Blackmask: Site could be back up–and LOC has ‘approved’ transfer of Doc Savage and Shadow titles, ‘with reservations’
Just received from David Moynihan, owner of the much-missed Blackmask (don’t count on the link working right now):
Let’s see:
they [Conde Nast] sent a DMCA Takedown Notice,
We’ve issued a counter-notice,
The ISP has deemed said counter valid, and oh yeah, the LOC [Library of Congress copyright office] just approved the transfer of all Doc and Shadow titles (with reservations).
It unfortunately takes 10 days from receipt of counter notice until my two sites can be back up.
Other things happening that I cannot comment on, so, I think I’ll go to China for a week.
Actually, this was planned, partly a biz trip related to that Monkey… which I hope somebody has a copy of.
Yes, there are questions, especially about exact meanings of “transfer” and “reservations”; and that “Monkey” business escapes me right now. But so far this appears to be a much better outcome than Blackmask’s going out of business. While I wouldn’t have taken on Conde Nast on the matter, I wish David the very best of luck at getting the Blackmask site and a related one going again.
Meanwhile it’s clear that the fight with CN is continuing.
I invite both sides–(1) David and (2) Conde Nast–to make their cases and update us in the TeleBlog comment area.
Related: Earlier item on Blackmask’s fight with CN over the disputed titles. Also see John Mark Ockerbloom’s latest observations.
May 9th, 2006 at 4:47 pm
I’m glad Blackmask will be back! I’m still using a Nuvomedia Rocket ebook and it’s one of the few ebook sites where I can get books in the format I need. I know I can read on a PDA and I do have one but the older I get the more those small screens strain my eyes. So here’s hoping the site will be back up soon.
May 9th, 2006 at 5:11 pm
We’ll hope. I did change the headline from “will” to “could” since there are still unknowns galore. Even David has just used “can.” But we’ll hope that “will” is the operative word. Thanks. David
May 9th, 2006 at 6:36 pm
Notice how easy it is for a company like Conde Nast to completely shut down the operations of a “competitor” merely by alleging infringement and invoking the DMCA. In what way is Blackmask violating the provisions of the DMCA? The ISP is forced to shut down the services, lest they be sued as an accomplice.
Here’s a bad law that is being abused by a company that has plenty of resources and no compunction about its behavior.
May 9th, 2006 at 6:45 pm
This whole Conde Nast thing look’s like a “I’m taking bat and ball and going home” scenario.
May 9th, 2006 at 8:43 pm
I recently bought the complete Blackmask DVDs: a) to help give David some cash to fight with and b) just in case the site does go down permanently. I don’t know if he’s still distributing them now the case is on but it wouldn’t hurt to ask. It’s the greatest bargain you are likely to get this century.
Jon.
May 10th, 2006 at 12:08 am
I’m a big fan of blackmask, but this episode is definitely scaring me. Blackmask is really the only website which offers a variety of ebook formats (Yes, I can build them myself, but…).
copyright disputes like this are inevitable; we need some way to insulate individual legal disputes from the site as a whole. Then again, is Moynihan making any money from this? Is it realistic to put the burden of providing public domain ebook files to the world on the back of a single individual?
Perhaps instead we need some sort of nonprofit group that can serve public domain ebook binary files.
Another thought. Why doesn’t somebody distribute periodic bittorrent ebook zips? Do it every 3 months, with separate torrents for plucker, ebookwise, rb, msreader, etc. I’m guessing, but ebookwise files are 100-500KB, with maybe 50 files a week. That comes to about 1-2 gigs per format per year.
May 10th, 2006 at 12:18 am
In the dark accursed forest of corporate publishing Kings, their ISP sheriffs, and some Robin Hoods like Mr. Moynihan, I’m just a leaf on a wee tree. I’m starting to sell large-print, accessibly formatted ebooks on eBay in connection with my site, easy-reading.com. (This is not a multi-million dollar business.)
