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I decided to dissect that portion of the Yahoo TOS that seems to be causing
folks the most concern. Here's what I came up with.
Just a reminder: I am not a lawyer. This is just a common-sense dissection of
one portion of their TOS, in terms of what I think it means. It's my opinion
only and you should not rely on it for anything.
Ok, the section many people are choking on says ...
"By submitting Content to any Yahoo property, you automatically grant, or
warrant that the owner of such Content has expressly granted, Yahoo the
royalty-free, perpetual, irrevocable, non-exclusive and fully
sublicensable right and license to use, reproduce, modify, adapt, publish,
translate, create derivative works from, distribute, perform and display
such Content (in whole or part) worldwide and/or to incorporate it in
other works in any form, media, or technology now known or later
developed."
Let's analyze this.
"By submitting Content to any Yahoo property, ...
As soon as you submit any content to GeoCities under the new agreement, you
have agreed to the following.
... you automatically grant, or warrant that the owner of such Content has
expressly granted ...
Anything you upload has to be either your own property, or if it's not,
has to have express (not implied) permission from the copyright holder,
that they allow Yahoo the same rights to the material as Yahoo has to
your own material.
Put another way, if you use a way-cool 'free gif' (perhaps from one of the
many sites available on the net for such things) on your site, you are for
all intents and purposes saying to Yahoo 'the owner of this GIF has granted
permission for Yahoo to have the same rights to it as to my own material'.
If the owner of such a GIF image sued Yahoo for using their GIF on, say, a
CDROM, Yahoo would have the right to say 'it's YOUR fault! YOU pay damages!'
You could not, for example, make a copy of POV-Ray available for download
via GeoCities, because doing so would imply that we (the POV-Team) had
explicitly granted Yahoo rights to our software. Needless to say, we
have not done so. (You can put images created by yourself with POV-Ray
[using your own scene files] on the site since we do not claim any
copyright over such material).
I can see the need for a section that covers roughly this sort of thing
so that Yahoo can mirror its content elsewhere. It's up to you to decide
if it's gone too far and/or is unnecessarily broad.
... Yahoo the royalty-free, ...
They don't have to pay you if they use any of your submitted material.
That's not the same as saying they WON'T pay you, but they don't have to.
... perpetual ...
This means 'forever'. It doesn't mean 'until you are no longer a GeoCities
member' as some have suggested. It means FOREVER.
... irrevocable ...
You can't change your mind. Once this is granted, it can't be un-granted.
... non-exclusive ...
This means that they don't claim to be the only right-holders. You can grant
other entities the same rights to the same content if you choose.
... and fully sublicensable right and license ...
'Fully sublicensable' means that they can sub-licence the licence you granted
to them. This presumably means that they can give third parties certain rights
to deal with your material.
... use, reproduce, ...
That's fairly clear, and not unreasonable in itself given the purpose of
GeoCities.
.. modify, adapt, ...
Hmmm. They can modify your work. For example, if you have an image on
Geocities that had been submitted under the new agreement, and that image
had a copyright signature written on it by you, they have the right to
remove that signature. (That's not to say they will, but that they can ...).
In fact, it seems they can do anything to the work that they choose,
including adapting it to suit some other purpose (see 'derivative works'
below).
.. publish, ...
Ok, that's not unreasonable. But note that 'publish' doesn't just mean that
they can publish it on the web ... they can also, if they choose, publish it
in printed form, on a CDROM, or anywhere else.
... translate, ...
Presumably translate it into other languages.
... create derivative works from, ...
A 'derivative work' is a new work (in terms of the US copyright act) that is
based upon, in whole or in part, other work(s).
... distribute, perform and display such Content ...
Again, not unreasonable in itself. After all, that's what GeoCities exists to
do.
... (in whole or part) worldwide ...
They can just use the bits that they want to use. They don't have to use
any part of it that they don't want to, even if that causes the bit that
they do use to be out of context.
It's interesting to note - when compared with the broadness of the rest
of this section of the TOS agreement - that they limit this to 'worldwide'
(i.e. only on Earth ;). Heck, what about the REST of the solar system !!!
