While one can sympathize with outsider outrage at the FBI's shutting down of Poetree.coop (as reported by Seth Godin), it appears that the site was breaking all kinds of copyright laws by posting poems without getting permission from poets.
As a writer, I would take great umbrage at some renegade site stealing my work. With freedom of speech comes responsibility to reserve that freedom for your own ideas and work--you are not free to post someone else's work (unless it's in the public domain or with permission).
I firmly believe in spanking, from time to time, the establishment literary community, but for the right reasons. Whether or not you like individual poets or not, you still don't have the right to lift their work, depriving them of their livelihood.
This right to control one's own intellectual property is the cornerstone of the literary community and benefits both insider and outsider.
By the way, I know my way around the domaining community and am aware that the .coop TLD exists, but I believe this is the first time I have seen it in actual use--or in this case, was in use.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment
The following are subject to deletion:
--Comments with outside links
--Off topic comments
--Advertising and general spam
--Hate speech
--Name calling
--Bad language
--Accusations
--Pornography