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Do you hear that? Thats the sound of the old-media dam bursting. Desperate for content and finding it impossible to compete with blogs when it comes to niche news coverage, Flare magazine has started ripping off content straight from blogs into their magazine, and claiming it to be their own.
Babar Bhatti has all the evidence here.
Spider has quoted Green & White a few times in the "around the blogosphere" section but they atleast give credit and a full link back to us.
This is shameful, particularly because they’re forgetting that blogs own copyright for their content and can very very easily file a case on this. Maybe this will be the start of a longer debate between old and new media on content ownership and distribution. From my view it is very easy for old-media to reposition itself as content aggregation and distribution channels. Print can still achieve higher distribution numbers (atleast on paper) and get the content to some demographics better than blogs, but blogs and the nature of bloggers can sometimes create deeper feature articles.
If print simply chooses to pay bloggers for each story chosen just as they pay freelancers, I dont think many would have a problem with this. But something needs to be done about people who are assuming that blog content is free for redistribution.
Flare’s contact info is:
flare.mag@gmail.com
Voice : +92-51-2890054
Fax: +92-51-2891339
Someone, please get on their case and get a response from their editor to the comments below. We need to do this for Babar and the rest of us.
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June 2nd, 2008 at 11:25 am
In fact something even better is if someone tries to email some of their main sponsors to let them know that their company is sponsoring plagiarism. Get at the things that can really influence Flare into reason.
June 2nd, 2008 at 11:13 pm
Osama, Thanks for taking this up. I am concerned by this trend where we accept copying and cheating. Civil society needs to wake up and realize that the tacit approval of such copyright violations will hurt us in the long run.
June 4th, 2008 at 10:47 am
Guys,
I know a few people who can take this up with Flare or the Press club.
Umair has already taken this up on his ‘rank of the week section of his column at Netxpress (http://netxpress.com.pk/2008/06/04/online-communities-part-1-umair-naeem/)
Baber, can you send me a document with the Flare article and your post, with publishing dates?
June 4th, 2008 at 1:53 pm
Woah this is bad news man.. i hope the cheaters get straight asap!
June 4th, 2008 at 2:44 pm
I think its absolutely rubbish what Flare has done. They really need to be blacklisted by the telecom companies who are their big sponsors.
Blog content can be protected, but it needs to be registered with the relevant copyright office first. Check out www.ipo.gov.pk for more information on Intellectual Property Rights, something that Pakistan is seriously lagging in.
I would suggest that all bloggers have a copyright statement on their blog warning people from copying the content. That way, legally, we can claim that we had officially informed the readers that the content can not be copied. For more information, see http://drowningshadows.wordpress.com/2008/06/04/protecting-blog-content/
June 6th, 2008 at 3:10 pm
Truly pathetic. But not at all surprising. The easy way out is the only way out these days it seems. The abnormal of the past has become the norm of the present.
Flare magazine should not be taken to court but a media campaign using personal connections and networks should be launched against them. The objective of this campaign would be to ridicule them to such an extent that by the end of it they will be no more then a joke in the media industry.
Osama, kudos to your suggestion. However, I hope the financiers care. They may just be happy with the fact that the magazine is making them money, and they may not care about the how behind that.
June 11th, 2008 at 12:36 pm
its been a common act of Flare to do this. From what I know, if any company refuses to sponsor them they actually post some very nasty content about them.
However, Flare readership is extremely low. There is not much of a need to worry, but yes, plagiarism should be stopped, and if they don’t get straight, expose them.