No doubt like other amateurs in the dying sport of reading and supplying texts to read, I’ve been sitting blind in the bushes, not really believing the tales of corporate dinosaurs stomping Merry Men in the mud. But Virginia, I guess they’re true.
Plato posed the right question. Socrates remarks to Thrasymachus that by definition the art/mission of real rulers is to care for their subjects, as the job of a shepherd is to care for the sheep. Thrasymachus laughs, as a Conde-Nast lawyer would smirk, and suggests that Socrates get his head out of its awkward hiding place and see life as it is.
Then Socrates says, “Oh, I see. You’re thinking of another art — the art/mission of wage earning (making Money).
The arguments go on, but the Big Question has been posed for then and now: Essentially, bottom-line, what are you doing? For example, as a publisher, are you (a) providing literature for the entertainment and enlightenment, maybe, of your customers and (b) getting paid for your efforts. Or are you (a) MAKING MONEY (in this case by selling books etc.)?
Well, I guess we know the usual Big Answer today. But I have a little question, leaf-sized. What’s the best way to find out if the Blackmask DVDs are still available — from Moynihan, eBay, or someplace — and how to buy one. It sounds like an excellent business investment for me. Thanks for any help you can give.
— Major Johnson
major.johnson@pobox.com
310-826-4198
http://www.easy-reading.com
May 10th, 2006 at 1:57 am
“Perhaps instead we need some sort of nonprofit group that can serve public domain ebook binary files.” - Robert N.
Actually, Robert, you’re in LibraryCity territory. That’s part of what we intend to do–serve up PD titles. But why the “instead”? I’d be delighted if David M used our titles.
I don’t control LibraryCity single-handedly (others involved are Jon Noring and librarians Rochelle Hartman and Alev Akman, as well as a K-12 group called LINCT), but if I have my druthers and it’s financially possible, we’ll make PD books available in different formats even for commerical use without charge. Whether a site is a nonprofit like Gutenberg or a for-profit, I want the books read.
For all of David M’s past talk about commerce, I suspect he feels the same way–which is cool, and one of the reason I want his site to survive. It is actually my favorite PD site because it’s well-organized and, of course, has a variety of formats to help people cope with the Tower of eBabel. (Two other good ones are manybooks.net and Gutentalk, of course.) I really hope that David and CN can reach a compromise to the mutual benefit of both.
May 10th, 2006 at 7:53 am
THIS lawsuit or court debate ,what ever you want to name it , is a farce,a joke but maybe expensive one !
I COULD SEE if conde was publishing more shadow novels or finaceing a movie or something in that line ,but as far as i know [ i search the net almost daily for news on a new shadow ,be it print ,or video] , and as far as i can tell there is nothing but talk
and that comes from the fans so all this tells me is conde nast
is greedy! there is no merit to this lawsuit or court battle !
I SAY AS A SHADOW FAN FOR 40 YEARS PUT UP OR SHUT UP CONDE!!!!!
May 10th, 2006 at 12:54 pm
The thing is…what does this really mean?
I was talking it over with a friend of mine, and he pointed out that transferring ownership of property is not the copyright office’s job—it just stores records of what people send them. Adjucating property disputes is a job for the courts.
Furthermore, section 201(e) of the copyright code states (emphases mine)…
I don’t think this means that Blackmask has necessarily won yet.
May 11th, 2006 at 12:59 am
It really astonishes me that a site that is so valuable to many students and readers all over the world can be shut down by Big Business just to grab every cent they can get hold of. Blackmask does more to promote international friendship and co-operation than the Conde Nast organisation could ever dream of.
Why doesn’t the Conde Nast organisation do the right thing and sponsor Blackmask? They might do their corporate image some good - this lawsuit certainly won’t do that!
May 11th, 2006 at 5:21 am
The DMCA has been abused for an estimated 30% of the cases it was invoked, IIRC. Which amazes me, as the lawyers who send in these things have to swear on penalty of perjury that they really do believe there’s a case of infringement. Perjury is a crime; it means the lawyer who uses a DMCA take-down notice just to bully a site should go to jail. Either US DAs are really lazy, or the 30% figure is exaggerated.
