Xbiz promoting newsgroup reseller?
 

Latest xbiz news has a big ad on the top for http://www.eroticusenet.com - a service reselling access to "filtered" newsgroups.

Isn't this just real close to reselling copyrighted material without a license? How can they be sure that all the content is legal?

Alex

Sounds like a similar thing to GUBA.

And GUBA technicaly is just software, that allows end users to search for content in usenet groups, but not actualy being a provider. Another grey area by the sounds of it.

-N

It's pretty grey until you start re-selling the content, which is what this appears to do. I can assure you 100% that this isn't 2257 compliant, which would be a requirement for a secondary supplier - either you know who has the 2257 records or you have them yourself.

It's grey - so why would xbiz touch it and take their money?

Alex

Does Xbiz have a disclaimer on their website saying that in no way are they responsible for the content or maner a program is run. In any clients payed campaigns?
That would be a way to get aound it. Or maybe Xbiz arn't aware of how the program operates?

-N

very unsafe IMO.
Its an understatement to say 'some' of it is not legal/2257, i would bet the almost half if not more is. Think of all the sponsor pics posted on that, they are basically making money off of other paysites and sponsors work, arent they?

Lets just say I wouldnt touch it with a 10 foot pole if I were a sponsor.

that is what i don't understand - I saw it and I knew what it was right away. How can Xbiz figure that this is a good thing, something worth taking ad dollars from?

Alex

An Opinion for Webmasters / Usenet & 2257
 

Hi,

We promoted our EroticUsenet service in the XBiz newsletter recently, which generated some incorrect statements from a couple of folks within the Greenguy & Jim message board.

In response to that discussion thread, we'd like to make 3 points:

1) Usenet newsgroups predate the Internet, and they are provided by Telco, ISP, government, university, and corporate news servers worldwide. We receive over 2 million newsgroup postings a day, and during the 12 years that we've operated our Usenet service, we have not been involved in any legal matters related to 2257. If interested, I've included our complete 2257 policy statement at the end of this message

2) Generally speaking, the Usenet / 2257 discussion is usually originated by a handful of adult service providers who feel their home territory is being threatened. Rather than educate adult webmasters and developers about how Usenet can benefit their businesses, some providers seek to stifle competition by making negative comments about Usenet that are simply untrue & uninformed.

3) In regards to XBiz / Gigacash, they need to decide if they are in the business of selling advertising space or selling competing adult products & services... trying to juggle both, creates a clear conflict of interest.

We appreciate the opportunity to correct some of the earlier misstatements, and if there are any questions about this topic, please feel free to contact us.

Best regards,
Joe D'Alessandro
EroticUsenet.Com

(T) 408-720-7620 / 1-866-487-3638
(E) info@eroticusenet.com

### Our 2257 statement:

18 U.S.C. Section 2257compliance does not apply to Usenet services of any type, from any provider, including those operating on government servers, corporate servers, universities, every major Telco and the tens of thousands of commercial Usenet services operating worldwide on the Internet. Usenet is a protocol or conveyance, designed to propagate millions of daily messages across virtually all Usenet services, Erotic Usenet is not a content originator, so there is no content to pledge as child pornography free. The analogy is an International phone company attempting to censor the contents of every phone conversation that takes place on its network. This does not mean we do not contribute to barring the presence of child pornography from Usenet.

Erotic Usenet will not maintain a business relationship with any entity or individual responsible for posting child pornography through Erotic Usenet, or maintains such material as a component of their service. In addition, we will seek to block or filter originating points of this material, including discontinuing peering relationships with services that do propagate child pornography. Erotic Usenet maintains an outbound stream of "cancel messages" to cooperative services that removes material of this type as discovered, not only on Erotic Usenet systems, but participating services as well. Erotic Usenet actively assists law enforcement in child pornography investigations. Erotic Usenet maintains a system for customers to report to us any infractions of policy regarding child pornography and addresses reports expeditiously.

I always thought the purpose of 2257 was the prevention of child and other illegal types of pornography. Never read the part where the regulation states 'just wait till it happens, then pull it'.

