That’s interesting. I was looking up “Lemmy Terms of Service” for comparison after getting that quote from the Reddit ToS and could not find anything for Lemmy.ml. Now after you mentioned it, looking on my Mastodon instance, nothing either, just a privacy policy. That is indeed kinda weird. Some instances do have their own ToS though. At least something stating a sublicense for distribution should be there for protection of people running instances in locations where it’s relevant.
The funny thing about Lemmy is that the entire Fediverse is basically running a massive copyright violation ring with current copyright law.
Is it, though?
When someone posts a comment to Lemmy, they do so willingly, with the intent for it to be posted and federated. If they change their mind, they can delete it. If they delete it and it remains up somewhere, they can submit a DMCA request; likewise if someone else posts their copyrighted content.
Copyright infringement is the use of works protected by copyright without permission for their use. When you submit a post or a comment, your permission to display it and for it to be federated is implied, because that is how Lemmy works. A license also conveys permission, but that’s not the only way permission can be conveyed.
The idea that someone does this willingly implies that the user knows the implications of their choice, which most of the Fediverse doesn’t seem to do
The terms of service for lemmy.world, which you must agree to upon sign-up, make reference to federating. If you don’t know what that means, it’s your responsibility to look it up and understand it. I assume other instances have similar sign-up processes. The source code to Lemmy is also available, meaning that a full understanding is available to anyone willing to take the time to read through the code, unlike with most social media companies.
What sorts of implications of the choice to post to Lemmy do you think that people don’t understand, that people who post to Facebook do understand?
If the implied license was enough, Facebook and all the other companies wouldn’t put these disclaimers in their terms of service.
It’s not an implied license. It’s implied permission. And if you post content to a website that’s hosting and displaying such content, it’s obvious what’s about to happen with it. Please try telling a judge that you didn’t understand what you were doing, sued without first trying to delete or file a DMCA notice, and see if that judge sides with you.
Many companies have lengthy terms of service with a ton of CYA legalese that does nothing. Even so, an explicit license to your content in the terms of service does do something - but that doesn’t mean that you’re infringing copyright without it. If my artist friend asks me to take her art piece to a copy shop and to get a hundred prints made for her, I’m not infringing copyright then, either, nor is the copy shop. If I did that without permission, on the other hand, I would be. If her lawyer got wind of this and filed a suit against me without checking with her and I showed the judge the text saying “Hey hedgehog, could you do me a favor and…,” what do you think he’d say?
Besides, Facebook does things that Lemmy instances don’t do. Facebook’s codebase isn’t open, and they’d like to reserve the ability to do different things with the content you submit. Facebook wants to be able to do non-obvious things with your content. Facebook is incorporated in California and has a value in the hundreds of billions, but Lemmy instances are located all over the world and I doubt any have a value even in the millions.
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That’s interesting. I was looking up “Lemmy Terms of Service” for comparison after getting that quote from the Reddit ToS and could not find anything for Lemmy.ml. Now after you mentioned it, looking on my Mastodon instance, nothing either, just a privacy policy. That is indeed kinda weird. Some instances do have their own ToS though. At least something stating a sublicense for distribution should be there for protection of people running instances in locations where it’s relevant.
deleted by creator
Is it, though?
When someone posts a comment to Lemmy, they do so willingly, with the intent for it to be posted and federated. If they change their mind, they can delete it. If they delete it and it remains up somewhere, they can submit a DMCA request; likewise if someone else posts their copyrighted content.
Copyright infringement is the use of works protected by copyright without permission for their use. When you submit a post or a comment, your permission to display it and for it to be federated is implied, because that is how Lemmy works. A license also conveys permission, but that’s not the only way permission can be conveyed.
deleted by creator
The terms of service for lemmy.world, which you must agree to upon sign-up, make reference to federating. If you don’t know what that means, it’s your responsibility to look it up and understand it. I assume other instances have similar sign-up processes. The source code to Lemmy is also available, meaning that a full understanding is available to anyone willing to take the time to read through the code, unlike with most social media companies.
What sorts of implications of the choice to post to Lemmy do you think that people don’t understand, that people who post to Facebook do understand?
It’s not an implied license. It’s implied permission. And if you post content to a website that’s hosting and displaying such content, it’s obvious what’s about to happen with it. Please try telling a judge that you didn’t understand what you were doing, sued without first trying to delete or file a DMCA notice, and see if that judge sides with you.
Many companies have lengthy terms of service with a ton of CYA legalese that does nothing. Even so, an explicit license to your content in the terms of service does do something - but that doesn’t mean that you’re infringing copyright without it. If my artist friend asks me to take her art piece to a copy shop and to get a hundred prints made for her, I’m not infringing copyright then, either, nor is the copy shop. If I did that without permission, on the other hand, I would be. If her lawyer got wind of this and filed a suit against me without checking with her and I showed the judge the text saying “Hey hedgehog, could you do me a favor and…,” what do you think he’d say?
Besides, Facebook does things that Lemmy instances don’t do. Facebook’s codebase isn’t open, and they’d like to reserve the ability to do different things with the content you submit. Facebook wants to be able to do non-obvious things with your content. Facebook is incorporated in California and has a value in the hundreds of billions, but Lemmy instances are located all over the world and I doubt any have a value even in the millions.