h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

At my local Farmer Jack grocery store, in the corner of the store with "bakery" spelled in neon on the wall, I saw a machine that looks like a giant photocopier for posters and blueprints. On the top of the machine it said, "Federal law prohibits the use of copyrighted images on our photograph cakes. We apologize for any inconvenience."

Isn't it nice that photographers and publishers are protected from having their valuable images transfered to the tops of cakes and eaten? ...that is, if enough royalties aren't paid?

Funny how the art is not as important as the artist these days. Fifty or a hundred years ago, artists would have been thrilled at the notion of more and more and more people experiencing their works. Now they try to squeeze more money out by ensuring that it can't be seen or used without payment.



Oh well. S**t happens. Q*e s**a s**a. In a few years, they'll make a cheap attachment to your inkjet so you can transfer images to cakes at home, and we'll all have a laugh about those wacky old copyright laws.

A month ago I put in a couple of old songs that I recieved orally thirty years ago and made the mistake of crediting the authors.
The moderators imediately removed it as copyrighted.
I found a link to a website that said In US Law any copyright prior to 1978 had to be renewed after 28 years or it became public domain.
the moderators said in essence, we don't go by US Law we go by our house rules based on British law. Then a couple of days ago I found a 15 line anti-war song and yiked it just to see what would happen. the moderators said that since it was not an entire song but only an inconsequetial part it would not be removed. Don't you think they are being subjective picking and choosing what is inconsequential?

15 lines sounds like a substantial portion to me. I don't understand what their standards are for "inconsequential" amounts of copyrighted material. There's a lot about moderation that I don't understand.

"A month ago I put in a couple of old songs that I recieved orally thirty years ago and made the mistake of crediting the authors."

The irony is that you might have gotten away with it if you had not given credit to the real authors. Maybe someday BBC will get some decision-makers who understand the web better than the current batch, and they'll let us have reactive moderation again.