As Luminary fights off a flood of takedown requests, podcasters have to ask themselves how they feel about having their content automatically added to new products and services. More importantly, podcasters need to take action to ensure that their rights -- their copyrights -- are explicitly stated*.

Since I'm not a lawyer, I asked one. Ruth Carter is an IP attorney and personal friend. It was from my conversation with Ruth that I give the following advice:

Go add this to the tag in your RSS feed right now: © 2019** by [Rights Holder Name]. All rights reserved.

No, this isn't a guaranteed fix to keep Bad Actors from grabbing your feed and adding it to their own directory service. It's incumbent upon services/directories to respect copyright. (Sadly, I don't think most do today. But with all this brouhaha, future services may start.)

No, this doesn't stop you from submitting your show to new services/directories as they come about. The fact that you, the rights holder, go through the submission process on that new service/directory acts as a license you are granting to that service (though Ruth recommends you read the click-wrap agreement, which is just what you'd expect an attorney to say.)

While I recommend taking this action -- I just did it for my shows and all of my firm's clients' shows -- there will be a business impact. Namely, if precedence is set so apps/services/directories decide it is in their best interest to secure licenses with each rights holder... that's going to slow things down. Big time.

And that's a topic worthy of future discussion, don't you think?

* Ruth reminds me that, at least in the US, copyright applies even if the rights-holder doesn't expressly state them. Still, stating them is good practice, so do it.

** If you're looking at this in the future, adjust the year accordingly. And yes, you need to change the year on Jan 1 of every year. Dumb, I know. 

 

Mentioned in this episode:

Support For Abortion Rights

While Americans overwhelmingly support the right of an individual to make their own decisions about abortion, unfortunately, that right is no longer protected everywhere in the U.S. The Supreme Court overturned Roe v Wade on June 24th.

Abortion is a basic healthcare need for the millions of people who can become pregnant. Everyone should have the freedom to decide what’s best for themselves and their families, including when it comes to ending a pregnancy. This decision has dire consequences for individual health and safety, and could have harsh repercussions for other landmark decisions.

Restricting access to comprehensive reproductive care, including abortion, threatens the health and independence of all Americans. Even if you live in a state where abortion rights are upheld, access to safe medical procedures shouldn’t be determined by location, and it shouldn't be the privilege of a small few.

You can help by donating to local abortion funds. To find out where to donate for each state, visit donations4abortion.com.

If you or someone you know needs help, or if you want to get more involved, here are 5 resources:

1. ShoutYourAbortion.com is a campaign to normalize abortion.

2. DontBanEquality.com is a campaign for companies to take a stand against abortion restrictions.

3. Abortion.cafe has information about where to find clinics.

4. PlanCPills.org provides early at-home abortion pills that you can keep in your medicine cabinet.

5. Choice.CRD.co has a collection of these resources and more.

We encourage you to speak up! And spread the word.

This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis:

OP3 - https://op3.dev/privacy