I'm wondering about the legal aspects of running automated blogs using rss to make posts. Read somewhere it was legal as long as source is shown and linked. But I doubt that it is true. Anyone know anything on the matter ? Or anyone being contacted for running an automated rss blog ?
Whether an automated blog is legal or not depends on the RSS feeds that you use. Read the terms of use for the various RSS feeds. Some specifically allow you to repost the material. Some only allow you to use them for personal use. If the RSS feed does not stipulate, then you can't use it without first getting permission.
if the rss is freely accessable with no noting otherwise apon ENTRY to the feed you are free to use it. If the poster does not add a link to their site within the feed then it is there own fault and no action can be taken.
Not sure why people think that freely accessible RSS feed means that it's ok to copy. There is no case law on this yet so we have no idea. I would just publish the RSS feeds and take them down in case somebody complains.
There may not be case law specifically dealing with RSS feeds, but the concept is the same regardless of the media. Copyright permission must be explicitly given by the copyright holder in order for you to be able to republish material legally. If the terms of use do not state that you can use it for commercial use, then you can't.
RSS feeds are covered under DMCA. Meaning that you can only get in trouble if the original copyright owner requests you take it down and you refuse. Just like copyrighted videos on YouTube- they dont have to take them down unless they receive a DMCA request.
Not exactly, they don't have to sort through all of their material because it is user submitted and because they have a registered agent (as well as other measures they must take under the DMCA). What it sounds like the OP would be doing is selecting RSS feeds and adding them to an automated blog. Since, in this case, the website owner would be selecting the content, the DMCA would offer no protection at all.
See.... as others said. JUst do it. If someone asks u to get rid of it just take it off.... not hard....
And what if someone decides to take you to court rather than ask you nicely to take it down? It's not likel;y, but it could happen. Something not as bad, but more likely, instead of asking you to take it down they report it to your host (which then takes your site down) and Google (which then takes your site out of search results). The former could spell big trouble. The latter would just mean you would lose future earning potential from that domain. The question one has to ask themselves is whether the meager earnings the site would get is worth the risk.
To sum up what the intelligent people have said: it's not legal nor ethical. If you want to use someone's feed for an automated blog, contact them and ask if it's OK.
Of course its legal - If a site offers RSS and you use their feed; there's nothing illegal in that. Really Simple Syndication is 100% legal; if the webmaster offers RSS then it should be allowed, why not? I don't see any point in that. Regards, Meti
It depends on the terms set out by the person that has the copyright for the content of the feed. There are many ways that RSS feeds can be used that don't involve republishing the content to the world. One example is placing the RSS feed on your desktop background. RSS itself is nothing but a standard. There is nothing implied by using it. If the terms of he feed say you can't use it on a website, then it is illegal for you to do so. The logic that it is available means it is okay to use any way you want is ridiculous. That is like saying since you don't have to pay to listen to the radio it is perfectly legal to rebroadcast any radio station you want. That is not true. If the terms of use for the RSS feed allow you to republish them on a website, then it is fine. Some say you can only place them on non-commercial sites. If it says you can't use it on any publically accesible website, then you can't legally.
Not at all. It's 100% legal to read, NOT to republish. This is a common fallacy on the web; if I can copy that picture to my local drive, I should be able to use it, right? Wrong. a RSS feed is no different from a newspaper in many important respects; it's someone else's copyrighted original work. For you to use it for profit (ie; an automated blog) is a clear and unequivocal infringement, should the site owner choose to pursue action. And the statutory penalties can be quite high. So, without EXPRESS WRITTEN PERMISSION, you are treading on very thin ice.