In this case Condé Nast probably do have a claim, regardless of which way the judge will swing. As David M. has pointed out, he has sent in a counter-notice, and the site should be back up shortly. The only thing this has achieved is that the hosting provider can no longer be held liable for contributory copyright infringement.
I am not a big fan of copyright (not just today’s overreaching copyright, but any copyright); nevertheless, if we are to have a copyright system, I don’t see what is wrong to hold the online equivalent of a book shop (the hosting provider) accountable for the works he helps distribute. If a RL bookstore were to sell unauthorized copies of a book, and would continue to do so after the right sholder informed them of the infringement, they can be held liable too. The DMCA may be bad law for various reasons, but the general idea of letting providers absolve themselves is a good one.
(The execution is definitely atrocious; a site should stay up so that the accused can respond within a reasonable time-frame.)
May 11th, 2006 at 8:01 pm
I “claim” you are distributing my copyrighted material on your website. I find a way to invoke the DMCA. Now I can sue the ISP if it doesn’t immediately cut you loose. What can the ISP do? It has no choice but to shut you down.
And that’s what Conde Nast has done with Blackmask.
Whether Blackmask is infringing on Conde Nast’s copyright in some cases or not, it should be a matter settled in court or arbitration. CNP shouldn’t be able to close down an online company’s website over a civil matter like this. But with such shallow pockets, I doubt Moynihan can sue CNP back for damages and for making false statements, which it seems obvious that they did.
(Full disclosure: I once worked at a CNP publication.)
May 15th, 2006 at 11:10 am
Why couldn’t they have just shut down the pages to the two books in question instead of the whole website? I don’t really know the ethics of this, and I suspect that what Conde Nast has done is unfair, but why should the other books that indefinitely aren’t violating copyright laws be shut down too? It seems to me like a case of throwing the baby (the other 10,000 books) out with the bathwater (the two in question).
May 15th, 2006 at 4:39 pm
Roger: What “false statements”?
Blackmask.com was hosting copies of the Doc Savage and Shadow novels. That’s verifiable.
The Doc Savage and the Shadow novels are still under copyright to Conde Nast. Also verifiable. (See reader comments here for details.)
Therefore, Conde Nast was perfectly within its rights to issue a DMCA takedown order.
It may be true that 30% of DMCA uses are abuses—but there’s no sign that this was one of them. Sure we’re all disgruntled because we like us some free ebooks—but if those free ebooks include ones that belong to someone else, in the eyes of the law that’s no different from if they were offering DVDrips of the MPAA’s latest “masterpieces.”
I’m not a lawyer or anything, but from what I’ve read, our current copyright law system is heavily slanted in favor of the copyright-owners. It is deemed better to stop the operation of the defendant, and thus limit further potential damages to the plaintiff, immediately, than to have to wait a few more days to get a restraining order. When used legitimately (as it is in this case), it’s just a shortcut anyway; it gives the plaintiff the time they need to get a more permanent restraining order. The eventual outcome would not have been different; the site would have been up for a few more days but would have had to be taken down when the restraining order went into effect anyway. Now, granted, in a case like this where Blackmask has been going for years without Conde Nast taking any notice, it seems kind of petty to DMCA them for those additional few days—but that is what the law is there for.
May 23rd, 2006 at 1:13 pm
Can someone explain why blackmask cannot continue to operate for those ebooks whose copyright is not in dispute while discontinuing (if only temporarily) those volumes for which Conde Nast claims ownership?
May 23rd, 2006 at 11:33 pm
I would imagine because the court order said so. Though, in the absense of being able to examine that court order, it’s impossible to know.
May 31st, 2006 at 11:15 am
So, does anyone have the actual court case details?
May 31st, 2006 at 2:11 pm
I am not familiar enough with the US justice system to know where to look (assuming such details are available at all).