... and/or to incorporate it in other works ...
Such as a CDROM, for example, or anything else that they please.
... in any form, media, or technology now known or later developed."
That covers a LOT of ground.
Also, don't forget that the licence you grant them is perpetual. Even if, for
example, Yahoo was purchased by another firm (e.g., Microsoft), the licence
you granted still applies (and is now owned by the purchaser).
Again, just a reminder: I am not a lawyer. This is just, in my opinion, a
common-sense dissection of one portion of their TOS, in terms of what I
think it means to POV-Ray users (particularly those who place their
raytracings on to a Yahoo property). It's my opinion only and you should
not rely on it for anything.
-- Chris
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Hej Chris, hej all!
I completely agree to your dissection of the Yahoo TOS with one little
comment:
> .. modify, adapt, ...
>
> Hmmm. They can modify your work. For example, if you have an image on
> Geocities that had been submitted under the new agreement, and that image
> had a copyright signature written on it by you, they have the right to
> remove that signature. (That's not to say they will, but that they can ...).
They have to include this passage as it also covers the modification of
your submitted HTML code to open their splashy windows and to include
their watermark !
Without this section in the TOS every user could sue them for their
"some words of our sponsors", banners that are included if you should
use the "geoguide" etc...
Of course they could narrow this paragraph to something that would
exclude the modification of certain parts, like pictures, text etc. but
I guess what you can read in the TOS is US lawyer language...
Uwe.
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In article <3781A574.5BD4275A@ele.kth.se>, Uwe Zimmermann <uwe### [at] ele kthse>
wrote:
>Of course they could narrow this paragraph to something that would
>exclude the modification of certain parts, like pictures, text etc. but
>I guess what you can read in the TOS is US lawyer language...
Just remember that no matter where you are, if some future owner of
Geocities decides to use your creation in a manner that you wish to stop,
you will have to stop them in a US court using US lawyer language.
Jerry
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Chris,
Read this excellent article on copyright at the internet
http://www.patents.com/copyrigh.sht
Perhaps,
the following procedure may protect your image from servers that donot
understand what good hosting means:
Publish your picture first in a local or in the POVRAY discussion group.
Mark it with Copyright, 7 July 1999, your name.
Then, after a week, send it to geocities with the same copyright mark.
In principle, you remain always the owner of original or creative work,
you may transfer these rights if you sell your work to a publisher, but
for the internet the matter is not quite clear.
regards, stephan
Chris wrote:
>
> I decided to dissect that portion of the Yahoo TOS that seems to be causing
> folks the most concern. Here's what I came up with.
>
> Just a reminder: I am not a lawyer. This is just a common-sense dissection of
> one portion of their TOS, in terms of what I think it means. It's my opinion
> only and you should not rely on it for anything.
>
> Ok, the section many people are choking on says ...
>
> "By submitting Content to any Yahoo property, you automatically grant, or
> warrant that the owner of such Content has expressly granted, Yahoo the
> royalty-free, perpetual, irrevocable, non-exclusive and fully
> sublicensable right and license to use, reproduce, modify, adapt, publish,
> translate, create derivative works from, distribute, perform and display
> such Content (in whole or part) worldwide and/or to incorporate it in
> other works in any form, media, or technology now known or later
> developed."
>
> Let's analyze this.
>
> "By submitting Content to any Yahoo property, ...
>
> As soon as you submit any content to GeoCities under the new agreement, you
> have agreed to the following.
>
> ... you automatically grant, or warrant that the owner of such Content has
> expressly granted ...
>
> Anything you upload has to be either your own property, or if it's not,
> has to have express (not implied) permission from the copyright holder,
> that they allow Yahoo the same rights to the material as Yahoo has to
> your own material.
>
> Put another way, if you use a way-cool 'free gif' (perhaps from one of the
> many sites available on the net for such things) on your site, you are for
> all intents and purposes saying to Yahoo 'the owner of this GIF has granted
> permission for Yahoo to have the same rights to it as to my own material'.