The point is that usenet news providers are simply internet service providers. It's not their content and they are not selling content, they are selling access to an Internet service.

If Usenet providers should have to act as primary or secondary producers for all adult content that passes through their servers, then the same should apply to all ISPs, e-mail providers, hosting companies, and telcos.

3) In regards to XBiz / Gigacash, they need to decide if they are in the business of selling advertising space or selling competing adult products & services... trying to juggle both, creates a clear conflict of interest. (QUOTE)

UMMM GigaCash is an AFFILIATE PROGRAM, XBiz is a PU-BLI-CA-TION and NEWS SOURCE. Both companies are run seperately. Competing products and services???? You are kidding right, conflict of interest? NOT AT ALL.....Take a look at our advertisers why would we have the top ten AFFILIATE programs advertising with XBiz if I VP of GIGACASH an AFFILIATE PROGRAM was worried about competing products and services.

It is too bad about this thread I called and tried to speak with you privately about your product Joe and our concerns regarding the exposure to XBiz and then you take it to the boards???

I do have 2 questions:

1 - what happens when there is an image in question as far as the age of the model?

2 - who do content producers contact when they see their unlicensed images on your site?

The problem comes when you cross the line from providing access to the newsgroups and providing filtered / selective newsgroup access, by eliminating all the posts and text and providing access to only the images. You then resell the access. I cannot see how that would differ from me collecting images from the newsgroups and using them inside a paysite. There is a line there, but it is difficult to detemine exactly where that is.

However, 2257 is clear. You have to be able to prove that all the models on your site are of age. Unfiltered, the newsgroups are a seperate issue. But once you start filtering, editing, and removing the text component of the newsgroups to provide only a selected part, you very likely fall into the definition of a primary producer. Why? Because you are unable to confirm the primary producer, the assumption (legally) can be that you are the primary producer because you are unable to accurately point the finger at the primary producer. There is a huge difference between being an ISP offer an unfiltered view of the internet and a company packaging, cleaning, and selectively displaying content. In my opinion, you truly need to get yourself better lawyers if the legal advice you have gotten is different. I'm not a lawyer, but I can see where the logic goes.

The likelihood that you are distributing KP is about 100%, and if you are filtering to remove it, then you are not just an ISP. You cannot have it both ways.

Alex

Alex
How exactly would that differ from any isp that offers usenet access unfiltered? They give you access to the same content, right?

Jim - are you saying that you endorse this kind of thing?

Usenet access???
Is that the thing you are asking about?

No, I'm talking about allowing access to illegal and/or unlicensed content.

You mean like every isp that offers usenet access?

Good questions, and I've included some additional information below. If any of the following is unclear, please let us know.

1) If you view inappropriate content within the newsgroups, simply contact our staff and we'll make sure the posts are removed. Additionally, we will block the originating points of this material, and discontinue peering relationships with any services that propagate child pornography.

Our staff is available 7 days a week throughout the year, allowing us to address these concerns in a timely fashion. Folks are welcome to email their inquiry to "abuse@eroticusenet.com" or phone us at 408-720-7620.

2) We take this issue very seriously as well. All incoming copyright complaints are handled within DMCA guidelines, and we set aside a dedicated email address (dmca@eroticusenet.com) to expedite those complaints.

Please note that a number of adult webmasters also post content to the newsgroups to promote their websites, and we've assisted them with that process for the past 12 years.

Those folks will typically post their older, archived content to the groups, providing them with an inexpensive, but effective method for advertising their websites.

The following web page provides some general posting guidelines for commercial sites, and our staff is always available to answer any questions...

http://eroticusenet.com/posts.htm

Thanks for the opportunity to discuss some of these topics on your message board, we appreciate it.

Jim, an ISP is offering "unfiltered" access - raw feed, do what you want. ISPs are safe from prosecution - they are the same as phone companies, message carriers. As long as they don't filter the message, they are not responsible for it. They offer pipe not content.