According to an earlier quote: “The case goes before a [magistrate] in Greenbelt, MD on May 8.” Parties are presumably David Moynihan/Blackmask.com and Conde Nast.
June 1st, 2006 at 11:33 am
So, either nothing happened, the information is not available, or it is only actually availabl eif you wander into that courtroom and ask for it?
June 2nd, 2006 at 11:52 am
In theory, anything that would happen in the courtroom would be a matter of public record. One could probably request transcripts, but I have no idea where you would even begin to look.
June 6th, 2006 at 2:50 am
Is there a website or newsource where I could follow the “Blackmask Case”?, (though you guys seem to be doing a fairly good job of it here). Is there a place where I could buy the Blackmask content online? (The legal bits, that is…) And, thirdly, what is the third best online source for online book texts after gutenberg and blackmask? Thank you for any knowledge you can impart to me.
June 6th, 2006 at 3:14 am
Hi, Cindy.
1) Nope. I’ve asked David Moynihan for an update.
2) Not sure. There is a site that may carries Blackmask titles, but apparently the iffy ones are mixed up with the good ones. Better to steer clear of Blackmask stuff until this is over.
3) For public domain, try manybooks.net.
Good luck,
David
June 8th, 2006 at 9:10 pm
i’ve been trying to log on to blackmask for a week now and i’ve just discovered that the new age tyrants had stopped it.it is a shock for me at least for i’ve accumulated a great wealth of knowledge from it.one word is enough for those tyrants “go to hell!!”
waiting for your return soon
June 13th, 2006 at 4:15 pm
Hi there
As a Brit, I truly believed America was the ‘land of the free’. Not so apparently. I too am appalled to discover my favourite site has been killed off. I will keep checking back. Conde Nast will never get my business.
Come back soon.
June 14th, 2006 at 1:20 pm
Like many of you, I am frustrated at the disappearance of Black Mask. But I think a word ought to be raised in defense of intellectual property. Creative people should, and in most civilized parts of the world, do retain the right to sell the fruits of their labor. That is the core of copyright law. Are there abuses? Yes, there are. Unpublished or inexperienced authors and artists can sign away their rights to a company for a relative pittance, which the publisher can, if the work proves profitable, capitalize on. The exact length of time in which copyright may be renewed varies. Sometimes thiings which ought to revert to the public domain are witheld for what some of us would regard as an unreasonable time. From some of the foregoing posts, it seems that Conde Nast, which alleges that it holds the rights to certain material, is taking a “dog in the manger” attitude towards pulp material which it does not intend to re-publish, but will not permit the relatively small minoritiy which is interested in these two files of pulp fiction to have access to them. SupposIng that to be true, and I haven’t the slightest knowledge as to whether Conde Nast wishes to republish what they claim is theirs, if it is theirs, the principle that copyright should not be infringed ought to be upheld. What we all ought to be raising the roof over, is that the public also has rights. When you shut down ALL the data, the right of the public is CERTAINLY being violated. If a book dealer sells a bootleg copy of a book or a recording,the contraband is properly confiscated, and the vendormay be tried, and, if convicted, pay a fine, etc. But, if he is otherwise, a reputable dealer, you cannot put him out of businesss.The First Amendment of The US Bill of Rights is ALSO being infringed. And that, it appears, is worth the notice of the public, anti-censorship groups, the legal profession and civil rights agencies.
June 20th, 2006 at 10:43 am
I don’t know if anyone here knows more about this, but I tried reading up on copyright term lengths at copyright.gov.
Here’s my understanding:
“The Living Shadow” was published in 1931, the copyright would have expired during 1959. If the copyright owner renewed it during 1959, it would have expired in 1987, which was increased to 2026 in 1978.
The 325 Shadow pulp would all have been in this same situation (adjusted by year of publication) since they were all published before 1964.
Is that correct?
