Guiding principles for user-generated content
Some of the biggest names in the Internet and media business have been busy creating principles around user-generated content (UGC).
In a recent press release, “Several of the world’s leading Internet and media companies today announced their joint support for a set of collaborative principles that enable the continued growth and development of user-generated content online and respect the intellectual property of content owners. The principles serve as a comprehensive set of guidelines to help user-generated content (UGC) services and content creators work together towards their collective goal of bringing more content to more consumers through legitimate channels. The principles acknowledge a collective respect for protecting copyrights and recognize that filtering technologies must be effective and are only a part of what is necessary to achieve this goal.”
This initiative includes some of the largest organizations in media for example, Disney, MySpace, CBS, Microsoft and Fox to name a few. However, there are some very big names missing, like Google’s YouTube and Facebook. Not to mention the hundreds of blogs and small USG communities popping up every day. Also, what about the end user? Did they forget to invite the end user to the table to discuss a topic that is well, about them!?
Principles and guidelines are great and we do need to protect our content creators and IP owners. But to be honest, I just don’t see how this is really going to stop copyrighted content from being mashed-up and uploaded somewhere on the web.
