I second what Jonrock said - the way the second paragraph is phrased, it makes it sound like when any reader anywhere submits something, I have rights to it. I am a lawyer, but this is really a grammar question: don't switch from third person to second person in midstream (so to speak). For maximum legally goodness, I would phrase it as follows:

When a reader contributes content to our sites, that reader retains ownership of the copyright, and that reader grants permission to us to display and distribute it. [And so on.]

@ Doggo: It must be geared for efficiency, because otherwise, why wouldn't you just run?

That said, I wish someone would power one of these by riding a little BMX bike on it, because that would be delightfully meta.

You could just rip your CDs as one long mp3, y'know (or edit the albums you purchase online into one long file). I realize that's a lot of work for your admittedly anachronistic (or maybe just weird) preferences, but hey, that's what the digital revolution in music is all about, right? I grew up on DJ mixes, so I like random. You favor the cohesive album (which, I will admit, I do appreciate on the ever-rarer occasion that it is well done), so you can do that. And you can still have your shiny Pebble!

I love the idea of getting the FCC to regulate so that wireless providers won't censor, but don't have a lot of faith that a Bush-controlled FCC will do anything to help customers at the expense of companies. On the other hand, a class-action contract lawsuit by subscribers seeking a refund of monthly fees for any month in which texts were blocked might make Verizon et al. think twice about this sort of monkey business.

When I read the headline, I initially had the impression that by "realworld," you meant that they make little bitty LEGO weapons that actually shoot little bitty LEGO bullets. I would pay two bucks for that.

Cory, when I was in high school in Argentina, we had a similar method - before the exam, we would take a pen with no ink and "write" our cheaty info on our "blank" scratch paper. It would leave an impression that was legible from up close but completely invisible from any distance. Brilliant, and totally more trouble than it was worth.

@ #66: Well, yes, the press gets greater leeway when showing trademarked things, because press coverage is entitled to a presumption of fair use. But the images of famous people are different - there's no question of trademark or copyright, only a protection against unauthorized publicity or use of a person's likeness. Famous people don't get the same protection because (a) they're famous and (b) since they're famous, they're considered (wrongly, I think) inherently newsworthy.

But that's all really tangential to Ford's dumb position this calendar case.

Um, sorry for the weird, James Garfield-style non-consecutive double post. Don't know how that happened.

IAAL, and I just spent a few minutes doing some legal research on what court cases are out there concerning the manufacturer of a commercial product's power over the use of the image of that product. The short answer is that manufacturers win when the use is purely commercial and lose when the use is at least partly artistic or documentary.

There are two elements to this calendar that make it, I think, a good case for the motor club and a bad case for Ford:
1) The calendar is more like a collection of art photographs and less like an unrelated commercial product; They're not using the pictures of Fords to sell peanut butter; they're just selling the pictures of Fords because in their own right.

2) Because the cars being photographed are highly customized and, presumably, different than the product that Ford offers to consumers, they are inherently works of art in their own right (like sculptures made from Sculpey brand modeling compound - Sculpey has no rights to those).

BTW, I could not find a single case in which the manufacturer of a commercial product was able to limit a purchaser's ability to photograph the product and distribute the photograph as a work of art.

IAAL, and I just spent a few minutes doing some legal research on what court cases are out there concerning the manufacturer of a commercial product's power over the use of the image of that product. The short answer is that manufacturers win when the use is purely commercial and lose when the use is at least partly artistic or documentary.

There are two elements to this calendar that make it, I think, a good case for the motor club and a bad case for Ford:
1) The calendar is more like a collection of art photographs and less like an unrelated commercial product; They're not using the pictures of Fords to sell peanut butter; they're just selling the pictures of Fords because in their own right.

2) Because the cars being photographed are highly customized and, presumably, different than the product that Ford offers to consumers, they are inherently works of art in their own right (like sculptures made from Sculpey brand modeling compound - Sculpey has no rights to those).

BTW, I could not find a single case in which the manufacturer of a commercial product was able to limit a purchaser's ability to photograph the product and distribute the photograph as a work of art.

