Wide World Of Trolling

I don’t know if this is the future or not, but a second newspaper chain has signed on to a copyright trolling service. WEHCO Media, a newspaper chain based in Arkansas, has teamed up with Righthaven LLC to root out “news aggregators.” Righthaven’s first and, until now, only client, had been Stephens Media. Righthaven acquires the copyrights to newspaper content and then files infringement lawsuits against blogs and websites that re-post the articles. The term “trolling” refers to the time spent looking for infringers. It’s pretty clear that the more traditional media is pushing back against the online world. At least a few newspaper sites are creating pay walls in an effort to recoup some revenue for their content. But it will be interesting to see how the battle between the aggregators and the trollers plays out. It’s not exactly the Hatfields and the McCoys, but it will have a much greater impact on the reach of copyright law.