Re the clause Liam has pointed out: In the original article which kicked off this thread (if anyone can remember back that far) Andrew Orlowski writes: "It's the return of the old favorite, the ambiguous ownership contract. Myspace is actually using a boilerplate text designed to allow it to republish the content. Five years ago Microsoft was forced to change a similar, but even more acquisitive click... Apple had introduced a similar click through before retreating, and two years ago Google attached almost identical terms to its Orkut service. That was in 2004, the bloggers' love affair with the ad giant was still untarnished, and very little protest was heard."

The bloggers' love affair with the ad giant. Hmmmm. Anyway, I have since seen the offending clause pop up in a number of places, some of them quite alarming such as ordinary retail sellers' terms & conditions (my post 10:03) so it's something a lot of outfits are obviously latching onto. I STILL think that we won't know for sure what the actual consequences are until there's some real money at stake. Like when some MySpacer has a global smash hit with a song. There have been precedent-making lawsuits over this sort of thing before, and that could well be another.

A final word on MS (MySpace, not Micro$oft): Before a lot of people jump in saying what a good thing MySpace is for artists' exposure & contact, etc: PLEASE – WE ALL AGREE ON THAT. As a useful, even fascinating, fun way to hear/display new talent and make new friends, it's great. Ian (I think it was Ian?) describes it as a do-it-yourself John Peel show, which is the best definition I ever heard. But that's not in dispute. It is the question of how vulnerable these artists are, and I don't think that's been really proved yet because it's probably going to take a landmark law case to settle.   

And I STILL don't know the difference between "the license" which ends, and the "Agreement" which does not (my post 6:15). An agreement that doesn't terminate with the removal of one's material is something I would sure want to know more about before submitting to. There has been a truly thundering silence on this topic which suggests that no one else knows either.