Comments on: NYT General Counsel Says Aggregation Isn’t Stealing http://theharperstudio.com/2009/07/nyt-general-counsel-says-aggregation-isn%e2%80%99t-stealing/ the 26th Story Wed, 08 Feb 2012 16:01:00 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2.1 By: avidReader http://theharperstudio.com/2009/07/nyt-general-counsel-says-aggregation-isn%e2%80%99t-stealing/comment-page-1/#comment-3449 avidReader Thu, 23 Jul 2009 01:49:04 +0000 http://theharperstudio.com/?p=4066#comment-3449 Copyright isn't the culprit. It belongs to an era in which 'readers' were regarded as 'merely consumers' of information. Today, whatever digitaliterati we have expect their media consumption to be participatory: take video clips and mix them up with other sound, video, or text files, then pass those around to other 'reader-consumers' who then remix, remash, and resend. Copyright is a great model for user as consumer. It simply does not synch with the user habits, user assumptions, nor technical implications of digital media. NYT is smart not to fight the implications. Almost certainly, they are getting new readers via HuffPo; how that will all pan out economically is still mystifying. But antagonizing online readers by going after HuffPo is probably not a very smart move; better to leverage HuffPo's ability to bring in new readers to the NYT. Copyright isn’t the culprit. It belongs to an era in which ‘readers’ were regarded as ‘merely consumers’ of information. Today, whatever digitaliterati we have expect their media consumption to be participatory: take video clips and mix them up with other sound, video, or text files, then pass those around to other ‘reader-consumers’ who then remix, remash, and resend.

Copyright is a great model for user as consumer.
It simply does not synch with the user habits, user assumptions, nor technical implications of digital media.

NYT is smart not to fight the implications.
Almost certainly, they are getting new readers via HuffPo; how that will all pan out economically is still mystifying.
But antagonizing online readers by going after HuffPo is probably not a very smart move; better to leverage HuffPo’s ability to bring in new readers to the NYT.

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