YJL

I was looking for an API for data in Public Data Explorer, thinking about presenting the data in different visualizations (BigQuery, probably is the right one, Google stuff is too many and too confusing), then I saw this:


Who would list cURL as programming language? Google really needs someone to proofread. I am sure this mistake was made by a writer who added the entry for that Bash example code which utilizes cURL to retrieve data.

As a developer, you wouldn't make such error, this isn't even a simple typo. It must be written by whom didn't have basic knowledge of development environment. They can either let a developer write the draft, then a writer proofreads, or the other way around. Anyway, I doubt this page is proofread.

Last time, only a few days ago, I mentioned issue in Google Docs Spreadsheet's and Analytics documentations. The underlying problem is the same. There seems no developers involved in writing documentation (outside of code), that sounds ridiculous, but that's what I felt after I read their documentation.

And there is a more important issue about the code and other on Google Developer, see the following screenshot:


There is no notes about the license of the code, except the copyright statement in the comment block. If I read this kind of code block anywhere, I would not even try to read it.

The question to be asked is: may you use this example code freely? May you even select the whole code and press Ctrl+C to reproduce?

I don't understand why Google neglects or forgets such important thing: noting copyright and license in every page. (They have legal department, don't they?) To see the permission and license, the fastest way is to click on Terms of Service Site Policies. That's two clicks and only if you know where to read, and I really need to quote:

You will find the following notice at the bottom of many pages on the Google Developers website:

Except as otherwise noted, the content of this page is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.

[snip]

You may also find the following notice on the bottom of some pages:

Except as otherwise noted, the content of this page is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License, and code samples are licensed under the Apache 2.0 License.

Okay, which one? Wait a minute, I see neither. WTF.

Google announced their latest update on Transparency for copyright removals in search. They receive more than 250,000 requests per week, it's not a shocking number by my expectation. If people knew we can submit removal requests via a webform, I am sure the number would be much higher, and I am intended to submit my removal requests in the feature.

I have seen some of my contents were duplicated on Google Search results, though some claimed that's for mirroring lest sudden unavailability of access, but that's just pure non-sense in these days. Unfortunately, I licensed some works under the Creative Commons, which rendered me useless to take any action if I wanted to.

I have written a post telling you not to license your work and you should follow my advise, so you can take down those garbage websites when they ripped off you Flickr photos or your articles.

Recently, one of my popular-free-to-rip-off Flick photo gets ripped again, which is not even a good photo by any means. those rippers don't even care about the quality of the photos. They find whatever the photo relates to the keyword they need, then just shamelessly use the photo with same generated text in multiple sites.


It's not only the copyright being violated but also your reputation, which is a severer issue for everyone. See how my username gets attached to that page in red box in the preview image? It uses "by livibetter," that may read as if like 'this page is written by livibetter' if the reader doesn't read carefully. I doubt any human would even pay attention to read that page. However I am more consider how Google's bot thinks about it than real people and you can see the text preview, it sort of confirms my worry.

Sigh... if I didn't license that photo, then I could take it down since it would be violating my copyright. It's not only good for me but might also help a tiny bit for other people. For example, you wouldn't see that entry if your search unfortunately could hit on it.

There are plenty of pages like that if you have tried to search your contents, I am sure you will find your works are being violated. This world is filled with good people but also shameless people as well.

In the Google blog post, there is one thing very interesting:

For example, we recently rejected two requests from an organization representing a major entertainment company, asking us to remove a search result that linked to a major newspapers review of a TV show. [emphasis mine]

So, shameless people, again, huh? They do whatever it takes to abuse you in every way they can to screw you up. Producing bad TV shows result bad ratings, that is the perfect logic. But they want to fix it by muting other people's voice, how absurd is that? They maliciously use and copyright claim as censorship tool and attempt to manipulate people to think that's legit and ethical, sounds familiar to you? Those people truly have no moral standards in their hearts, wait! I doubt they even have a heart.