I'm not saying that I know this from first-hand experience or anything, but it is customary in Buenos Aires for teenage couples wanting some, ahem, privacy, to go to "albergues transitorios" - pay-by-the-hour hotels, essentially - and in one such establishment, there is (or there was, in 1992) a bed with curlicue cutouts on the headboard, which cutouts are backed with colored plexiglass, and with a small lamp on the side table, and set in the side table is a three-way switch. When the switch is all the way to the right, the table lamp is on; when the switch is in the middle position, the lamp is turned off and lights inside the headboard are illuminated to make the curlicue cutouts glow warmly; when the switch is all the way to the left, the cutouts remain illuminated and, additionally, soft, Barry White-style disco music to emanates from somewhere within the bed. The effect is, to put it briefly, incredibly awesome. I predict great things for this bed-speaker-device, and the proprietors of hot-sheets motels around the globe are advised to purchase it in order to offer the finest low-cost luxury to their discerning clients.

Being a professional Spanish translator myself, I was initially going to post that this seems like not the greatest translation (see Discovery's comment, above, and the fact that a more accurate translation of Richelieu's quote would use "ahorcar" rather than "colgar"). Then, prompted by Teapunk's comment, I thought, "The guy who translated this did it for free. And a free translation with a few errors is certainly better than no translation at all." And that's all I have to say on the matter.

@NOEN: Saying that Bill White's site is the equivalent of cross-burning doesn't really answer the question of whether it's illegal or not. Just last year (I think), the Supreme Court ruled that a state could outlaw cross-burning, but only where it was designed particularly to intimidate some person (because cross-burning is also a form of political speech). At the end of the day, we have to decide based on whether it's a specific threat or just a general screed.

As a matter of good constitutional policy, I think we should err on the side of allowing speech rather than criminalizing it. Here, absent a plan that lets would-be murderers coordinate their activities and gather at an appointed time for the appointed task, White's website doesn't pose much risk. I hate to say it's a slippery slope (because that's so hackneyed), but a general exhortation to racist violence isn't so different from a general call to oust the current administration, in terms of its relationship to a completed crime. Better to criticize it thoroughly but not prosecute.

Coming back to the legal question, I'm going to say that posting the addresses and numbers, even when accompanied by the general exhortation to "Lynch the Jena 6," is probably not a crime by itself. The Planned Parenthood case, if memory serves (and correct me if I'm wrong), involved civil liability, not criminal liability, and that's a lower standard. And as far as solicitation goes, I think it usually takes a bit more specificity as to a particular overt act to make out solicitation. So if these fools had a post that said, "Let's all meet on Tuesday at 8:00 p.m. in front of this address and bring rope so we can lynch this person," that would do it, but merely publishing the address and saying, generally, "kill," doesn't.

It's a close question, to be sure, but at the end of the day, this is political speech of the sort protected by the First Amendment. Better to let these racists run at the mouth and make clear to everyone how ignorant they are than to muzzle them and leave the impression that what they have to say is so powerful and dangerous that it can't be neutralized by a sensible response.

Teresa: Fair enough (and you win my non-Williamsburg-but-very-much-Brooklyn-native heart by dissing Queens).

I knew the screeners were supposed to be on the lookout for passengers with certain habits, but I didn't suppose they'd take it so literally.

I hate to pick nits, but Williamsburg, although trendy, has not yet attained the status of meaningful political subdivision. It is just a neighborhood and should not be allowed to shrug off the storied borough in which it is situated. Therefore, please refer to the place where this doctor practices as "Brooklyn, New York," or "the Williamsburg neighborhood of Brooklyn," if for no other reason than to avoid further muddling non-New Yorkers' conception of the city's geography. Thanks.

I seem to remember someone else running into a similar problem several years back when they wanted to record and compare prices at Wal-Mart: As soon as Wal-Mart managers saw them taking notes, they got the boot. They solved this problem by carrying in a hidden audio tape recorder and having loud, deliberate conversations about the prices ("$3.98 for kitchen size garbage bags? That is a fine price, don't you think?" "Yes, but it is not nearly as much of a bargain as paying just $4.25 for this large box of Special K cereal!").

"Babies . . . have reported complications including . irritability or constant crying"? Impressive. One wonders how a baby would report irritability and constant crying - maybe by crying constantly.