What this company is doing is collecting ONLY images off usenet, filtering, organizing them, etc and then reselling access to ONLY those images. At that point, they are no different from a site you or I run offering access to images for a price. The difference is they have sourced their material not from content producers but by scooping usenet. They pay no fee, have no license, and have no access to 2257 info.

ISP offers access to the internet as a whole. newsgroup suppliers offer access to newsgroups as a whole. Once you start to filter and edit, you accept responsiblity for it.

Alex

It's the filtering you don't like? What about isps that filter adult content? Is that the same thing? After all, content is content, right? Doesn't matter if it is images and/or text.

Or, how about the old dejanews, now groups.google? Or for that matter...any service that provides a content database for usenet.

I know I don't have to say this but...everyone knows I don't support content thievery in any shape or form. I just think when you are talking about Usenet access and/or filtering, you are looking towards the wrong place for the thieves.

I have always had a strong feeling about access to usenet. It is the very last place for free speech and anonymity. I believe you have to take the bad with the good.

In all fairness Stephen, we had a positive phone conversation about this matter the day after our first ad banner appeared in your XBiz newsletter (4/8/05).

You found a couple of posts in the Greenguy message board that talked about XBiz/EroticUsenet/2257, and you wanted to clarify a few points.

We talked for an extended period of time, and at your request, we sent you a statement that detailed the relationship between Usenet, our service and 2257.

After reviewing that information, you said there was "no problem", and that you'd post a reply in the Greenguy discussion thread. You also suggested that XBiz might write an editorial piece to help educate the adult industry about Usenet and the services that we provide.

That was the last time we spoke. You never made a reply post to the Greenguy discussion thread, the editorial coverage never materialized, and you also failed to respond to several phone & email messages that we left for you. Additionally, we left several messages with our XBiz account rep (Kristen) that went unanswered.

As a result, we elected to post some information into this discussion thread to help address some of the misconceptions about Usenet and our service.

In regards to my other comment... I was simply saying that as a publisher it would seem to be a conflict of interest to operate an affiliate program (Gigacash) that's linked to a variety of commercial content sites that you own. As an example, when you run a WHOIS on several of the sites listed at http://gigacash.com/sites.html those domains are registered under Webstar Marketing, which appears on the advertising invoices that we've received from XBiz...

shelovesbigballs.com
coedchicks.com
mombang.com
etc.

In the end, all we wanted to do was address some of these issues in a responsible manner, but you elected to close off communications and essentially left us out there to hang. Not sure what we were expected to do in that situation.

While I appreciate your participation in this discussion, your comments are uninformed and incorrect.

As an example, the following statement is a complete misrepresentation of the services that we provide...

"...collecting ONLY images off usenet, filtering, organizing them, etc and then reselling access to ONLY those images."

We are a Usenet service provider, and have been for the past 12 years. It is the same service that is offered through telcos, ISPs, universities, corporations and competing commercial Usenet providers.

We are not "collecting", "filtering", "organizing" or "scooping" anything. Those are your descriptions of our service, and as noted, they are incorrect.

In the end, our clients... both adult and non-adult... have benefited tremendously from the Usenet services that we provide to them... and as business people, it would have been nice to have a candid, responsible dialog about the topics appearing in this thread.

Quite frankly, we thought that if anyone could understand the importance of free speech... the importance of not being characterized or labeled unfairly... it would be participants in the adult entertainment industry. Obviously we were wrong, and that's unfortunate.

I'm struggling to understand why you are so concerned about our opinions of your business model. Is this just a matter of properly educating us or are we doing you harm of some mysterious manner?

You're absolutely right.

Usenet was the heart of the net long before there was any such thing as the world wide web and it is still a very valuable resource.

I see your free speech and raise you violated copyrights and failure to follow 2257 guidelines. Explain to me WITH COURT JUDGEMENTS how you are exempt. How can you run KP images without fear?

At the end of the day, newsgroups are the home of scams, spams, KP, lies and crud. Wading through it to get anything useful is a joke, like a million unmoderated chat boards filled with scam artists, theives, and liars. Usenet could die tomorrow and the web would be a MUCH better place.


