Latest on UK WWW links copyright infringement case

[Jan Whitaker]

[Tony, if this is way off topic, please advise and I will drop out of the
discussion on this]

Hmmmm....I can see your point to some extent, but having looked at the
services that comu.net.au is offering, it would seem to me that you would
want as much traffic as you can get from any links from anywhere.  

I call on the journos to comment on this one, as I'm not a journalist.  If
you think about the content of a modern newspaper from the publishers
perspective, it is an advertising system with news/information as the
enticement for people to buy it.  Free to air television is the same.  The
reason we get it "free" is because we pay for it with our purchases of
products from comapnies which then pay for space to advertise those
products. Much of the commercial web is doing the same thing.  Flash web
sites are presented with flash advertising as a way for companies to think
about how the web can benefit their bottom lines.  The current paradigm is
still "eyes on sites" [v. eyes on TV boxes/newspapers/magazines, etc.]. 

If this is to be changed, as I gather Ron is interested in doing, the
operating paradigm in the commercial world must change as well.  But there
needs to be a strong rationale for that shift that can be expressed to the
business community [which now seems to include the public services as well
given the embrace of a busineess metaphor gone mad].  

Saying we are on the information highway doesn't hold any practical
imagery for most people.  The existing paradigm of getting as many viewers
as possible in order to sell the "product" rules.  Saying this is a
fragile industry doesn't say enough about why links to a second site
deserve to be paid for when the apparent point of having the info on the
web is so that people WILL look there.  If the point is otherwise, it
needs to be said.  I don't think I can say what it is, but am willing to
consider alternatives. 

Plagiarism has a long history and is understood as "cheating" from school
days.  Is it plagiarism to say, hey, go look at that neat info on the 2000
problem that IBM put up?  Is it plagiarism to be included ina Yahoo
listing of pertinent sites on a particular topic? [I liked the phrase
"sign posting"].  I don't think the current "rules" [that's what a
paradigm is, a set of culturally agreed to rules for seeing the world]
consider "connecting to other info" as a wrong thing to do.  Is there an
ethic that is being breeched?

[how about a cuppa the next time you get to Melbourne instead of the
cheque? :-)]

Jan Whitaker
JLWhitaker Associates     \--------/ - jwhit@primenet.com
Educational Technology Consultant / - Video and Computer Specialties
Melbourne, VIC, Australia   \----/ - http://www.primenet.com/~jwhit/
Voice: (+613)9592-5752       \--/