Like many people who receive ZENIT‘S emails, I appreciate their new coverage and must also deal with fundraising campaigns that seem to come along every few months.
I have no problem with that. Goodness knows that such organizations need money. But let me say here what I have said many times to ZENIT itself but never received a reply: there is something strange about an organization that solicits contributions in the name of its service to the Church and world, and, at the same time, enforces extreme copyright control over the words that it distributes, demanding that it and it only somehow owns exclusively every word it prints. It is not uncommon for this organization to write good Catholic bloggers and demand that they stop reprinting their articles. They can be extremely severe and threatening. It always shocks people because in reprinting and linking, people figure (rightly) that they are helping the mission of ZENIT. ZENIT regards this as theft of its property.
Now, it might be one thing if this were the NYT (which doesn’t do this, by the way), a profit-making company that has its eye on the bottom line and doesn’t solicit charity from others. But that is not ZENIT. ZENIT calls on our charitable instincts to help them in their plight even as it acts like some kind of corporate conglomerate, happy to use the law against people who think that they are helping. To me, this is akin to a soup kitchen that turns people away based on their dress, or a church that demands that its parishioners never evangelize. It is also extremely bad business to put artificial limits on the distribution of your message.
For this reason, I cannot and will not given ZENIT a contribution. If the day comes when ZENIT decides to leverage my contribution by making its material completely open and publishes into the commons, and stops using the state against people who just want to spread the good word, they can count on my constant support.
Hi Jeffrey,
It's too bad because they are doing quite a good job.
I was not aware of that, thanks for pointing out.
Are there any alternatives around? I don't know any.
Regards,
If ZENIT is like other companies, it's just a top-level management error of the first order, a terrible decision made by some small and unimaginative group of fuddy duddies who don't do the reporting, don't write the code, and don't understand technology and modern world.
Isn't Zenit owned by the Legionairies of Christ/Regnum Christi? I'm just sayin'…
It seems to me (and I might be mis-remembering as I have done this in a while) that asking permission to reprint is not onerous. I am pretty sure I've used their stuff in various places, like in RCIA and on my own blog. Hmmm. Maybe should double-check.
Right on Mr. Tucker. I won't have anything to do with them because I don't trust their reporting.
Anonymous @ 7:02 AM, exactly.
I stopped receiving their emails a while ago because of the constant fund-raisers. I’ve also doubted some of their responses to reader questions, although I can’t recall particular instances just now. Anyway, it is sad to hear about this lack of evangelical spirit, especially in light of the Holy Father’s recent efforts to make us all more conscious of our responsibility to spread and re-spread the Holy Faith.
I have also "heard" that ZENIT is "owned" by the Legion but know nothing for sure.
They say on their website that they were funded at the beginning by the Legion (among others) but that 80% of their operation costs are covered by reader donations, with the rest coming from advertising, reprints fees and donations from institutions (the last being about 14% of the total). Of course this may all be smokescreen for it "real" ownership by the Legion.
It is paranoia, plain and simple. Indicative of the spirit of Macial.
That purging has a long way to go yet….
-Kevin Symonds
Desiderium
From what I understand there is a law being challenged in the SCOTUS that would potentially uphold the copyrighting of previously public domain works…. i.e. beethoven, vulgate et al.
I think this is an over-reaction. zenit is a full-on professional multinational news agency (50 staffers) which sells content to other professionals and provides it free to people for private use. Its content is copyrighted which is perfectly normal and unexceptionable in itself. Breach of copyright is theft. That is basic and there is no call to wax indignant about it.
Like most (let's say all) other news agencies, it requires – at a minimum – that those who quote content should credit the source and give a link. VIS news (the Vatican news service) copyrights all its material and requires source acknowledgement. CNS (the USCCB-linked news agency) stipulates for giving the link. zenit differs only in stipulating that people additionally apply for permission. Hardly an outrage.
Now, you say that zenit "enforces extreme copyright control" and that it is "not uncommon for this organization to write good Catholic bloggers and demand that they stop reprinting their articles" (this seems to be the same point made in two different ways – not two objections against zenit).
Well, for all I know these bloggers are taking content without acknowledgement – but even if they do acknowledge the source, all I can say is that if respectable bloggers of all stripes are unwilling to ask for permission, they should give a paraphrase and a link rather than paste an entire article into their blog (copying particular passages does not seem to be the problem, the way Jeffrey tells it).
zenit is within its moral rights to do all it can to draw more readers within its orbit of readership, and bloggers who usurp its content wholesale without acknowledgement or permission are doing no favours to the cause of evangelization.