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Fairly sure this is illegal in a lot of countries. Either way it's not legally enforceable as Apple would have to prove that someone actually received their email. They will have to change this.
 
Fairly sure this is illegal in a lot of countries. Either way it's not legally enforceable as Apple would have to prove that someone actually received their email. They will have to change this.

Google were sued on exactly that basis in Germany and the result was they had to offer an opt-out. This is what Apple are doing.
 
You shouldnt have to actively act to preserve your copyright.

It's no different than any other property - I can explicitly give you permission to use my property, you cant just say "hey i'm going to use this unless you tell me otherwise".

Unfortunately Google have successfully argued the case that it is the copyright holder's responsibility to opt out, not Google's to prevent posting of copyrighted material or indeed use it themselves (viz. Google Books).
 
This issue, as I see it, isn't the use of RSS but that Apple expects an indemnity if Apple gets prosecuted because of the contents.

btw does this also mean RSS reading is returning to OS X ? It was removed some time ago unless you got a 3rd party app.

I suspect it was removed as a lead up to this.
 
Firstly, RSS feeds are not driving clicks to a website -- if anything, they do the exact opposite by design. The whole purpose of an RSS feed is to make it unnecessary to visit the website from which the feed originates.

Secondly, Apple made it very clear that they intend to commercialize other people's content WITHOUT COMPENSATING THE CONTENT OWNER:

"You agree to let us use, display, store, and reproduce the content in your RSS feeds including placing advertising next to or near your content without compensation to you."

This is NOT what publicly available RSS feeds are there for, and this is NOT what RSS reader apps are supposed to do. The purpose of an RSS reader is to provide the user with the content that he subscribed to - NOT to swamp him with ads. RSS feeds are a service to the reader, not a service for third party advertisers.

Thirdly, and this is the real issue here: Since when is it okay that ANYBODY can send you an eMail imposing terms on you? Imagine I send YOU an eMail saying that you owe me a million bucks and I would get away with it in a court of law and you actually would have to pay me the money because you simply didn't answer back. This is how contracts were made in the old Roman Empire, but even then it required that both parties AND a witness had to be in the same place at the same time. "A" would say "this is my house" and "B" simply would not say anything and "C" would then testify that the house was sold from "B" to "A". While this might seem similar to what Apple is doing, Apple's action is at best an abuse of that very old legal concept.

It is interesting that you have a German E-Mail address as I suspect this action is down to the case in German courts where Google were obliged to offer opt out of German news sites from search results and aggregated
 
For me, the current 'Newsstand' app has exactly one news source. For everything else I use Flipboard on mobile, and a web browser when I have a full-featured computer. I see value in curated collections of content within my interests that originate in a variety of sources.

It seems to me this discussion is raising awareness about any possible issues with something that Apple intends to do in the future, but hasn't yet done.
 
Am I the only one who knows that most RSS feeds don't include the entire content of the article? There is only a title, a synopsis and a link to how to get TO the original site to read the entire article. Hell, RSS feeds don't even have a standard way to include thumbnail images!
There are actually many RSS feeds that contain complete articles. RSS is basically just an XML-based file format specification. It's completely up to the publisher how they want to use it.
 
Google were sued on exactly that basis in Germany and the result was they had to offer an opt-out. This is what Apple are doing.

opting out of google street view is very different than opting out of a collection of RSS feeds that you put out into the wild for people to click and view.

maybe if german residents had already posted all the pictures of their houses and streets on a different service that was also free to use, then you'd have a parallel scenario. as it stands, google street view is more invasive than collecting RSS feeds that were actively posted and uploaded, meant to be seen by anyone and everyone.

the best logic i've read so far is that this is exactly what Flipboard does, yet collectively, people only have a problem with it because Apple is doing it and invariably (supposedly) they will make a buttload more money than Flipboard could dream of. hence the 'backlash'.
 
Google were sued on exactly that basis in Germany and the result was they had to offer an opt-out. This is what Apple are doing.

The scary bit of these terms is not the opt-in/out it's the fact that without doing anything at all a content provider could find themselves liable for a huge legal bill to indemnify Apple if someone takes offence at the content.

