Starting your day off with a bit of humor. This story is about a week old, but, still relevant
GateHouse Media Inc. sued the Boston Globe’s parent company, claiming its new practice of grabbing headlines from GateHouse Web sites constitutes copyright infringement.
In a lawsuit filed yesterday in U.S. District Court in Boston, GateHouse asks a judge to stop the New York Times [NYT] Co. from linking to GateHouse articles on Boston.com’s new local advertising-supported “Your Town” sites. A Newton site launched last month sparked the dispute.
GateHouse, which publishes eight dailies and 117 weeklies in Massachusetts, has posted Newton news online with its WickedLocal.com brand for many years.
The Fairport, N.Y.-based company, which has regional headquarters in Needham, also accused the Globe’s parent of unfair competition, false advertising, trademark dilution, unfair business practices, trademark infringement and breach of contract.
New York Times spokeswoman Catherine Mathis called the suit “without merit.”
“Far from being illegal or improper, this practice of linking to sites is common and is familiar to anyone who has searched the Web,” she said in a statement.
Bwahahahaha……..huh? Wait. Um, I think I am going to have to take the side of the Grey Lady and Boston Times, depending on how much they are linking. We here in ye olde blogosphere kinda rely on doing that. Heck, I just did that for this story (of course, I’m not trying to make money off the stories). But the big point is that Gatehouse seems to be suing primarily on headlines with hyperlinks. Woah!
For more details, check out Media Nation here, here, and here.
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