>
> If the owner of such a GIF image sued Yahoo for using their GIF on, say, a
> CDROM, Yahoo would have the right to say 'it's YOUR fault! YOU pay damages!'
>
> You could not, for example, make a copy of POV-Ray available for download
> via GeoCities, because doing so would imply that we (the POV-Team) had
> explicitly granted Yahoo rights to our software. Needless to say, we
> have not done so. (You can put images created by yourself with POV-Ray
> [using your own scene files] on the site since we do not claim any
> copyright over such material).
>
> I can see the need for a section that covers roughly this sort of thing
> so that Yahoo can mirror its content elsewhere. It's up to you to decide
> if it's gone too far and/or is unnecessarily broad.
>
> ... Yahoo the royalty-free, ...
>
> They don't have to pay you if they use any of your submitted material.
> That's not the same as saying they WON'T pay you, but they don't have to.
>
> ... perpetual ...
>
> This means 'forever'. It doesn't mean 'until you are no longer a GeoCities
> member' as some have suggested. It means FOREVER.
>
> ... irrevocable ...
>
> You can't change your mind. Once this is granted, it can't be un-granted.
>
> ... non-exclusive ...
>
> This means that they don't claim to be the only right-holders. You can grant
> other entities the same rights to the same content if you choose.
>
> ... and fully sublicensable right and license ...
>
> 'Fully sublicensable' means that they can sub-licence the licence you granted
> to them. This presumably means that they can give third parties certain rights
> to deal with your material.
>
> ... use, reproduce, ...
>
> That's fairly clear, and not unreasonable in itself given the purpose of
> GeoCities.
>
> .. modify, adapt, ...
>
> Hmmm. They can modify your work. For example, if you have an image on
> Geocities that had been submitted under the new agreement, and that image
> had a copyright signature written on it by you, they have the right to
> remove that signature. (That's not to say they will, but that they can ...).
>
> In fact, it seems they can do anything to the work that they choose,
> including adapting it to suit some other purpose (see 'derivative works'
> below).
>
> .. publish, ...
>
> Ok, that's not unreasonable. But note that 'publish' doesn't just mean that
> they can publish it on the web ... they can also, if they choose, publish it
> in printed form, on a CDROM, or anywhere else.
>
> ... translate, ...
>
> Presumably translate it into other languages.
>
> ... create derivative works from, ...
>
> A 'derivative work' is a new work (in terms of the US copyright act) that is
> based upon, in whole or in part, other work(s).
>
> ... distribute, perform and display such Content ...
>
> Again, not unreasonable in itself. After all, that's what GeoCities exists to
> do.
>
> ... (in whole or part) worldwide ...
>
> They can just use the bits that they want to use. They don't have to use
> any part of it that they don't want to, even if that causes the bit that
> they do use to be out of context.
>
> It's interesting to note - when compared with the broadness of the rest
> of this section of the TOS agreement - that they limit this to 'worldwide'
> (i.e. only on Earth ;). Heck, what about the REST of the solar system !!!
>
> ... and/or to incorporate it in other works ...
>
> Such as a CDROM, for example, or anything else that they please.
>
> ... in any form, media, or technology now known or later developed."
>
> That covers a LOT of ground.
>
> Also, don't forget that the licence you grant them is perpetual. Even if, for
> example, Yahoo was purchased by another firm (e.g., Microsoft), the licence
> you granted still applies (and is now owned by the purchaser).
>
> Again, just a reminder: I am not a lawyer. This is just, in my opinion, a
> common-sense dissection of one portion of their TOS, in terms of what I
> think it means to POV-Ray users (particularly those who place their
> raytracings on to a Yahoo property). It's my opinion only and you should
> not rely on it for anything.
>
> -- Chris
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From: Mark Wagner
Subject: Re: Yahoo/GeoCities TOS: A partial dissection
Date: 7 Jul 1999 00:51:13
Message: <3782dcc1@news.povray.org>
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Jerry wrote in message ...