If you're a struggling content provider nobody is going to sue you as it's not worth it, but they sure as hell would sue Apple with all that cash in the back.

If what Apple is doing is not illegal then it bloody well should be.
 
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I'm not ignoring the copyright issues and I'm not necessarily wrong - you're also not necessarily wrong. It's not a simple issue and there are not clear legal rulings (in the U.S.) regarding the manner (there is a ruling in Israel that would seem to support Apple's actions [in Israel]: http://www.jpost.com/National-News/Posting-RSS-feed-items-not-copyright-infringement).

Here's an example from about 4 years ago but about a paid RSS reader (which News isn't exactly [if you have an iOS device]): http://www.dmlp.org/blog/2010/new-y...g-all-paid-rss-readers-infringe-its-copyright

It's a gray area of copyright law with legal experts arguing for both sides. Right now, the bulk of opinion (expert) is in Apple's favor, like it or not.

The like it or not part is childish and I don't care either way as I am not in the usa just pointing out the laws. I do not know israeli laws so that also is unimportant pertaining to the us. It's far from cut and dried in the court system right now and I don't think it will eventually go that way as doing so would open a lot of closed doors.

Aero was sued for rebroadcasting tv signals, which is the same as this since the signals are free.

"
Aereo, a startup that claims it can legally stream video from local TV stations in New York City to residents via the Internet, has been sued by a collection of TV networks.

Twentieth Century Fox, Fox Television, Univision, PBS, and two local New York TV stations filed suit against Aereo in a New York district court, charging the startup with copyright violations due to unauthorized rebroadcast and reproductions, as well as unfair competition.

A second suit was filed later in the day against Aereo, by ABC, Disney, CBS, NBCUniversal, Universal Network Television, and Telemundo, charging Aereo with one count of copyright infringement. The suits were filed before Aereo's service begins operating on March 14. Both seek a permanent injunction preventing Aereo from operating, plus damages.

Aereo denied the claims. "Aereo does not believe that the broadcasters' position has any merit and it very much looks forward to a full and fair airing of the issues," the company said in a statement. "

"Consumers are legally entitled to access broadcast television via an antenna and they are entitled to record television content for their personal use," Aereo added. "Innovations in technology over time, from digital signals to Digital Video Recorders ("DVRs"), have made access to television easier and better for consumers. Aereo provides technology that enables consumers to use their cloud DVR and their remote antenna to record and watch the broadcast television signal to which they are entitled anywhere they are, whether on a phone, a tablet, a television or a laptop.""

Guess what. Aero won in the lower courts and lost in the Supreme court, get ready, *LIKE IT OR NOT*.

"
SCOTUS ruled that the decision of the second circuit, which upheld that Aereo was within the bounds of the Copyright Act, shall be reversed. It was a 6-3 decision, with Justices Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas, and Samuel Alito dissenting."

If and when this goes to the supremes in the us it will get ruled copyright infringement. Lower courts are regularly ruling differently and get tossed aside. Calling this legal in the supreme court would mean someone could recapture free tv signals and rebroadcast and this June 2015 ruling is certainly a precedent for rss feeds since they are inherently the same. Copyrighted material sent out in signals for private use, not to be rebroadcast.
 
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Apple isn't claiming ownership of anything that's it's publishing and as has already been posted, the publishers keep 100% of the profits from their ads. Apple isn't doing anything different than Google News or the million other news syndication services. If these publishers didn't want their content redistributed, they shouldn't have publisted RSS feeds. All this will do is drive more traffic to publishers that may have gone unnoticed.

Just because something is made available on the internet like on-line newspapers, photography, music and video doesn't mean it's public domain for someone else to sell as their own. If you want to reprint it, you either license it, or maybe you can get away with it by driving all the incoming traffic to the rights holders publication.

Apple does neither, since they won't fragment the reader experience in the unified News app by loading content formatted by publishers websites. They rip the content off, cache it, strip off the monetization resources from the original publisher and rights holders, and even go so far as to slap Apple's own monetization scheme with iAds !! And that's what every pirate out there does in their illegal activity. Apple is doing no better.
 
