?