Are you saying your service does not filter IN ANY WAY usenet? Does not group, selectively display, edit, filter, remove, or in any way present information outside of it's original format?

Jim, once you start filtering (specifically editing) material, you become a producer not just a delivery method. Selectively displaying only images from usenet, example (a common business model, sadly) means that the provider isn't just giving access to the usenet but is filtering, aggregating, and yes, editing the content you see. Google avoids this problem by providing UNEDITED but searchable results, and they always present the final results in context and in format. They don't just extract the images.

Sorry, but rebroadcasting and charging access fees to material that is most certainly illegal isn't exactly a brainy business model.

Alex

Being a newbie, I don't understand the usenet thing to be honest. But... doesn't google extract only images when you do an image search? Like I say, I'm very green when it comes to this, and seeings I just signed up for GUBA, very interested nonetheless :)
Also, does the safe search filter by it's very name not also give a filtered result?

Our concerns are pretty simple...

We've had a couple of people maliciously post libelous comments about our service on a public message board, in an effort to scare away potential customers and damage our business.

This is the equivalent of someone walking into a crowded theater and yelling "Fire!" when there isn't one.

If the harm still seems "mysterious" to you, it may help to step into our shoes for a moment....

You've operated a quality adult website for over a decade, which has been in complete compliance with federal and state laws.

In an effort to raise awareness for your site, and to expand upon your business, you run some advertising.

A few folks... competitors, anti-porn fanatics, whatever... go to a public discussion board, and in front of an audience of potential customers proclaim that you promote and provide child pornography. The statements are malicious, untrue, and scare the crap out of folks who may have otherwise purchased a membership with your site.

If this doesn't help to clarify, and personalize some of our concerns, there's really not much more I can offer at this point.

Interesting observations Alex... completely incorrect... but interesting none the less :)

As I've noted several times now, we've been providing Usenet services to retail and commercial customers for over a decade. Usenet continues to grow in popularity, and to date, over 2 million valid newsgroup postings pass through our news servers every day. This translates to approximately 800 GB of newsgroup content daily, which is comprised of text discussions and multimedia related to a variety of different topics.

Please note that adult webmasters have utilized the Usenet newsgroups for years to advertise their products, services, and websites. In fact we currently assist a number of adult websites with their promotional postings to the groups. In the end, if a few basic guidelines are followed, the newsgroups benefit by receiving quality content, and adult webmasters benefit by promoting their websites to a worldwide audience.

With our Usenet service, adult and non-adult webmasters can deliver 30,000+ newsgroups through their website, without having to use their servers, storage or bandwidth. At a time when webmasters are looking for new ways to drive and retain traffic at their site... to remain competitive & profitable... our Usenet service provides an inexpensive solution.

Our Usenet service is currently a popular component within a variety of adult websites, and its the same service that we deliver to our non-adult clients, such as ISPs, universities, government agencies, corporations, national newspapers, law firms, etc. It is also the same service that is available on Comcast, Adelphia, RoadRunner, Earthlink, and any other international/national/regional ISP.

The service is easy to use, fully supported by our technical staff, and can be brought online at most websites in less than 15 minutes. No hardware or software required, and our clients' end-users simply need a web browser to access, view and post to the newsgroups.

While you're references to "rebroadcasting", "filtering", "KP", "court judgements" are all very sensational and inflammatory... they ultimately have nothing to do with Usenet or the services that we provide.

As mentioned earlier, it would have been nice to have a productive conversation to see how are respective businesses could benefit one another, rather than get caught up in a bunch of chest pounding and territorial pissings.

With that said, if anyone has questions about our service, or the Usenet community in general, please feel free to contact us any time and we'd be happy to assist you.

(E) info@eroticusenet.com
(T) 408-720-7620

no territorial pissing, sorry, you misunderstand. You don't get it! Usenet is nothing but stolen images, images used without permission, and untraceable nudes in total violation of 2257. To resell it is to condone it - and now you let slip that you "help" companies spam newsgroups.