"Let me get this straight, Apple: you send me an e-mail outlining the terms under which you will redistribute my content, and you will just assume that I agree to your terms unless I opt out?" wrote Plausible Labs programmer Mike Ash on his personal blog. "This makes typical clickwrap EULA nonsense look downright reasonable by comparison. You're going to consider me bound to terms you just declared to me in an e-mail as long as I don't respond? That's completely crazy. You don't even know if I received the e-mail!"


Well... They do now..
 
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I'm heavily biased, but it seems Apple's coming up short with it's news reader (I work for News Republic). It's fine for more evergreen content, but for the breaking news junkie it seems too limited.
 
The like it or not part is childish...

Aero [sic] was sued for rebroadcasting tv signals, which is the same as this since the signals are free.

I was merely stating with the phrase "like it or not" that someone might or might not agree or like with the prevailing opinion that is in Apple's favor on the matter. What's childish about pointing out that people have different opinions?

Aereo is an interesting case. Copyright law played a large role in the ruling (http://www.scotusblog.com/2014/06/how-copyright-law-blocks-cheap-internet-tv-in-plain-english) but that case isn't fully comparable because there were other U.S. laws at play (i.e., the Cable Television Consumer Protection and Competition Act) in addition to copyright law.

Aereo was declared in the 6-3 ruling to be functionally equivalent to a cable service provider. Their actions thus were infringing but the SCOTUS ruling applies only to "broadcast television and the re-transmission of broadcast signals" (source: http://www.scotusblog.com/2014/06/s...-one-thanks-to-breyer-j-for-copyright-owners/). Aereo was also charging for access to content, which Apple isn't doing (although you could argue that if Apple displays ads by the content they are charging advertisers to display the content - I don't know how that argument would fly in court).

My point is that there are not clear guidelines on this particular issue. A law passed by Congress and a Supreme Court ruling are likely the only way that there will be clear guidelines for RSS feeds and readers. I make a living largely from creating copyrighted material (articles) so I pay a lot of attention to copyright law and issues. There just isn't enough legal precedent to say whether or not Apple is technically breaking copyright law (the News app isn't even out yet so it's mostly a moot discussion). RSS has been widely adopted for 13 years now (RSS 2.0 came out in 2002) with all sorts of aggregators and web services and apps doing similar things to what Apple is saying they'll do. Where are the court rulings?

Apple News isn't like Flipboard because it will use RSS whereas Flipboard doesn't (and so some argue that it actually "copies" the content).

The real issue is more of how Apple handled the notifications rather than copyright.
 
Just because something is made available on the internet like on-line newspapers, photography, music and video doesn't mean it's public domain for someone else to sell as their own. If you want to reprint it, you either license it, or maybe you can get away with it by driving all the incoming traffic to the rights holders publication.

Apple does neither, since they won't fragment the reader experience in the unified News app by loading content formatted by publishers websites. They rip the content off, cache it, strip off the monetization resources from the original publisher and rights holders, and even go so far as to slap Apple's own monetization scheme with iAds !! And that's what every pirate out there does in their illegal activity. Apple is doing no better.

But that's just it, Apple ISN'T stripping out the monetization resources. The articles keep their ads. And iAds aren't even supported if articles are retrieved through RSS, only when the publisher uses Apple News Format. My god, if people would just look into things for two seconds instead of jumping on the bash Apple bandwagon.
 
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I was merely stating with the phrase "like it or not" that someone might or might not agree or like with the prevailing opinion that is in Apple's favor on the matter. What's childish about pointing out that people have different opinions?

I never said anything about liking or disliking and a snarky remark is not pointing out anything.


Aereo is an interesting case. Copyright law played a large role in the ruling

That's the whole point.

Aereo was declared in the 6-3 ruling to be functionally equivalent to a cable service provider. Their actions thus Aereo was also charging for access to content, which Apple isn't doing (although you could argue that if Apple displays ads by the content they are charging advertisers to display the content - I don't know how that argument would fly in court).

Aero was taken to court because they were rebroadcasting. That argument would fly especially because apple is gaining by the ads.

