Copyright – PLEASE pay attention!

I was reading a blog today and got a huge “de ja vu” feeling.  Suddenly I realized that’s because I had read the entry before – on someone else’s blog.  Sure enough, at the very end, the person had “thanked” the original writer for the post.  The way it read it was like this world-famous blogger had written a post for this small, off-the-beat-and-path blog.

I totally get that the blogger was giving credit and therefore felt he had done the right thing.  But he’s wrong.  I’m not claiming to be a lawyer or anything, but here’s an easy one:  if a blogger has a common use statement on their blog, you have to follow that.  They generally lay out exactly how  you can use the content and give credit.  “thanks to so and so for this post” is NOT acceptable.  If the person does not have the common use statement out somewhere, you shouldn’t take that to mean it is a free for all and start grabbing their content.  In fact, it is more likely that person has someone scanning the internet for these scenarios.

So what should you do if you like a blog post?  First, always give credit up front.  It should be incredibly clear to the reader who wrote the post.  Link to it even.  Don’t lift the content and copy and paste.  Instead, discuss the article.  Add thoughts or comments, site specific quotes and react, or expand on an idea.  Write it as if you got a chance to talk to the author and got to tell them about your feelings to their face.  It is entirely possible they will see the link back and see your article.  Much better attention than a note from their lawyer!

Copyright seems tricky but the reality is, what someone else writes belongs to them.  If they are willing to share they will tell you.  And if not, don’t use it.