RE: Does Steemit count as commercial usage of content?
So if Steem is its own ecosystem then it shouldn't be bound by universal rights and laws of government? So the work of all spammers and plagiarist that would get a poem, a short story or an image from the internet is okay and since it was just shared and the secondary effect was someone upvoted on it thus giving them cash is okay since there was a money printer.
No, we also have the right to disagree with rewards, and so we can flag.
My point about the ecosystem wasn't that it is completely independent of the world. What I meant was that this isn't a company or anything like that. It's an ecosystem with forests with leaves made of silver and fruits made of gold, and the fact that you're walking around with an album of pictures that you can't resell doesn't mean that you should't go to the elders and say "I found this cool thing by the river" right before asking for permission to take a tiny fruit that you could sell afterwards.
Steemit.Inc is very much a company! It is registered and based in the USA and is bound by the laws of the USA, like it or not. There is this strange belief that Steemit Is the Blockchain. It is not. It is a for-profit website that uses the Blockchain.
https://www.steem.center/index.php?title=Steemit,_Inc
Under US copyright law, my work is protected whether you like it, or agree with it or not! You can't change the fact that I have rights under the law to protect my work, and that you have no rights under the law to take it.
I know, lol! I've never said the opposite. I'm very familiar with the Steem-based services such as Steemit, Busy, etc.
And I agree with the protections! You should get every protection you can get and fight to make those protections grow until they assure you the best system possible to be a creator and a publisher. This can only stimulate creators as it improves, and I'm all for that.
You sound like I'm saying "you shouldn't have rights!". You should have all these rights and much more. In this world, self-interest is what gets you the most profit, so yeah, go get everything you can out of everything you make and you'll be getting much more than if you go the charitable way.
I’m confused, though. You said you had the rights to use any image you find because you can’t afford to pay for the license, or you can’t find the creator! That would trample on my rights! If you have the right to use it, where do my rights come in? Either you have the rights, or I have the rights. It can’t be both. All copyright work is ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. That means no one else has the right to use it! That means that images can’t be used with simply attribution like is happening all over Steemit! You said you would like to see copyright laws change so that others can have more rights to copyright work! I would like to see them change too - and hopefully that is about to happen! It will be for the benefit of the creators - not the users!
Self interest? Are you saying that trying to make a decent living is simply self-interest, and that others have a right to deny me that living? What do you know about what I give to charity and my chaurch and missions from my hard earned dollars? As Carnegie said, we earn money in order to give it away. But that does not mean we allow it to be stolen from us because some feel entightled to take from me under the belief that it would be charitable if me to allow it. I think that is called Communism - a failed system. People give more, when they do so freely!!
Do stores make more money if they sit back and allow merchandise to be stolen?
I didn't say I had the right to anything. Read again, lol.
Trying to make a decent living is self-interested, of course, you're interested in your own benefit, for your own survival. There is nothing wrong about that.
And people have the rights that the law sets on them, so if you try to deny someone else's living (like shooting them) they can deny you your right to life (by shooting you in self-defence). I'm not saying that we can equate copyrights to shooting people, I'm just describing the laws.
Nothing. And I would really like for people NOT to donate to churches, lol, but that's just my opinion. You do with your own money what best pleases you.
And to eat, to pay for rent, to buy a phone and a snack, to pay the taxi and get a vacation trip to a mountain range and see a beautiful bird.
And about the whole communism and altruism thing, check out this comment I made. I'm not at all an altruistic person. I help because I want, just like you say, and I don't believe that it should be the duty of anyone to give out their stuff for free.
So, it’s agreed. Lol! No one has the right to use copyright images without express permission from the creator. Sorry to take up your time here with an issue dear to my heart. I will stick to writing my own posts about the subject matter, which I very often do, because along with The Copyright Alliance, I respect the copyright of all original creations, and with their help I will continue to fight for those rights. The End. Lol!