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-- PC Week Article on Handspring (http://discussion.visorcentral.com/vcforum/showthread.php?threadid=546)

The following information is a copy of the text in a PC Week article from the 11/1/99 Issue. (Vol 16, Number 44, Page 16)
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From the start, Handspring Inc. was swimming in money. As the company quickly found out, it was also in way over its head.

On Oct. 27, the maker of the Palm OS-based Visor device re- launched its e-commerce site after nearly three weeks offline. In a letter posted at the site, CEO Donna Dubinsky said, "As a young company, we have immature systems, and we have experienced several startup glitches."

Among those "glitches" was an inability to meet the overwhelming demand for Visor, which resulted in customer service chaos.

The Mountain View, Calif., startup's problems started with the initial Visor orders in late September. The company had trouble translating data from the order database to the shipping database, resulting in extremely late shipments for customers who were first in line with their orders.

Things got worse Oct. 8, when Handspring's e-commerce site went down. Customers flocked to the phones to place orders that they couldn't place online and to complain.

Customer service, which Handspring had outsourced, was unable to meet demand. Visor customers were placed on hold for up to 4 hours and were often disconnected at random.

In response, disgruntled customers formed a support group at www.visorcentral.com, where they posted dozens of messages.

Handspring officials claim they've since resolved the issues.

"All orders received in September are being considered the highest priority for us to ship," Dubinsky said. "We expect to have all orders shipped no later than mid-November" -C.N.

Ah, yes. The art of factual journalistic reporting is an all too rarely accomplished effort. Just a few points I think all here can agree were not well covered in the above "copied" article:<UL TYPE=SQUARE><LI>Customers were flocking to the phones and inundating Handspring's CSR staff before the online store was up. Then of course it REALLY went down hill after they pulled it.
<LI>www.visorcentral.com was MOST DEFINITELY NOT formed for a place of customer dissatisfaction (read griping). What an insult to the VisorCentral staff that line is.
<LI>That's it -- just report what HS officials claim... what a rube!</UL>As a side note, it seems not too many here are aware that taking the full text of a written piece from a newspaper, magazine, or Web site publication, and posting it verbatim without authorization of the publishing entity, is often considered a copyright violation. Can we please keep VisorCentral out of legalistic harms way by linking to or paraphrasing said articles?

I'm not a lawyer, but how in the world can it be a copyright infringement if you cite your source? Otherwise, ESPN would be infringing copyrights everytime it shows highlights from a football game shown on CBS, for example! I think it's only a copyright infringement if you don't cite your source or if you make money off of several copies of it. There's nothing wrong with quoting somebody.

MJH &lt;&gt;&lt;

Zippy
Learn the law before you make rash statements

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Dave B (Grandpa Geek)"If it ain't broke, don't fix it yet!
BUT IF IT IS PLEEZ FIX"

Sorry guys, I also am not a lawyer, but eight years in and out of the publishing world allows me to write what I did. (And dabirk: I never make rash statements.)

Siting the source is a qualification for redistribution of written material WHEN, AND ONLY WHEN the source has given you such permission. Authorization to do so cannot be assumed. Do you want me to start quoting US and international copyright law? Instead of boring you to death with that, how about I just quote the copyright notice from the last PC Week I picked up:

"Copyright (c) 1999 ZD Inc. All rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part without permission is prohibited."

Under conditions of copyright law, "in part" for a magazine publication is not taken to mean you cannot reproduce a couple of lines (like the copyright notice above), but that you are barred from republishing a complete editorial work owned by that publication, such as a news article, review, or commentary.

My goal here was not to attack anyone or stop folks from posting about news articles. But how hard is it to just point to it and avoid the legal annoyances? Afterall, the article 'quoted' above is ONLINE:

http://www.zdnet.com/pcweek/stories...2384531,00.html

*** BTW Mike, forgot to mention before I posted, but ESPN pays CBS (actually, the NFL) for the rights to those highlights. ***

[This message has been edited by Zippy (edited 11-06-1999).]

