[bowerbird]

finally! someone in this mess says something of substance!

jeremymims said:

> I work with hundreds of newspapers and

> a dozen or so have contacted me to ask

> how they could use Scroll Kit's technology

> in the past few days. In fact,

> one of my larger top-100 newspaper clients

> signed up to use Scroll Kit this week.

> They won't be the only ones.

looks like scrollkit's gambit, as misguided as it was, actually _worked_ for them. :+)

-bowerbird

p.s. and maybe _i've_ made a mistake calling it "misguided". in one sense, sure, it was stupid to use copyrighted content from a protective source. but can anyone honestly argue that the brouhaha didn't get extra juice because it was "snow fall"? would an example based on "pride and prejudice" have garnered so much attention? yeah, right... i mean, i thought cody was a bit crazy because it seemed like he expected praise for scrollkit and he ended up with a shitstorm instead. but maybe, just maybe, he was crazy like a fox, and knew that a shitstorm was exactly what he needed right now.

[jimray]

So, the ends justify the means and it's all good because at least his startup got some publicity? Even if the "publicity" turns out to be a net win, what a terrible way to conduct yourself.

[bowerbird]

oh, puleeze. it's not as if they drowned orphan children.

they merely copied some text and pictures and stuff, and not for the purpose of "stealing" it, but to do a demo...

it's entirely possible a jury -- if it'd come to that -- would have ruled that what they did constituted fair use.

it hardly qualifies as "a terrible way to conduct yourself." indeed, in my opinion, such a charge borders on ludicrous.

plus recall, in america, you're innocent until proven guilty.

-bowerbird

[jimray]

Ease off on the rhetoric. I'm not accusing anyone of anything, I don't think anyone did anything illegal and, for what it's worth, I thought the Times' lawyering was dumb and hamfisted at best.

But there was a right way for scroll kit to handle this and there was the wrong, easy way they chose. They could've said "Have you been blown away by features like The New York Times' 'Snowfall' or Pitchfork's cover stories? We'd like to show you Scroll Kit." And then put together their own demo video with their own work without a smarmy "it took us an hour to do what the Times did in months".

It's classless and low. But they got the publicity they wanted and seem to have a fan in you. Hoo ray.