Rav Miller Website Accuses ‘Joseph’ Of Stealing

“Any IP attorney will tell you that compilation, transcription and presentation of the work of a third party in a particular format should not be reprinted ”

A) I’m 99.9% sure you’re wrong anyway.
B) Even if that were true, I’m pretty sure this website’s “share on social media” buttons are a pretty good indicator that they’re OK with you sharing their material.

Joseph isn’t stealing the sites source code and passing it off as his own site. He’s just quoting the same primary source as them. This idea that when two people want to quote the same primary source, the first one to get it gets to “call dibs” and sue anyone who quotes that source after them is ludicrous.

The source is the web site because of all the work they put in to collect the information which is public, and not Rav Miller Ztzl.

GadolH
I’m going to ask the question again
You keep using the word “stealing”
Were do you find a halachic basis for your accusation? Were do we find that quoting torah in any format (or any quote for the matter) can possibly be construed as “stealing”? or improper. Just the opposite we all know that as long as you attribute torah to its author it’s all good.
and even in american law
for non-commercial purposes please tell us how an attributed statement used during a free speech discussion of ideas can possibly be considered copyright infringement?

“If the owner of a website has obtained copyright protection for IP”

Yes and like I said, if Joseph made an identical website that served the same purpose, they would have a case. That’s not the same thing as believing that the site has exclusive rights to everything Rabbi Miller said just because they provide a service. That’s a belief that would officially be known in the law community as “stupid.”

Some clarification: The contents of the letter written by Rabbi Wolhendler should not have been publicized by YWN as it was a private communication. There was no intent to accuse Joseph of stealing (which he did not do) – it was merely an explanation of why we feel we have th right to ask YWN to not post any further Q and A’s. The negative comments about Joseph are simply the work of people who don’t appreciate his posts, using this opportunity to malign an innocent person. The fact is that TorasAvigdor.org is run on a purely volunteer basis, and no profit is made at all. The website, as well as the daily Q&A ([email protected]) and the weekly Parsha sheets, are distributed for free, and all costs are borne by donations and volunteers. It is a project that was created for the purpose of making the Rav’s words accessible. However the difficult work of transcribing from audio to print probably does create a legal and halachic copyright – to a certain extent. But we do not even attempt to enforce such rights because there is no monetary claim. We only are requesting that the Q and A’s not be published on a format that allows anybody to denegrate the words of the Rav. I understand that in this new world of no standard and no respect, anything goes, but some of us still retain a basic level of decency and understand that. And the wide range of comments that have been posted here make it abundantly clear why Rav Miller’s Q and A’s should not be publicized in a forum where every ignorant fellow can comment on equal footing with the Rav zatzal. It becomes, Rav Miller said this, but some am ha’aretz sitting in his basement thinks this.
That being said, the website and daily Q and A are open to th public, and they were created for that express purpose.

TorasAvigdor: A Freilichen Purim, Joseph 🙂

Davka that’s why Joseph shouldn’t quote your site, because it will give you bad PR.

Torass Avigdor

” It becomes, Rav Miller said this, but some am ha’aretz sitting in his basement thinks this.”

Ah, but what if the one sharing Rav Miller’s words is also “some am ha’aretz sitting in his basement ” ?

Rav Miller passed away looking before anyone considered putting shiurim online, so I find it hard to believe that he was asked about it.