Who owns what we post?
Nobody. It’s a public forum, anyone can take what you said and use it as their own.
From technical side, instance admins, community moderators, and you have the ability to remove them.
Removed by mod
In very limited circumstances. While copyright applies automatically, it has to be registered with the Copyright Office for you to be able to enforce it. I doubt Lemmy posters register each of their posts with the Copyright Office.
The World Copyright Office then?
Oh wait, three seconds of googling suggests my posts are most likely covered when I post via my home instance in Australia.
“You don’t need to register for copyright in Australia. The moment an idea or creative concept is documented on paper or electronically it is automatically protected by copyright in Australia. Copyright protection is free and automatic under the Copyright Act 1968.”
The same applies here in NZ (although my instance is currently residing in AU)
That’s what I said.
While copyright applies automatically
You can’t enforce it without it being registered. Courts will reject any claim that is filled with unregistered copyright.
I think the problem is that you’re not explaining which country you’re thinking of, and seem to be suggesting it’s the same legal situation everywhere
The concept of needing to register copyright does not exist in most countries. In many countries you just have it and you can enforce it.
Fediverse servers do exist outside of the USA so this is relevant for people who run those servers.
No, there is no need to register copyright in Australia.
That’s only US courts. Other countries don’t even have a procedure for registering copyrights.
How about you read the very first sentence of my little snippet again.
The very first sentence.
The sentence that says, “You don’t need to register for copyright in Australia.”
You know, the sentence that effectively describes what needs to happen if you’re thinking about registering copyright in Australia.
Perhaps in your country you have to register works for copyright so that the courts will recognise your claims of infringement. Other countries, maybe not so much.
Well, let’s see what the ToS says. sh.itjust.works here.
Legal:
TBD
Oh.
They were too busy getting shit to just work.
Others have expanded, but it may be useful to try to break out of the typical idea of ownership.
But everything has to be owned by someone! Otherwise how could it be worth anything?
(I’m being sarcastic, but alas, I expect there really are people with that mindset. I often see people who are absolutely incensed that someone could use their posts to train an AI without them somehow getting the microscopic fraction of a penny that the AI might eventually make, for example)
Leftist spotted 🤭
Nah, spend years and money on something and then give it away? Nope, hard pass. Corporations would love that though, less litigation when they’re going to steal it anyway.
I think this is something that should be clarified in the terms of service of the instance.
deleted by creator
You own your original ideas, technically speaking. Just other people that view the board can use the ideas, copy it, or remix it into their own ideas as well.
As an analogy, say you buy a brand new red car, and you drive it on a public street. People who take a picture of the car don’t own the car, you do of course. They, however, own the picture of your car and can sell it, copy it, post it, whatever as they please.
deleted by creator
im to lazy to check my instance
To add to this, can we “disown” what we post? If it can be used against me but isn’t “mine”, it just seems like I’m always getting the short end of the stick.
As far as any legal liability, no, unless you’re successfully anonymous (VPN, tor, etc)
So shouldn’t some of the legal repercussions be shared with whomever “owns” what I post?
Generally you own what you post, but you have given a license to the site to display and use it. In the US, social media sites are protected by something called Section 230. This allows sites to display user-generated content without being liable for legal issues related to it, as long as they do a decent job of trying to moderate clearly illegal content.
Makes a lot of sense, thanks
