Is the distinction obvious if I took your blog articles and packaged them in a series of PDFs and published them on my site for download?
Re:PDFed Hacker News Daily
by SimonPStevens on Tuesday November 16, 2010 @10:43AM
(#1910408)
The distinction here is between the software and the distribution.
This is legal in the same way that software that rips MP3s from CDs is legal.
On the other hand, distributing the content isn't. So you can rip the content and use it personally, but you can't distribute it without permission.
Its a conversion tool, not a distribution tool.
Re:PDFed Hacker News Daily
by SimonPStevens on Tuesday November 16, 2010 @11:13AM
(#1910509)
That's my point. This web app is doing the content extraction and nothing else. (I can see how perhaps I wasn't clear on that)
I'm saying that it would only be illegal if he attempted to distribute the content too, which he doesn't.
OK, I misread you.
Thats not what this "web-app" is doing.
Okay, bad example. Change it so that my site provides a tool to convert your blog posts to PDF. That is basically what this web-app is doing right? Is it different if I put it on a non-app looking site (like my site)?
I understand the difference in distribution vs conversion, but it seems like this is almost a mix. I actually think this service is pretty cool, even though I hate PDFs in general... but I still had to ask. :)
This "web-app" (if I may use the word), is a simple automated way of putting multiple stories in to PDF format. You could do it yourself at home. There is no ad, reformatting, or rebranding or selling involved.
This distinction seems very obvious to me.