As the issue has been coming up a lot lately (and its never dormant for too long), I figured a reminder of the laws regarding the reprinting of (cutting and pasting) text that is copyright-protected, and this site’s policy in those regards, was in order.

Unless you’re satirizing (making a “transformative” use), it is not considered “fair use” to reprint in toto a news piece, or any other copyright-protected article on the web. It’s a violation of law.

The proper approach if you want to reference a copyright-protected piece is to use an excerpt, cleanly separated and identified as an excerpt, and a link to the original piece. It doesn’t hurt to include one’s own commentary contextualizing the excerpt.

If you don’t know if an article is protected under copyright, assume it is. It probably is, in fact.

Please be aware that diaries or comments that break copyright laws could get GMD into trouble, and are therefore subject to deletion with-or-without notice. Blogs can be – and are – sued for this. We’re not trying to create any hurt feelings, but we really have no wiggle room on this. Violations of copyright law will come down just as soon as one of the front pagers is near an internet-connected computer.

Future deletions will include a link to this diary. For more information on what is considered fair use, click here. For more information on copyright law in general, click here.