Some days back one of the Knowliz readers asked, where is my Entrecard (EC) widget.  (Entrecard is something which lots of blogger use to increase their traffic and to meet fellow bloggers.)
I also used it for some time and was doing my regular 250 or so drops with some ads selling and buying.  Suddenly one day I got an email that my entrecard account has been deleted.  The email says,
Your account ‘Knowliz’ on entrecard.com has been deleted. The administrator gave the following reason:
rule 4, copyright violations, http://entrecard.com/docs/doku.php?id=blog_quality_standards
Please contact deleted@entrecard.com if you have any questions regarding this action.
Out of the blue moon when suddenly I got this mail, I thought it was some kind of joke or it is a spam.  But when I visited the site, really I was not able to login.  So I emailed at the address given to find out what was the exact reason of my account being deleted.  This is what I wrote:
Hi There,
Can anyone tell me on what basis my blog was considered to be in violation of copyrights.
Each and every post on my blog is written by me and only me.
Can anyone tell me an example of what looked like a copyright violation to him/her?
I am really disappointed to see this kind of action for my Technology oriented blog.
User ID: XXXXX.
Thanks but no thanks… :(
The reply I got was really astonishing for me which was:
That would be the 21 photos in the post “Man Asked Nature to be Beautiful” that would have triggered the report we received on your account. It is not unusual for blogs in general to reproduce photos found elsewhere on the internet, with credits, but that does not constitute permission to do so. Further, rule 4 of our standards expressly forbids the reproduction of any material found elsewhere on the internet, permission granted or not, as it is not original to you.

For an article to have a copied, credited photograph as an illustration to a written article is a common and accepted practice, permission granted or not, but your 21 photos are a blatant and unacceptable violation of that practice. They must be removed before we can consider reinstatement.

For discussion sake, I replied to that mail with:
Well,
Then all articles published in “Smashing Magazine” would be considered as “Reproduction of material found elsewhere on the internet”
In fact I at least gave credit to the owners and have specific permissions (show you the mails I got from them), Smashing Magazine doesn’t even give credits or ask for permission.  Here is one example (read the comments) : http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2008/10/05/celebration-of-smoke-photography-and-smoke-art/
And I am sure Smashing Magazine is not a small blog like mine. (Sure it is not Entrecard user.)
I am sure one article like mine can’t be held accountable for the account deletion against over 290 or so original articles with the exception of few articles posted from the forwarded mails.
And I was one of the few who blogged about Entrecard like this one:  http://www.knowliz.com/2008/09/entrecard-is-looking-for-new-owner.html
If all my articles doesn’t satisfy Entrecard policies, then be it so.  I am not going to remove any article to use Entrecard.  Better close my account and donate my EC credits (EC currency) to someone needy or distribute among various contests.  I am sure, by this policy you might have deleted about 60% of the blogs including some major ones.

Entrecard has been a great fun to use and I really appreciate it being there.  However, I don’t want my blog to be dictated by the conditions of Entrecard.

Thanks a lot
Anurag Bansal
Proud owner : http://www.knowliz.com 

After that I haven’t received any reply.  I am not sure if I was right or wrong.  
But my EC account was deleted and hence I removed EC widget from my blog forever.
 
(Image by: Marion Doss, Modified image: Knowliz)
Tell me, if you think that post of mine was a copyright violation. If that post is a copyright violation then the people who are stealing content from other blogs without permission and copy the entire material word to word on their blogs, should be heavily punished for this kind of activity.  
You may look at some example of this activity on one of my most popular post “20 things to do after installing Ubuntu Linux“.  Check the ‘Links to this post’ and you should get the idea.
Why should sharing such kind of photos with permission from the owners be considered as a copyright violation?  What do you think?  Should we all stop sharing photos and other material over the internet like on Facebook, Bebo, Pownce, Twitter and Plurk?

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