Don't bid on this Pilot TV

[site123a]

It's true, he shouldn't have linked your website to his auction.. Here's the problem, after people start bidding on his auction, the content of the page becomes permanent, thats to prevent "bate & switch".

You got two options, you can either report it to ebay which will take too long. Or temporarily take down that webpage from your site so the link he has no longer works. Or even better, temporarily replace the Pilot TV page with porno so he looks like an idiot.

[jpdylon]

Originally Posted by site123a

Or temporarily take down that webpage from your site so the link he has no longer works. Or even better, temporarily replace the Pilot TV page with porno so he looks like an idiot.

I second this great idea. Or perhaps, something to the effect of "hey asshole, stop linking to my information for your benefit without my permission!"

[clydeselsor]

Originally Posted by jpdylon

I second this great idea. Or perhaps, something to the effect of "hey asshole, stop linking to my information for your benefit without my permission!"

I like the porn idea better!

[Dave S]

Hi Phil,

I'm actually a little ambivalent about this type of bad manners. On the one hand, we all use the web as a resource for information. And on the other hand, there are right and wrong ways to use the information people have so generously published there. Where do you draw the line? Is it making any reference whatsoever to your material? Or in linking directly to your files without your permission? Copying your files? Or using you material in a commercial way? I'm not trying to defend this guy (I think he should have asked you first) but he did disclose that he found the information on the 'net and was reproducing it in his listing. I don't think he really thought about it. His intentions, from his perspective, were probably relatively pure. He just didn't consider YOUR perspective.

I'd caution against modifying the site so that material can't be copied. I've referred to your pages many times; they're a great resource, and it was a great convenience to be able to copy down information for offline reference.

Still, when the line has been crossed it's upsetting. That line may be different for each of us. I'm not sure I'd be too terribly offended if the information I posted was, however backhandedly, honored as an authoritative resource in this way. But I did have an instance a while back where one of those automatically generated websites that seem to exist for no other purpose other than to generate ad revenue linked to one of my images on the NJARC site. Ordinarily, I wouldn't mind, but A) this was, to me, an offensive type of site and B) the reason I even noticed it was they were consuming an appreciable amount of my bandwidth, which was somewhat limited at the time. I try to be a nice guy, but I'm not always completely successful. So I replaced the shot of the swapmeet with this one

Their link to our file was changed several days later and the guys in the club all had a good laugh!

--Dave Sica

[Phil Nelson]

Yes, I did report the auction to eBay. No action so far. I also modified my TV-37 page to explain that I have temporarily removed the real article because it was illegally copied.

I have often given permission for people to use my articles & photos for various purposes -- but not selling on eBay, since my site has always been noncommercial.

This guy [A] didn't ask permission in the first place, and [B] copied a large portion of the article verbatim without attribution. When I asked him to cut it out, he just added a note stating that he had "gathered" some of his information online, with a link to my article.

I try not to be overly sensitive to this, but in the past people have conducted fraudulent auctions using the entire text and all of the photos from some of my articles. Others have copied text and/or photos, or linked to my site in such a way that a bidder might be confused, thinking that my fully restored set might be the one they're bidding on, or thinking that my noncommercial site is a place where everything is for sale.

Copyright infringement is a matter of degree. I wouldn't have a problem if the guy had simply used facts from my article, rather than copying & pasting a big chunk of it verbatim. I wouldn't have a problem if his description had said, "You can read more about this kind of TV at <link>."

It's not good enough for him to say he "gathered" information online. That's like me saying, "Please buy this novel entitled Jurassic Park by Phil Nelson. I gathered it by photocopying the novel Jurassic Park by Michael Crichton."

I would rather not put porno pictures on my website, even temporarily, or defeat copying from pages. As Dave mentioned, it can be useful to copy a tube lineup, or whatever, from an article, and print it out to refer to in your workshop. Helping people out in that way is why I go to the trouble of writing this stuff in the first place.

This person has sold hundreds of items on eBay and should know better. He didn't have the courtesy to reply to my message to him. Perhaps he is a well-meaning nitwit, but he should at least be called when he crosses the line.

OK, enough whining

Phil

[Findm-Keepm]

Folks,

We can all help Phil in this - you don't have to be the legal copyright owner to report an infringement. On the subject auction page, click on "report item" at the bottom of the page, then select "listing violations" then "copying of your listing" and then "Someone copied text or pictures from another web site or eBay listing"

In the brief description block, I simply stated that the auction copied copyrighted text from the website listed in the auction.

I think if we all reported this, eBay might get the message that we all take this seriously. Many reports of the same listing are very hard to ignore.

Cheers,

[ranf1970]

Originally Posted by Findm-Keepm

Folks,

We can all help Phil in this - you don't have to be the legal copyright owner to report an infringement. On the subject auction page, click on "report item" at the bottom of the page, then select "listing violations" then "copying of your listing" and then "Someone copied text or pictures from another web site or eBay listing"

In the brief description block, I simply stated that the auction copied copyrighted text from the website listed in the auction.

I think if we all reported this, eBay might get the message that we all take this seriously. Many reports of the same listing are very hard to ignore.

Cheers,

Done! Good luck Phil!