My point is that there are not clear guidelines on this particular issue.
I said that in an early post, but just because it has not been decided in a supreme court case yet does not mean it does not break the copyright laws. I fully believe the supremes will rule, if and when a case like this goes there, that it infringes or that would open all kinds of doors for rebroadcasting.

Apple News isn't like Flipboard because it will use RSS whereas Flipboard doesn't (and so some argue that it actually "copies" the content).

Spin it however you want, they will be making money off of copyrighted material that belongs to someone else. RSS is no different than posting copyrighted material on a website, just a different way to display it.

The real issue is more of how Apple handled the notifications rather than copyright.

Then you are missing the issue. The issue is that apple should be contacting people about using their copyrighted materia, not telling them they have to opt out for them not to use it. Apple is putting the onus onus on the owners when it should be on them.
 
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I never said anything about liking or disliking and a snarky remark is not pointing out anything.




That's the whole point.



Aero was taken to court because they were rebroadcasting. That argument would fly especially because apple is gaining by the ads.

I said that in an early post, but just because it has not been decided in a supreme court case yet does not mean it does not break the copyright laws. I fully believe the supremes will rule, if and when a case like this goes there, that it infringes or that would open all kinds of doors for rebroadcasting.



Spin it however you want, they will be making money off of copyrighted material that belongs to someone else. RSS is no different than posting copyrighted material on a website, just a different way to display it.



Then you are missing the issue. The issue is that apple should be contacting people about using their copyrighted materia, not telling them they have to opt out for them not to use it. Apple is putting the onus onus on the owners when it should be on them.
Wrong on all counts
 
"Let me get this straight, Apple: you send me an e-mail outlining the terms under which you will redistribute my content, and you will just assume that I agree to your terms unless I opt out?" wrote Plausible Labs programmer Mike Ash on his personal blog. "This makes typical clickwrap EULA nonsense look downright reasonable by comparison. You're going to consider me bound to terms you just declared to me in an e-mail as long as I don't respond? That's completely crazy. You don't even know if I received the e-mail!"


Well... They do now..

No by publishing your content in an RSS feed you are agreeing to the universal terms by which everyone on the planet uses RSS. Once again apple's e-mail was one of polite consideration and not something they were required to send at all. However trying to helpful they presented the option for publishers to opt out. That is not something they had to do nor is it something any other RSS aggregator / collector does.

Of course it is silly to bring this up for the fiftieth time in this thread as some people simply ignore facts.
 
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Just because something is made available on the internet like on-line newspapers, photography, music and video doesn't mean it's public domain for someone else to sell as their own. If you want to reprint it, you either license it, or maybe you can get away with it by driving all the incoming traffic to the rights holders publication.

Apple does neither, since they won't fragment the reader experience in the unified News app by loading content formatted by publishers websites. They rip the content off, cache it, strip off the monetization resources from the original publisher and rights holders, and even go so far as to slap Apple's own monetization scheme with iAds !! And that's what every pirate out there does in their illegal activity. Apple is doing no better.

Apple is doing none of those things.
 
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Fairly sure this is illegal in a lot of countries. Either way it's not legally enforceable as Apple would have to prove that someone actually received their email. They will have to change this.
Lol what's illegal? Aggregating RSS feeds? Name one country where that is illegal.

I feel like this thread is some kind of April fools joke.
 
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People are passionate on MR. Some a very passionate and find a need to defend apple over everything. It's not actually personal against you, it's personal that you question something about apple. I call them apple apologists.

Most of us are keyboard warriors. Without the keyboards, harmless geeks :)

LOL. That's true. Apple is a bit of the cult. The funny thing, search through some of my messages. I was one of those people, but starting to step back a little realizing we are supporting and creating an uncontrollable giant. We NEED competition. That's what forces companies to do better.
 
Google were sued on exactly that basis in Germany and the result was they had to offer an opt-out. This is what Apple are doing.
Actually the Google cases in Belgium and Germany had nothing to do with published RSS feeds but instead related to fair use in search results and Google news. This is an entirely different thing.
 
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