This is a situation which I'd like to discuss with the community of A-O.
There was recently an incident regarding a contributor who had a single thread for his uploads. Another user "stole" his uploads and posted them individually. This is a complicated situation. Said "thief" actually downloaded the files from the other user's thread and then uploaded them to his host, one of those hosts that paid for downloads. Now, it probably wouldn't have been an incident if the second user repackaged the files or changed the images from the description, but he didn't even bother to change the images, files and the password from the original contributor. This of course made quite clear how many of the files this user "stole". Most of his posts consists of said "stolen" files. The original contributor took notice of that and decided to close his thread and post them individually to avoid more "thievery". After all, all his hard work was being "stolen" by someone else.
The thing is that making mirrors of such files is not actually a negative thing, is it?. Mirrors are always appreciated. But what this second user did was to take all the material from that thread in order to gain some benefit for himself. My question is: Should this kind of action be punished at A-O? What about link "stealing", taking a link from other user and post it without giving proper credit?
I know that other forums have some rules to that effect, but A-O does not. And there is a reason for that. Although hard working contributors are always appreciated, we certainly aren't the copyright holders of the material we post. A-O is a community that tries to share this material for the joy of it, not to gain some profit out of it. But it certainly seems unfair to me that some users just take the hard work of others without even telling the original contributors of said actions.
Personally, I welcome such link "stealing" as long as they don't make people pay for them. In fact, I encourage everyone to share what I post with whoever they want, be it by taking my links or making mirrors. I don't need to be credited and my permission is not needed. After all, what we try to do is to share our favorite series with the rest of the world because we want them to be able to enjoy them also. However, I do think that what the second user did in that incident was cheap. He could have at least put his own password and not merely post the same images to illustrate the material. Some contributors certainly put a lot of effort to share the material with everyone and it seems unfair that they see their efforts siphoned with no other purpose than some personal gain.
Personally, I'm in favor of giving some kind of punishment for that action, but at the same time, I don't where to draw the line. I don't want to make mirror-making a discouraged activity and I certainly don't care much for mirror stealing. What does the community of A-O think?
There was recently an incident regarding a contributor who had a single thread for his uploads. Another user "stole" his uploads and posted them individually. This is a complicated situation. Said "thief" actually downloaded the files from the other user's thread and then uploaded them to his host, one of those hosts that paid for downloads. Now, it probably wouldn't have been an incident if the second user repackaged the files or changed the images from the description, but he didn't even bother to change the images, files and the password from the original contributor. This of course made quite clear how many of the files this user "stole". Most of his posts consists of said "stolen" files. The original contributor took notice of that and decided to close his thread and post them individually to avoid more "thievery". After all, all his hard work was being "stolen" by someone else.
The thing is that making mirrors of such files is not actually a negative thing, is it?. Mirrors are always appreciated. But what this second user did was to take all the material from that thread in order to gain some benefit for himself. My question is: Should this kind of action be punished at A-O? What about link "stealing", taking a link from other user and post it without giving proper credit?
I know that other forums have some rules to that effect, but A-O does not. And there is a reason for that. Although hard working contributors are always appreciated, we certainly aren't the copyright holders of the material we post. A-O is a community that tries to share this material for the joy of it, not to gain some profit out of it. But it certainly seems unfair to me that some users just take the hard work of others without even telling the original contributors of said actions.
Personally, I welcome such link "stealing" as long as they don't make people pay for them. In fact, I encourage everyone to share what I post with whoever they want, be it by taking my links or making mirrors. I don't need to be credited and my permission is not needed. After all, what we try to do is to share our favorite series with the rest of the world because we want them to be able to enjoy them also. However, I do think that what the second user did in that incident was cheap. He could have at least put his own password and not merely post the same images to illustrate the material. Some contributors certainly put a lot of effort to share the material with everyone and it seems unfair that they see their efforts siphoned with no other purpose than some personal gain.
Personally, I'm in favor of giving some kind of punishment for that action, but at the same time, I don't where to draw the line. I don't want to make mirror-making a discouraged activity and I certainly don't care much for mirror stealing. What does the community of A-O think?
mg:, this is an example: