Dear all, I am from India. I am in the process of designing my own website related to health & beauty.It will have Discussion forums,blogs,Recipes and NEWS SECTION. The NEWS section is just a small section of my site,amongst the various other sections.This means that my site is NOT A NEWS WEBSITE. In the NEWS section,the registered members of my site will post latest news related to beauty and health.Earlier I thought that they can copy-paste and submit the news,after mentioning its source from where it has been taken,so that copyright related issues don't emerge.However I was told it is illegal. So following are my latest queries: 1. If I ask my website members to write the news in their own words, after reading it in a news website,will that be legal? 2. If that is legal, does the law still demand that they mention the source of this news,where they read it,even if they submit it in their own words? 3. If the above 2 options are not legally safe,please suggest me other ways through which members can submit news daily without my website getting into any legal problem. 4.Is it a good idea to put a disclaimer on my website that all the contributions made by members of my site,in forums,recipes and news sections are their own individual contributions and that my website is not responsible for the content they post.However on getting a complaint from another website,that something has been copied from their site and pasted onto my site,I will delete it that content.Is such a disclaimer legally safe for me? Please reply in accordance with Indian and international copyright laws,only if you have a good knowledge of the same. Thanks a lot..
You need express permission to cut and paste anything you didn't author. Giving credit or a link doesn't make it legal. You can write on something in the news if it is done completely in your own words, not just changing a some of the words. It is not reasonable to expect members to rewrite news articles for you. A disclaimer is not going to give you full-protection - especially since you are soliciting them from people and I'm assuming you are going to be monetizing the site in some way (advertising, donations, etc.) I would personally skip the news section unless you are going to do the news yourself or pay a professional writer to do it.
u can add that section...........you can see on many sites on web where they are giving option for guest to write article and submit........so you can add it there.........on ur site too..........uhh...infact, if u find any script just let me know too........because i too have a site of same niche....and finding some sought of such scripts.....
Perhaps the smartest and the easiest thing that you can do is use RSS feeds (syndicated content) because your intended use is exactly what these are for. If you are not already familiar with RSS feeds then just google away and begin the journey of discovery - Many many many sites use RSS feeds to install wonderful, live, real-time news that is updated continually and all you have to do is nothing. Not a bad deal.
RSS feeds are NOT intended for people to display on their sites. They are for their readers unless their TOS states otherwise.
Mjewel has highlighted an important point. It's strange, really, when you think that RSS stands for 'Really Simple SYNDICATION'.