Did I break copyright law? Maybe...

The real question is... Do you really believe Ziff Davis is going to care after I gave a complete reference to the article?

Although they would likely be required to remove it upon request, the VisorCentral staff would not be responsible for the post.

I am saying this on the concept that VisorCentral is a content distributor and not a content publisher. The two are held by a different set of rules.

All the best,

LarryD

Larry,

Thanks for taking the time to put the article up.

Zippy,

I really think you must have too much time on your hands. You criticized me a few weeks ago for simply posting the link to a review of the Visor I came across without giving a description of who wrote it. Now you are criticizing people who are skipping the link and citing quoted text. Lighten up.

Now you guys are acting really poorly about this i am 16 and i dont care... "Learn the Law" egad man we might as well just ring the bell and let you throw the first punch

Not only that, but I guess we had better start prosecuting all of those people who quote their sources in research paper.

And it's spelled "cited" as in "citation".

MJH &lt;&gt;&lt;

I'm well aware that this is a 'forum', that VisorCentral alleviates much concern by stating (in the About section) they are not responsible for the content of member posts (which they are not), and that we the members are accountable for our own works found here. None of this I believe is anything any of us disagree on.

I also don't think ZD will release the legal hounds on LarryD and this site for one message containing one article. And yes I'm quite sure the VC staff would edit out the content of a post if they were sent a request -and- if it is seen as copyright infringement.

But why should we be setting off everyone to bother on such an action?

Am I overreacting? Perhaps. My time spent in and around publishing has trained me (like Pavlov's dog) to go on alert in situations like this. But believe me I didn't post anything above to start off an argument or start a discussion on the features or philosophies of copyright law. I wrote with the best of intentions. So let's not start a copy-riot.

LarryD: Thanks for your civility.

diogenes: If you meant your post on the IGN review, my comment was not about you providing a source for the link (which is a bit ludicrous to demand). It had to do with the article itself: it doesn't have an adequate byline. Sorry if I caused you think anything other than that.

Too much time on my hands? Oh, how I wish that were true...

mike1in3: Your point about research papers is a bit over the top. The key to that in copyright law is called "fair use". And complaining about spelling and grammar in a forum like this is going to keep you very busy.

I believe this is the first flame-war that I have read on an otherwise great discussion board. Let's get back to being angry at HS and not each other....

Blah blah blah blah blah copyright. Blah blah blah blah blah visor. Blah blah blah? Blah blah blah! Blah.

Blah,

Blah of Blah

What does this discussion have to do with the Handspring Visor? You know, the new PDA that runs on the Palm OS? You put data into this magic device and it 'HotSyncs' with your PC. You can even put games on it, and add Springboard modules... anyone here ever hear of such a device?

------------------
Mark Neumann
[email protected]

"Ladies and gentlemen....Let's get Reeaaaddy to RUMBLE"

[This message has been edited by RJT (edited 11-07-1999).]

Okay, let's introduce the concept of Fair Use to this discussion. BTW, I'm a former Broadcasting and Journalism major, so I've had a few classes on the subject...

If you present and attribute an article to the source and do not profit in an extraordinary manner from said usage, you can do so without violating copyrights. For music, I think it used to be something like 8 notes before you had to pay for it.

Now, I'm not a lawyer, but as long as no one is exchanging cash, I think we're okay.

OK, OK, in the standard Net tradition of failing to know when to quit, I think we (with my urging) have been able to munge this one up royally. And it began so well. Sorry Larry!

For anyone requiring a synopsis of this thread, the post from GodofSales provides an adequate one.

(Flame-war? This is barely a charcoal ember when compared against some of the more roaring usenet battles I've seen. We're more civilized around here than that...)

Larry, just add this next time...


In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, any copyrighted work in this message is distributed under fair use without profit or payment to those who have expressed prior interest in receiving this info for nonprofit research and educational purposes only.

See: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml