Is this legal?

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#3
Difficult to say. You do not have any copyright notice on your website for the article. However you do say this.
The project section is describing do-it-yourself amplifiers, on a non-commercial basis, free for use.
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key point being on a non-commercial basis.

You may be able to issue a DMCA take down notice against them. As the original Author you automatically get copyright even if you don't register it, however if they refuse to remove the article from sale the only way you can do anything about it is to take them to court.

Possibly a better way to handle it is to post something on your site linking to their website and stating that they have taken your content (which is free to diy enthusiasts) and are charging for it, without your consent. Hopefully your result will show up in searches and warn people of their lack of scruples.

edit: Allen's suggestion is definitely something to try first!

Tony.
 
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#4
Hi Knut,

On your home-page you have a "© 2020 KHN" on the first page. Exactly for what that is intended is not clear. But, it is likely to include own material produced by you.

The other site unambiguously violate an eventual copyright. It does not even cite the source of the article. This is not legal.

The question is what you want to happen? Had the other site distributed your article for free, mentioning your home-page as the source and you as the author, you could hardly object as you leave it as public domain.
That the other site re-distribute your work is hardly the crux, it is that it claims money for it. Claiming royalties for sale of your article is hardly feasible when it has become public domain.

You can write (registered letter) to the owner of the other site and claim your article to be distributed for free, with a reference to your home-page where it was found and with you as author. Your article may then be removed.

Conducting a foreign court-case on this is hardly worth the efforts.
 
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#7
knutn said:
A search led me to this site:

A la Hiraga: A Class A Power Amplifier | Amplifier | Electronic Circuits

I have written the article, it is free for downloading at:

Home


However, they are demanding paid to download my work at their site! It can not be legal, can it?
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You probably signed away the publishing rights to that site when you let them post it, knowingly or not.

So you are breaking the law if you would give it away for free; you can't give away for free what is not legally yours. Who the author is, is irrelevant in this situation.

Jan
 
#8
Sorry Jan, I don't understand what you mean. Knutn wrote the article and put it on his (we presume) website. Someone else uploaded it to Scridb without his permission. Scribd charges for access to content. In what way did Knutn sign away his rights?
 
#13
Not the point here, today.

Scribd is violating Knut´s rights and should remove that publication from their site, period.

That´s a direct, unambiguous action, and THEY are charging for your article.

Knut´s "free for non commercial use" caption dos not only include *manufacturing and selling* but also *charging* for the article, the very definition of COMMERCIAL USE.

EDIT:
Content restrictions

Scribd places certain limits on content that our members can upload. You agree that you will not upload content that:

is illegal, or promotes or enables illegal or unlawful activities;
violates any applicable law or regulation;
infringes the copyright, patent rights, trade marks, trade secrets, or other intellectual property rights of another person or entity (see Scribd's Copyright Resource Center for more information);
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Copyright, DMCA, and BookID™ – Scribd Help Center
Copyright, DMCA, and BookID™ Follow

Scribd helps to protect the rights of authors and publishers by acting quickly on valid notifications of copyright infringement and by proactively detecting and removing infringements with Scribd’s BookID™ copyright protection system. Click the links below to learn more or to report infringements of your rights. The information contained in this section is for your general information only. These articles are not legal advice and may not cover all information related to your rights.

REPORT COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENTS AND ABUSE HERE
Frequently Asked Questions about Copyrights and the DMCA
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#14
Scribd has been around for years and is a well known site for stolen IP. Apparently they get away with it by keeping content that no one objects to. If they are asked to take down copyrighted content, they do - avoiding legal trouble.
 
#16
Pano said:
Scribd has been around for years and is a well known site for stolen IP. Apparently they get away with it by keeping content that no one objects to. If they are asked to take down copyrighted content, they do - avoiding legal trouble.
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I have never heard of Scribd, but after reading this thread I went there, searched and found some of my IP posted on the site.

Just searching for the word "Tubelab" brings up the schematic and an image of the placement layer in the recent TSE-II board, uploaded by a user named "sekhar203512." Both were lifted from post #1 in this forum thread (they are not available elsewhere):
After a 14 year run, the TSE must DIE!

There are also dozens of screen scrapes taken directly from diyAudio pages, complete with the advertising.

Insert the phrase "diyAudio" into their search engine and you will get over 16,000 hits, many are screen scrapes directly from this site. So, Is THIS legal?
 
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#18
I have filed an "infringement claim" with Scribd for the two pieces of info that were downloaded by a person who appears to be in India and has also posted bank transaction info, copyrighted schematics, and some Apple stuff, complete with "Apple confidential proprietary" in them.

In my case the info was only posted on diyAudio, it never got posted on my web site.
 
#20
I got an auto-reply immediately. It stated that I could reply to the email if I had any more info. I followed the link from the copy of my schematic to the person who uploaded it in India. Most of his uploads violate Scribd's policies. In addition to more of my forum posts, there are copies of an airline ticket transaction and boarding pass, a list of bank transactions, several copyrighted service manuals and a bunch of other stuff that was not intended for public consumption. I listed them all in my email reply.
 
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