>In article <3781A574.5BD4275A@ele.kth.se>, Uwe Zimmermann <uwe### [at] elekthse>
>wrote:
>>Of course they could narrow this paragraph to something that would
>>exclude the modification of certain parts, like pictures, text etc. but
>>I guess what you can read in the TOS is US lawyer language...
>
>Just remember that no matter where you are, if some future owner of
>Geocities decides to use your creation in a manner that you wish to stop,
>you will have to stop them in a US court using US lawyer language.
And because of the language used in the TOS agreement, if you try to stop
them, you will be laughed out of court. There is NOTHING you can legally do
to stop them.
Mark
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Mark Wagner wrote:
> And because of the language used in the TOS agreement, if you try to stop
> them, you will be laughed out of court. There is NOTHING you can legally do
> to stop them.
Well there might be one thing - at least for those who really are
concerned that Yahoo might steel their works. But it would have a
greater pressure if done by a lot of people together:
Yahoo/Geocities lives and dies with their sponsors. If anyone would set
up a collective letter to the main sponsors that the homesteaders will
leave Geocities/Yahoo as soon as Yahoo/Geocities first take some
"un-ethical" actions (uses contents of homesteads for its own commercial
profit)...
Just an idea,
Uwe.
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I think that Y/G has the moral right to "advertise" the coolest Y/G sites in *their*
magazine. They might, for example, want to do an expose' on the best 3D computer art
on the web, I believe it is quite fair for them to make references and show my artwork
in their mag, especially if the purpose were to give my site free advertising in their
mag. I'm sure that some geeks would whine about this; bless Yahoo for covering their
a.. on this possibility.
On the other hand, the license seems to allow them to print up and sell T-shirts, say,
at a Myrtle Beach T-shirt shop which would have no "connection" to Y/G. This use would
be "immoral," regardless of whatever agreements anyone had signed.
stephan wrote:
> Chris,
>
> Read this excellent article on copyright at the internet
>
> http://www.patents.com/copyrigh.sht
>
> Perhaps,
> the following procedure may protect your image from servers that donot
> understand what good hosting means:
> Publish your picture first in a local or in the POVRAY discussion group.
> Mark it with Copyright, 7 July 1999, your name.
> Then, after a week, send it to geocities with the same copyright mark.
>
> In principle, you remain always the owner of original or creative work,
> you may transfer these rights if you sell your work to a publisher, but
> for the internet the matter is not quite clear.
>
> regards, stephan
>
> Chris wrote:
> >
> > I decided to dissect that portion of the Yahoo TOS that seems to be causing
> > folks the most concern. Here's what I came up with.
> >
> > Just a reminder: I am not a lawyer. This is just a common-sense dissection of
> > one portion of their TOS, in terms of what I think it means. It's my opinion
> > only and you should not rely on it for anything.
> >
> > Ok, the section many people are choking on says ...
> >
> > "By submitting Content to any Yahoo property, you automatically grant, or
> > warrant that the owner of such Content has expressly granted, Yahoo the
> > royalty-free, perpetual, irrevocable, non-exclusive and fully
> > sublicensable right and license to use, reproduce, modify, adapt, publish,
> > translate, create derivative works from, distribute, perform and display
> > such Content (in whole or part) worldwide and/or to incorporate it in
> > other works in any form, media, or technology now known or later
> > developed."
> >
> > Let's analyze this.
> >
> > "By submitting Content to any Yahoo property, ...
> >
> > As soon as you submit any content to GeoCities under the new agreement, you
> > have agreed to the following.
> >
> > ... you automatically grant, or warrant that the owner of such Content has
> > expressly granted ...
> >
> > Anything you upload has to be either your own property, or if it's not,
> > has to have express (not implied) permission from the copyright holder,
> > that they allow Yahoo the same rights to the material as Yahoo has to
> > your own material.
> >
> > Put another way, if you use a way-cool 'free gif' (perhaps from one of the
> > many sites available on the net for such things) on your site, you are for
> > all intents and purposes saying to Yahoo 'the owner of this GIF has granted
> > permission for Yahoo to have the same rights to it as to my own material'.