I wish Google would release such information in the future, I tried to find about denials in Transparency Report, but I can't see anything about the result of a request. That would be great to see those people being exposed their ridiculousness to the public.

By the way, GitHub has a repository about DMCA takedown requests they receive, read those commit messages, a few of them are quite funny.

I stumbled across a project and saw this Unlicense:

This is free and unencumbered software released into the public domain.

Anyone is free to copy, modify, publish, use, compile, sell, or
distribute this software, either in source code form or as a compiled
binary, for any purpose, commercial or non-commercial, and by any
means.

In jurisdictions that recognize copyright laws, the author or authors
of this software dedicate any and all copyright interest in the
software to the public domain. We make this dedication for the benefit
of the public at large and to the detriment of our heirs and
successors. We intend this dedication to be an overt act of
relinquishment in perpetuity of all present and future rights to this
software under copyright law.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND,
EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF
MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT.
IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR
OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE,
ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR
OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.

For more information, please refer to <http://unlicense.org/>

It has the same purpose as WTFPL does.

There is a long post from the creator of this license, it's too long and I didn't read it all. The website Unlicense.org isn't accessible as of writing, but I found the source code of the website. There is also a Google Group for discussions.

I don't know if this Unlicense is dying since it didn't get approved by OSI or FSF. But I prefer WTFPL over Unlicense, although "Unlicense" sounds cool, but "WTF" is more awesome.

I don't care much about licensing (and I know pretty much nothing about it) when I intentionally place my work into Public Domain. Just let everyone do WTF they want to my stuff. Unfortunately, Public Domain isn't covered by law in everywhere, therefore you need to license your work in order to make sure you can have same effect as if you put works into Public Domain.

If you have tried to google your username and you have a blog or a Flickr account, you probably have seen some shameless people scrap your stuff or Flickr photos.

The situation for Flickr photos is worse, they are not only scraping photos but also the comments. Luckily, they don't always link back to Flickr photo page, I would not want them to do that. Maybe I can report to Flickr, so it will be blacklisted?

One issue is Google indexes those crappy websites. I believe this is sort of encouraging (even Google does nothing to encourage). Not only that, those websites uses AdSense and even have +1 button. Google often posts algorithm this algorithm that, why I still see those websites in their indexes?

They make it look like a blog post with comments using WordPress. Probably a way to fool search engine bots. Maybe search engine can't have enough data to reach the threshold? Every a few days, new website will pop out in results. New name, new design (not really such thing you can call design), new domain name, just my old photos. I have seen same photo was put on three or four websites almost in same period of time, I was guessing those were from same scrapper.

I don't know if I have mention in my blog why this blog is not licensed, the reason is to prevent those people scraping, but it does not really work. I think they just grab the feed and do whatever to generate posts. Ever now and them one of my post would be scrapped.

Of course, there is no efficient way to stop them, they are like cockroaches. You can never kill them all. They run, they hide, you can't find them even you want to sue them.

By not licensing is, well, the last hope, I guess. Maybe just the last item on checklist of how-to-desperately-stop-being-scraped-list you should have checked.

It's not as if I don't want to share, if anyone partially copy-and-pasting my content with proper attribution, it doesn't have to be a link-back, I wouldn't mind at all.

To me, licensing isn't important because I can't really take an action when someone violates my rights and I don't really want to keep my rights, I want to share. The more important thing is intention. It's crystal clear that scrappers are just want to exploit your heart-licensed works to make their own money. I don't want my stuff to be part of those.

Right now, I have switched my default license to none on Flickr. Only the new uploads will have new licensing setting. I will see if that could stop them, though I truly doubt about it.

Some careful people would ask you a clear statement about the license if you doesn't make it clear or haven't licensed yet. I actually do same thing, if I think I need a written permission.

Anyway, don't license your work. If people really need to use your works, they will send you an email.