Conde Nast bought Street & Smith in 1959. Was it common practice to just file copyright renewal forms on each any every article and story in every magazine S&S and CN had ever published? I don’t doubt it was done, but it seems like it would be a tremendous amount of work.
June 22nd, 2006 at 4:30 pm
[...] I am the proud owner of a REB 1100 ebook reader from RCA. I purchased it on a lark for about $40 on overstock a couple of years ago. I use it to read “classics” I can download off Blackmask for free rather than pay Penguin all that money. (Note: Blackmask is down do to various legal matters) Bottom line- I love ebook readers. I was waiting for the new round to come out. [...]
June 24th, 2006 at 12:57 pm
I am most concerned that if this is just an action which is being pursued in the US courts or justice why should this affect the rest of us?
Just think what might happen if a tin pot country like San Marino, or somewhere which you had never heard of decided to pursue an action. San Marino or its like states could shut down the whole world.
I call this shutdown of the BM site nothing but a Nasty Con.
June 25th, 2006 at 11:22 am
I became interested in public domain when I came across some 50s noir at blackmask last year. I did my own check of the copyright statuses using the copyright office’s online database and gutenberg.org’s print file of 1950-1977 renewals, and found a couple of apparent errors in blackmask’s research. For example, Wm. L. Stuart’s Nightcry showed a renewal in 1975 by the author. Since he was alive at the time, it seems obvious that the work is still under protection.
With that said, I would appreciate someone explaining to me on what Conde Nast bases its copyright claims. I searched gutenberg’s records for Doc Savage renewals: under the author, Lester Dent; his pseudonym, Kenneth Robeson; and the magazine itself, Doc Savage. I found nothing except a single renewal for Death at the Take-off, written under the author’s real name and renewed by his wife in the mid-70s. In fact, I found no mention of Kenneth Robeson, and no mention of the magazine except as the publication venue for some stories by John D. McDonald.
Perhaps CN is objecting to its trademark use? I assume here that it has taken trademarks for Doc Savage and The Shadow.
June 25th, 2006 at 9:47 pm
Robotech’s comment of May 15 prompted me to look into my renewal transcriptions, and I found that they indeed didn’t include periodicals, only contributions to periodicals. Since some magazines’ contents ar copyrighted as units, like anthologies, I wouldn’t have found anything if the Doc Savage issues were thus registered. I checked the records at UPenn and found that at least some Doc Savage mags were renewed, so all of them might be for all I know. I apologize for not thinking this through better.
August 16th, 2006 at 3:34 pm
I miss the site, it was so good to get classical texts. I wanted to buy the DVD but, the site would not come up for me…now I know why.
August 21st, 2006 at 4:32 pm
I have regularly checked the site since it went down, (via the bookmark on my computer). I hope it will not have to be deleted! Blackmask was, in my opinion, the best source of free ebooks anywhere. It had wonderful features, such as excerpts from each book, and a random book selector, that would present a book opened up ready to read. Other conveniences included selectable ebook reader formats such as Mobipocket, Microsoft Reader and others. This has been a great loss to the ebook community.
In the meantime, I found a pretty good site that seems to be somewhat similar but doesn’t have all the features. None the less, it is very good. Check it out at:
http://manybooks.net
The selection of titles is huge, but it lacks Microsoft Reader and Mobipocket formats for download selection. However, this is not a problem as I believe Mobipocket can convert some of the other available formats.
September 22nd, 2006 at 2:28 am
“Monkey” is the Chinese classic also known as “Journey to the West”. David Moynihan has long been searching for an English translation he can post on the much missed BlackMask.com.