> >
> > If the owner of such a GIF image sued Yahoo for using their GIF on, say, a
> > CDROM, Yahoo would have the right to say 'it's YOUR fault! YOU pay damages!'
> >
> > You could not, for example, make a copy of POV-Ray available for download
> > via GeoCities, because doing so would imply that we (the POV-Team) had
> > explicitly granted Yahoo rights to our software. Needless to say, we
> > have not done so. (You can put images created by yourself with POV-Ray
> > [using your own scene files] on the site since we do not claim any
> > copyright over such material).
> >
> > I can see the need for a section that covers roughly this sort of thing
> > so that Yahoo can mirror its content elsewhere. It's up to you to decide
> > if it's gone too far and/or is unnecessarily broad.
> >
> > ... Yahoo the royalty-free, ...
> >
> > They don't have to pay you if they use any of your submitted material.
> > That's not the same as saying they WON'T pay you, but they don't have to.
> >
> > ... perpetual ...
> >
> > This means 'forever'. It doesn't mean 'until you are no longer a GeoCities
> > member' as some have suggested. It means FOREVER.
> >
> > ... irrevocable ...
> >
> > You can't change your mind. Once this is granted, it can't be un-granted.
> >
> > ... non-exclusive ...
> >
> > This means that they don't claim to be the only right-holders. You can grant
> > other entities the same rights to the same content if you choose.
> >
> > ... and fully sublicensable right and license ...
> >
> > 'Fully sublicensable' means that they can sub-licence the licence you granted
> > to them. This presumably means that they can give third parties certain rights
> > to deal with your material.
> >
> > ... use, reproduce, ...
> >
> > That's fairly clear, and not unreasonable in itself given the purpose of
> > GeoCities.
> >
> > .. modify, adapt, ...
> >
> > Hmmm. They can modify your work. For example, if you have an image on
> > Geocities that had been submitted under the new agreement, and that image
> > had a copyright signature written on it by you, they have the right to
> > remove that signature. (That's not to say they will, but that they can ...).
> >
> > In fact, it seems they can do anything to the work that they choose,
> > including adapting it to suit some other purpose (see 'derivative works'
> > below).
> >
> > .. publish, ...
> >
> > Ok, that's not unreasonable. But note that 'publish' doesn't just mean that
> > they can publish it on the web ... they can also, if they choose, publish it
> > in printed form, on a CDROM, or anywhere else.
> >
> > ... translate, ...
> >
> > Presumably translate it into other languages.
> >
> > ... create derivative works from, ...
> >
> > A 'derivative work' is a new work (in terms of the US copyright act) that is
> > based upon, in whole or in part, other work(s).
> >
> > ... distribute, perform and display such Content ...
> >
> > Again, not unreasonable in itself. After all, that's what GeoCities exists to
> > do.
> >
> > ... (in whole or part) worldwide ...
> >
> > They can just use the bits that they want to use. They don't have to use
> > any part of it that they don't want to, even if that causes the bit that
> > they do use to be out of context.
> >
> > It's interesting to note - when compared with the broadness of the rest
> > of this section of the TOS agreement - that they limit this to 'worldwide'
> > (i.e. only on Earth ;). Heck, what about the REST of the solar system !!!
> >
> > ... and/or to incorporate it in other works ...
> >
> > Such as a CDROM, for example, or anything else that they please.
> >
> > ... in any form, media, or technology now known or later developed."
> >
> > That covers a LOT of ground.
> >
> > Also, don't forget that the licence you grant them is perpetual. Even if, for
> > example, Yahoo was purchased by another firm (e.g., Microsoft), the licence
> > you granted still applies (and is now owned by the purchaser).
> >
> > Again, just a reminder: I am not a lawyer. This is just, in my opinion, a
> > common-sense dissection of one portion of their TOS, in terms of what I
> > think it means to POV-Ray users (particularly those who place their
> > raytracings on to a Yahoo property). It's my opinion only and you should
> > not rely on it for anything.
> >
> > -- Chris
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