As to the question above..

If you someone leaves a comment or post they should be aware that the rest of the world can see it, which would now make that post public i agree with laura that you shouldnt have to seek permission,it boils down to what purpose their comments will be used for.

My newspaper, like most these days, has a stringent four-step test reporters must meet before they can use an unnamed source, and then the top editor of the paper still has to approve it.

And the context is important. If it’s a light-hearted story, I bet I could get permission to use unnamed blog comments in the paper, perhaps to give a “flavor” of the blog I am writing about.

I’ve also seen cases where newspapers have quoted from blogs maintained by criminals, for instance, who sometimes say amazingly incriminating things online.

From a commenter’s perspective, I think anyone posting comments on a blog should consider it no different than if they tacked their comments on a bulletin board in the town square, or stood in the square and shouted their thoughts out loud. If people hear or read your comments and they repeat them accurately and fairly attributed to you, then you really have no recourse.

From a journalist’s perspective, I also start from the assumption that quotes out there on the Net are fair game for use. But do know that in most cases, before a journalist would use blog comments, a fair bit of thought would be given to the context, fairness and legitimacy of the source before most MSM news outlets would quote them.

lawsuits.

And if you try to claim it as yours in advance, through terms of service, I’m simply not going to leave a comment.

BUT be courteous, show your appreciation, include a link back to their site.

Firstly the comments in the blog belong to the commentor! However, the blogger has certain rights to use them elsewhere in his/her blog. Similarly other bloggers can say A comemnted so.

So, I don’t see why newspapers shouldn’t. As long as they link to the blog.

If you are commenting in a public place, then your comment can be quoted by anyone.

Interesting that you should have this discussion today. I read you daily (seriously, I have for many months) and thought that you very likely would have picked up on the firestorm of controversy around a new site called Feedpass. (Disclaimer: This is the founder of Feedpass commenting.)

Feedpass creates landing pages that make subscribing to blogs like yours quite simple. Unlike FeedBurner, who takes control of your feed, Feedpass just creates a new landing page for the feed. Since the feed address stays the same, you are free to use the Feedpass page or stop linking to it at any time without any negative effect on your feed.

Feedpass places Google AdSense ads on the page and rotates credit for the page views between the creator of the Feedpass page, Feedpass themselves, and IF the blog has been “claimed”, the other 1:3 page view credit goes to the content owner.

The controversy has been over the ability for ANYONE to create a Feedpass for feeds that they may not even own. This has been picked up by many of the big A-list bloggers, like Dave Winer, Mike Arrington, and many, many more. Some of them were very upset that Feedpass was providing the ability to monetize their content without their permission….which I believe ties in nicely to your discussion topic. Is this fair use? Is it okay for some sites to profit from article titles, summaries and comments from your blog, and not okay for others?

Here’s a few choice blog postings on various sides of the issue, including a blog from Duncan Riley, one of your B5 counterparts.

http://mashable.com/2006/05/20/feedpass-rss-landing-pages/
http://duncanriley.com/2006/05/22/feedpass-debate-rages/
http://www.techcrunch.com/2006/05/21/feedpass-does-absolutely-nothing/
http://www.kbcafe.com/rss/?guid=20060522081957

On the Feedpass pages, we show the last 4 posts along with a short excerpt (never more than 400 characters), of the article. If a post is less than 800 characters, we only display 1/2 of it, requiring the user to click through to read more.

The point has been brought up: What is really any different about this than bloggers who have a site supported by ads that contains links to articles, summaries and even comments from another blog? Even Technorati is called out on this by Randy Charles Morin in The RSS Blog. (See the KBCafe link above)

I’d love to hear your viewpoints on this and that of your regular readers, many of which are bloggers that are obviously interested in monetization. This is an entirely new way to monetize your blog content even BEFORE a reader subscribes. It’s also a way to encourage others to link to you…because they stand a chance to earn a few bucks by using Feedpass instead of just a blind link.

By the way, we are compatible with FeedBurner, so you can even create a Feedpass for your current blog URL. Then, just get your readers to create Feedpass pages and use them on their sites and blogrolls to point to your feed. You’ll benefit, those that link to your sites will benefit, and readers will be able to subscribe with ease, hopefully increasing your subscription rates.

We created a Feedpass for you at http://www.feedpass.com/problogger so you can see what this is. Should you wish to claim it, just let us know and I’ll move the registration for the Feedpass over to you.

Jim
Feedpass