Website / Internet Legal Advice

FlyingKat

I am not sure if this is the right place to ask such a question.

I have for the last few months been trying to get some things removed from the internet that I had previously written. Most websites have been really helpful in removing things, however I have found one that is being a bit of a pain in the backside.

They tell me that because the letters written appeared in the local paper (printed edition) some years back they have the right to put them on the website.

Anyone offer some advice. I do not recall T&C stating they had a legal right to use my letters and put them on a website. I presume being a letter sent to a local paper via snail mail, it was only for a printed publication.

agrinnall

I'm sure they will have it covered - and I hope they do, because I don't agree with people deciding to ask for publicly available content to be removed on a whim. If you don't want it to be seen keep it private.

PasturesNew

The issue would be with the newspaper. You wrote to the paper, hoping to be published. They published your letter. I don't know how many rights you have over reprints etc .... but then the Internet came along and all newspapers are digitising their content, including your letter and the letters of thousands of other people right back to the day that newspapers began.

I suspect you have no rights.

The newspaper has digitised the content, or authorised it to be digitised. And you probably signed away any rights by writing to the paper all those years ago, hoping to be published. Well, you've been published. How great is that??



If newspapers didn't believe they had a right to digitise/republish their old content then they'd not do it.

But your gripe is with the newspaper, not the website (who I presume are something like the nationalpaperarchives or a family history site that enables content to be available.

Your chances, in my guessed situation, are virtually nil. You'd be playing with bigger boys, with expensive lawyers - and they'll have already covered all this with their legal departments before they started their projects.

If the facts are different to the above, give more information.

Fightsback

I'm not a fan of erasing history and strongly disagree the EU right to be forgotten. History is history and should not be re-written IMO.

Publish and be damned.

FlyingKat

agrinnall wrote: »

I'm sure they will have it covered - and I hope they do, because I don't agree with people deciding to ask for publicly available content to be removed on a whim. If you don't want it to be seen keep it private.

It was publically available in a printed paper, feel free to go read it in the archives. I see no reason a simple letter should be placed online without permission from the person who wrote it.

FlyingKat

PasturesNew wrote: »

The issue would be with the newspaper. You wrote to the paper, hoping to be published. They published your letter. I don't know how many rights you have over reprints etc .... but then the Internet came along and all newspapers are digitising their content, including your letter and the letters of thousands of other people right back to the day that newspapers began.

I suspect you have no rights.


The newspaper has digitised the content, or authorised it to be digitised. And you probably signed away any rights by writing to the paper all those years ago, hoping to be published. Well, you've been published. How great is that??



If newspapers didn't believe they had a right to digitise/republish their old content then they'd not do it.

But your gripe is with the newspaper, not the website (who I presume are something like the nationalpaperarchives or a family history site that enables content to be available.

Your chances, in my guessed situation, are virtually nil. You'd be playing with bigger boys, with expensive lawyers - and they'll have already covered all this with their legal departments before they started their projects.

If the facts are different to the above, give more information.

Most website have T&C and usually it is written in them that you can revoke permission and request for things to be removed. As I said most websites I have contacted have removed things with no problem, but one is being awkward, although they did remove some things I asked... so it seems they wish to make up the rules as they go along!

forgotmyname

Rules will vary depending on which country the server is hosted on also.

If its againt the law to post a picture and a name in this country you look for a server in a country where its legal.

Getting stuff removed can be a nightmare, what rights did you give the newspaper though?

googler

FlyingKat wrote: »

Anyone offer some advice. I do not recall T&C stating they had a legal right to use my letters and put them on a website. I presume being a letter sent to a local paper via snail mail, it was only for a printed publication.

Presumably you were looking for a forum for your opinion to be heard or seen when you wrote to the letters page back then?

The posting online has widened this reach, but that's not what you want?

esuhl

FlyingKat wrote: »

It was publically available in a printed paper, feel free to go read it in the archives. I see no reason a simple letter should be placed online without permission from the person who wrote it.

Why not? They don't need your permission; they need the permission of the copyright-holder, which will usually be the publication that printed the material.

Have you noticed that, on sites such as this one, the T&Cs require you to license your content to the publisher?

Too late now, but you might want to think twice about agreeing to give away publication rights to your content in future. (Are you worried about your post here being read in years to come?)

JJ_Egan

Content still on the Wayback Machine ??