otw_news | Once and future things

It adds a huge extra layer of complexity on the project-- definitely not something to be undertaken lightly. Just think how often we all use our LJs. Could a fannish nonprofit really support that kind of traffic and maintenance?

And I'm not sure how much protection it would give us. We'd have to buy our hosting from somewhere, and some "Warriors for Innocence" group could make threats against the hosting company. We'd need something on the order of a data haven to host it to be really sure it was safe.

Yeah, just look at how robust JF is... :-/

Plus, I don't know about other people, but I have non-fannish friends on LJ, and I have years and years of history on my journal; if I felt I had to get a journal on this archive to participate in fandom there, I would, as I have done with GJ And JF, but it would never be my home.

It's a good point, but at the same time, I don't think JF is a fair test case for the idea of a fan-run journal system. Nothing against what Robin and ZR have achieved, but other people did try to help improve JF and for whatever reason, the JF admins couldn't integrate those efforts into the site.

I hope the Archive project will have more luck at putting fannish volunteer work to good use.

True. And presumably the archive would have more personal journals rather than extremely high traffic comms like f_w.

Could a fannish nonprofit really support that kind of traffic and maintenance?
I always remain optimistic! (At least, until I am faced with actual code.)

But we'll be faced with a large amount of traffic and maintainance in any case - it sounds planned to be more complex than FF.N. And the journals wouldn't have to be a proper LJesque network... so long as we can post and build personal feeds.

Even just the option to post with different (specific) tags -eg, "archive:fic", "archive:vid", "archive:meta" - would attach the post to the appropriate part of the archive, whereas "journal-only" would only show up on the personal page.

Comms and forums serve the same purpose, more or less. We could stick with forums, which I'd guess to be much easier as there's so much ready-made code floating around. (And most sites have forums in any case.)

And I'm not sure how much protection it would give us.
Well, the archive'd be coming at its policies from the other direction - though, for all that our cost/benefit equation would be totally different from LJ's, centralizing always makes us a more tempting target.

From what I understand of the legal situation, and I am no lawyer, the organization is going to be a lot safer if it can claim to be hosting only fictional works. By which I mean no manips or vids (copyright issues are less clear-cut) and no personal journals.

Also, the level of complexity behind the servers of LiveJournal should not be underestimated. What they've ended up doing to make this site work has been adopted by most of the huge community sites on the Web, and it's server -- and therefore cost -- intensive.

I am also no lawyer, but I have to disagree with this: "the organization is going to be a lot safer if it can claim to be hosting only fictional works. By which I mean no manips or vids (copyright issues are less clear-cut)"

I've studied Art History, and there's a lot of legal precedent for artists being allowed to use copyrighted material, provided they change it enough to create a new work of art. (The most famous case would be Andy Warhol vs. Campbells Soup.) Manippers and vidders would be classed as digital artists, and so could use those legal precedents. (Which status, incidentally, could also cover adult manips against anti-porn laws: it's not porn if it's Art.)

Indeed there is precedent: it's just the precedent is significantly more clear-cut for prose fiction.

One thing that you're NOT considering is the copyright issues related to using music in fannish vids. Typically, a song is not altered as significantly (if at all) as the visual source material when creating a fannish vid. That means that any arguement claiming fair use due to "newly created" material is significantly weakened.

Also, the RIAA is also far, far more rabidly aggressive about perceived copyright infringement than other organizations. The issues of musical copyright regarding sampling and mashups have been treated somewhat differently, but even a very small sampling segment has been ruled, in some cases, to be copyright infringement and resulted in monetary damages.

The LJ community newsletter

veni_vidi_vids has a section on copyright articles related to vidding every Wednesday, and there are always at least a half dozen articles linked.

So, no, I don't think that you are accurate in your assessment about the relative risks of vids versus fiction.

One thing that you're NOT considering is the copyright issues related to using music in fannish vids. Typically, a song is not altered as significantly (if at all) as the visual source material when creating a fannish vid. That means that any arguement claiming fair use due to "newly created" material is significantly weakened.

Also, the RIAA is also far, far more rabidly aggressive about perceived copyright infringement than other organizations. The issues of musical copyright regarding sampling and mashups have been treated somewhat differently, but even a very small sampling segment has been ruled, in some cases, to be copyright infringement and resulted in monetary damages.

The LJ community newsletter

veni_vidi_vids has a section on copyright articles related to vidding every Wednesday, and there are always at least a half dozen articles linked.

So, no, I don't think that you are accurate in your assessment about the relative risks of vids versus fiction.

Once and future things

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Vids versus art re copyright

Vids versus art re copyright