Copyrights Violation by Yahoo Inc
By HarrySaturday, March 10th, 2007 at 10:17 am
In continuation of the interesting discussions we had on copyrights and with specific reference to the readings on Indirect Liability for copyright infringement ( by Lichtman and Landes), I wish to discuss the details of the copyright violations indulged in by Yahoo Inc in their recently launched Malyalam portal which is one of Indian languages spoken mainly in Kerala state. Those interested may like to see a questions-answers dealing with website plagiarism
A number of the Malayalam blogs were shocked to find the contents from their sites in this Yahoo portal most of which were copyrighted by the respective authors. Blogs and blog contents in India is copyrighted and protected under “Creative Common Licensing rights” A look at these, even though its in a different language, makes it amply clear that these seem to be a clear cut case of copyright violations and plagiarism. While contents from some blogs such as Surgayathri & Kariveppila blog were directly lifted as it is, language and pictures in some of the contents were intelligentlly ( well, not so much!) for some others like Puzha.com. The english translation of some of these violations could be seen here.
While this was noticed on Feb 14, 2007 ( the portal was launched on Feb 2) and there have been protests going on by affected parties, these ‘malayalam bloggers’ were made to run around between Yahoo.com and Yahoo India ( Yahoo.com claiming that Yahoo India is a saperate entity!).There was a response from Yahoo which runs as
The Malayalam story was provided to us by Webdunia.com (the content provider) on the express representation that they are duly authorized by the author of the story to publish it. In the circumstances therefore, we do not admit of any copyright violation, as alleged by you.
Although there is no copyright violation and without prejudice to our rights, the said story has been removed from our web site, to avoid any further controversy.
Should you have any further concerns on copyright violations, please write in to copyright@webdunia.com and it will be addressed by the webdunia team.
The Web bloggers were enraged with the answer. Even if its presumed that the copyright violation was indulged in by the content provider, could Yahoo wash off its hands from the entire issue? Is it not a case of indirect infringement by Yahoo? There certainly is a ‘bad intent’ by the content provider in lifting the contents from other sites. It is learnt that ‘Webdunia’, the content provider did contact some of the affected bloggers with an offer to remunerate ( bribe??!! ) but the issue remains whether it was a fair practice and how could Yahoo chose to close its eyes. And why were the contents removed if there were no copyright violations? Its an admission of the fact that it’s a case of copyright violation.
Due to this indifferent attitude of Yahoo Inc, a situation came when these bloggers and all affected parties took out a protest march on March 5. It was only then Yahoo.com came out with a more explicit admission of the whole issue on March 8 and also plans to post on the Malayalam portal its apology which runs as
Yahoo respects the blogging community and the etiquette followed by bloggers. We regret any inconvenience caused by the inadvertent posting of the recipe without attribution.”
The content is provided to Yahoo with the understanding that Webdunia holds all necessary rights to its use, the company said.
The blogger was not immediately available for comment. Her blog now features a graphic urging “stop plagiarism
While the issue may subside with this apology ( coming after about 35 days since the incident was brought to the notice of Yahoo Inc) few issues remain unanswered:
1. Is it not the responsibility of Yahoo Inc to initiate action against its content provider?
2. Would Yahoo Inc behaved in a similar casual & relaxed manner if contents were plagiarised from its site and there were copyright violations indulged in by local bloggers?
3. why dont we have a universal agreed action plan to deal with cases of copyright violations especially web based?
March 11th, 2007 at 1:24 am
Please donot miss to read this blog - http://copyrightviolations.blogspot.com/
It would be a key point to note that the same company (Webdunia) provides msn.co.in’s content for indic language portals. could this be a corporate sabotage? nice food for thought, I would think.
March 11th, 2007 at 4:11 am
Would Yahoo have let this happen US? I guess not. The repurcussion both legal and from PR point of view would have been too high.
So is this a reflection on our poor legal system??
May 21st, 2007 at 2:07 am
It is a different matter with pasting copyrighted matter. Don’t we have any universally applicable patent and copyright laws governing internet?
But is there anything wrong with pasting other matter from private blogs, while acknowledging the same explicitly? I guess, given the proliferation of blogs, many of the content in such sites are themselves of suspect origins. As long as the portal does not use the copied content to make money, it appears fine. In fact it should be encouraged given the need for an agency in consolidating the useful and interesting materials from the plethora of blogs. I suppose it would suit the blogger also since his material gets publicity by way of appearing in yahoo.