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BostonNow learns an important blog lesson
By adamg on Fri, 04/20/2007 - 9:37pm
If you're going to use somebody else's content verbatim, you really need to get their permission. Seems the paper reprinted entire chunks of Bostonist yesterday without first asking if it could. Kind of ironic given that the purloined posts are the first actual blog content to show up in what was supposed to be a revolutionary marriage of old and new media.
Distinctly new-media Boing Boing has the scoop, along with an apology from editor Jon Wilpers.
Anybody is free to lift my disclosure verbatim, although it probably won't do you much good.
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Comments
Good Grief
Yeah, Jon told me about this. What are they thinking?! That's sort of media 101 stuff. Messing with Bostonist or UHub or any of the preexisting institutions, strikes me as a VERY BAD IDEA! Plus, you don't mess with my friends, or I'll have to come up there and kick some butt!
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http://proactivebusybody.com
Did BostonNow go too far?
See for yourself: Download Thursday's PDF (18.5M, though) and look at page 5.
paging Captain Easy Zing to this thread
I feel bad for BostonNOW!!1's faux pas, but you have to remember, this is just its first week or so in publication and you can't expect polished perfection so early on in the game. I mean, even Kaavya Viswanathan had a few stumbles at first.
Enjoy the buffet.
Lifting content without
Lifting content without permission seems like more than a "faux pas" to me!
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http://proactivebusybody.com
Bit of a boo boo
There are a lot of articles in that issue that don't have a writer or AP byline. On the business page, did Scott Wachtler write the Blackberry and TurboTax articles? Seems unlikely.Many of the briefs don't have credits either. And do they have a deal with Variety.com or are they "lifting" that too?
Boston.com has a lot of user contributed content but it doesn't raise the quality of the site. I don't really want to look at pictures of people with their dogs.
The covers are a disgrace. Why do you want to resort to Channel 7 and Herald lows? I'd like to hear their editorial stance on the scare-tactic covers.
And why launch prematurely? Why not tighten the lugnuts before trying to jump off the starting block? No bloggers ( per their proposed platform). About 25% original content (unlike their proposed platform).
It will be interesting to see how this paper develops but so far it's not impressive.
I agree,
I've heard thru the grapevine that this team has never been big on content, but the fact that a hack from the Boston Bulletin is the new city editor is even scarier.
Most of what they print (aside from all the rehashed AP news and such) is cockamamie ideas for "investigative" pieces that are important to next to no one (which airline has the most delays, who gives? Tanning salons give you skin cancer? Duh!) and lame local coverage that is straight out of the mayor's press office.
SO disheartening that someone with the money can't seem to get it into their head that they need to hire good people and dig deep in this city. The stories are there.
And what is this stuff today? Where are sex offenders? Um, yeah, I think everyone knows by now that this is posted on the wall of your local police station. In the cases of high level offenders, the neighborhoods are already notified.