October 20th, 2006 at 7:57 pm
@Jerry Schechter - I went looking for Blackmask after finally getting round to buying a PDA. I can look on Usenet and find about 50 thousand ebooks for free download but I’d rather keep it legal and just read out of copyright works. The thing is if I had a PDA in 1900 I would (a) be the coolest guy in the world wondering where his next charge was coming from and (b) have virtually the same choice of public domain material to choose from. The Public Domain is the consequence of copyright. That was the original deal. If copyright holders manage to extend copyright then it should follow that the Public Domain gets something too. I’ll cut to the chase here - they didn’t. The theory is that in return for an exclusive license to make money from an artistic work for the public is allowed to enjoy those works in any way it chooses after period of time has elapsed. If you think that it’s weird that a member of the public should be allowed to use and abuse a piece of music or text or video ANY way they want after a few years then you’re a victim of the **AA’s propaganda machine. Copyright has been extended about thricefold or more in the lasy thirty years in the US. Big deal, right? The US is just a small self-inflated rock between Brazil and Canada right? No! They own an almost complete collection of various Judges. Mad huh?
So here we are, public domain fans waiting for our next release, and yet in the real world the best we can hope for is the wake for whatever projects we’ve been following.
October 31st, 2006 at 8:35 am
I hope this gets resolved soon so I can buy more of the wonderful black mask print editions of the Doc Savage novels. I have only bought 5 or 6 to date, but had intended to buy the whole lot over time! Can anyone email me with a source that might still have copies in stock?
November 13th, 2006 at 8:25 am
I miss blackmask.com
…….plzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz bring it back quick.
November 26th, 2006 at 4:10 pm
plese come back! I miss blackmask very much. T_T
December 13th, 2006 at 10:41 pm
boy, i could sure use an update on this situation. blackmask has been very much missed by me. i also think it would be cool to let the fans and general public know what we could do about it. i’m sure most of us would love to do anything possible to help preserve what blackmask stands for.
December 21st, 2006 at 9:52 am
Dear Sirs,
Please indicate if I could buy the whole Doc Savage stories in English (190 stories).
I am Swiss and speak French. Lefrancq had started to translate the Doc Savage stories but stopped them in 1996.
Do you know if Blackmask will or has started to reprint the whole stories an if the seems to sell the right to a French editor.
Thank you for your cooperation and to answer to me.
Merry Christmas and happy new year
December 24th, 2006 at 4:13 am
Thanks for your note and happiest of holidays to you as well! Especially given the way the court decision went, it would be better to direct your query to Conde Nast than to Blackmask/David Moynihan.
Let’s hope that Blackmask is back up soon. The decision affects only the disputed titles.
David
February 27th, 2007 at 4:31 am
Hey Blackmask Guys! I just wanted to tell I miss your site and your fantastic e-books. I do not know what is going on with the Court trial. If I understood right the problem is with certain material whose copyrights are disputed. So, why is the whole site closed if most of the material was unabridged?
Best Regards,
Adolfo
Stockholm, Sweden
January 21st, 2008 at 2:20 am
Here is the truth. He is a scumbag!!! My wife is Kenyon Charboneaux. He stole all of her work and didn’t pay her one red cent. He was selling peoples work and made money on other peoples stuff. As far as I can see, he is a hunk of S–T!!!
January 23rd, 2008 at 8:14 am
That’s quite a strong accusation. Have you got anything to back it up?
January 23rd, 2008 at 8:43 am
David Moynihan’s story here.
January 23rd, 2008 at 9:36 am
Hi, Branko. At this point it’s a “he said, she said” deal, but the “she” part of it is that David ignored her mail. And of course he acknowledges that her stuff ended up in the wrong place, even if he places the blame on others. I remain open-minded to David’s explanations–I want to consider both sides.
Too bad David won’t. He just made up facts about my Sony Reader purchase and still refuses to back down when confronted with the rather verifiable truth. If you’d like, for your private use, I can email you an electronic copy of the invoice. No libel suit on the horizon–I don’t want the government involved. But I gotta admit the stuff on David site was pretty bizarre, complete with 100 pounds added to my weight. Quite aware of Godwin’s law, but we really, truly, are deep in Big Lie territory. A shame. Oh, how I miss Blackmask!
Thanks,
David
November 15th, 2008 at 8:50 pm
It’s up. Blackmask link took me there, but site is now: http://www.munseys.com/site/home