As for filter, kp , and "court judgements", well, I won't repeat myself again except to say that rather than addressing the issues, you are just spewing ad copy. Nice but not informative or an informed reply.

Nice business model. :)

Alex

There is a difference between "filtering" search results and filtering individual messages. If a message has 100 lines of text and an image, and you present only the image, you have filtered and edited the end product, presented the image without context, and general are profiting from that image without permission. That is not fair use or any other "public" thing. Google's search function for newsgroups already returns the entire message plus thread guide etc. Most newsgroup resellers usually offer some sort of image extraction service that allows end users to browse ONLY images taken out of messages, without the attached message.

The internet could live quite happily without usenet. In fact, it would be a much better place. Adult membership sites would be foolish to pay to support a network who's users turn around and distribute your content without permission.

Alex

Gotcha. That clears up that :)

OK close off communications? everyone knows how to get a hold of me cell, offfice, ICQ, webmail etc I am always available 24/7 I did not hear back from you guys regarding the matter and I never said fine i said I needed to review your 2257 docs. Feel free to call me if you want.

Bugbee

We've already corrected your comments about Usenet & our services in previous posts, so there's no need to rehash that information.

The majority of our interactions with adult webmasters, designers & developers have been very positive.

Rather than rush to make incorrect prejudgments... something that you're very good at Alex... most folks have taken a few minutes to actually inform themselves about Usenet, and were able to see the value it could bring to their businesses.

Those interactions have been very positive as I noted, and we're looking forward to developing similar relationships.

Knowing how to get a hold of you, and having you respond, are two entirely different things Stephen.

As I mentioned, the last time we communicated was on 4/8/05. I emailed you our statement regarding Usenet/2257, and in your reply message you said there was "No problem". You also said that you'd review the docs a little further and contact me on Monday regarding an editorial piece.

Monday passed without any reply from you. On Tuesday (4/12/05), I left an email and voice mail message for you.

On Thursday (4/14/05) our 2nd ad ran in the XBiz newsletter, and I still had not heard back from you. On Friday morning I contacted our XBiz advertising rep (Kristen).

Kristen said that she was heading into a meeting with you and Alex, and that the three of you would discuss our ad placement, as well as an editorial piece to inform folks about Usenet/EroticUsenet/2257.

Kristen said she would call me back in 1-2 hours... I didn't hear from her the rest of the day. I left a voice mail message for her at approximately 3PM with no reply.

Monday morning I called Kristen again. She thought I was another client, and began telling me about "artwork problems" until I refreshed her memory.

She said that she wasn't in the office on Friday (not true, we had talked by phone that day), and that she didn't have a chance to meet with you and Alex. She suggested that we email Alex, rushed off the phone, and the runaround continued.

In the end, all we had planned to do was run 3 months of advertising in your XBiz newsletter. After the 1st ad ran, you contacted us about 2257 concerns that were unwarranted & had nothing to do with our service.

You basically dropped a turd in our lap, and than disappeared. You never followed up on the 2257 issue, never responded to the initial posts on the Greenguy board, and we never discussed the editorial coverage that you suggested. We were basically left in the dark, despite the fact that we didn't initiate all of this.

If it walks like a duck, talks like a duck and shits like a duck???

I'm with Raw Alex on this one.
No offense Jim, and yes, I've been around usenet for many many years.
1600 baud. There is free speach and there isn't.
Especially now.

What does that even mean?

Is there any way we can see an example of this in action?

Here is a good way to clairfy the situation:

http://eroticusenet.com/images/window_drnexample.jpg

Images extracted from the messages, displayed as thumbnail pages. This isn't just usenet access, it is a content aggregator and presentation format. you can then download those images without ever seeing the newsgroup messages attached to them.

That crosses the line.

Alex

So what makes that any different than a site like Fusker, hiding behind the usenet name???? Except having someone else pay for the bandwidth? At least on the usenet groups the way I remember it being is that you at least had to sift through the messages and get the ads to see the content?

There definitely seems to be a huge difference between that and just offering usenet access......I am at a loss at how that could possibly help webmaster, designers or programs?