copied book descriptions?
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3QueenOfDenmark
Copying book descriptions where?
I ask because I think I might have done this by mistake. When I add books and edit the information to put my review (always original) I sometimes put in a summary (in the summary bit, not the review) and have put stuff from the back of the book jacket in it.
Is that allowed or not and can everyone else see it when I have added it and am I upsetting people by doing it? I thought it was just for my reference.
I ask because I think I might have done this by mistake. When I add books and edit the information to put my review (always original) I sometimes put in a summary (in the summary bit, not the review) and have put stuff from the back of the book jacket in it.
Is that allowed or not and can everyone else see it when I have added it and am I upsetting people by doing it? I thought it was just for my reference.
4readafew
The only field in a public catalog that can not be seen by others are the 'private comments' FYI.
5jimroberts
#3: Jodyreadseverything
I hope copying blurbs is OK. Not that I have ever done it, but the whole point of a blurb is to encourage people to buy the book, and why should there be any objection to free publicity? What about copying the table of contents, as I and others do? Fair use?
Rather than copy an on-line description, I would post a link to it, mentioning that I like it (or perhaps don't). If somebody puts a page on the net, he's not going to object to its gathering links.
I hope copying blurbs is OK. Not that I have ever done it, but the whole point of a blurb is to encourage people to buy the book, and why should there be any objection to free publicity? What about copying the table of contents, as I and others do? Fair use?
Rather than copy an on-line description, I would post a link to it, mentioning that I like it (or perhaps don't). If somebody puts a page on the net, he's not going to object to its gathering links.
6Noisy
'Review' is for YOUR personal review. Not for text that you've copied from elsewhere (unless it is snippets to illustrate a point). If, on your profile page, you've selected either of the radio buttons allowing Tim to use your reviews outside LT, then I'm pretty sure that he doesn't want to pass on anything that may be tainted by dubious copyright status.
7andyl
Table Of Contents is fair game (but should really be in comments).
Description / cover blurb is probably copyrightable but IANAL. Also comments / private comments isn't the right place. If you write your own description of the book you should enter it in the appropriate place in Common Knowledge.
Description / cover blurb is probably copyrightable but IANAL. Also comments / private comments isn't the right place. If you write your own description of the book you should enter it in the appropriate place in Common Knowledge.
8QueenOfDenmark
What is the summary bit for then? I quite often see a book title that sounds interesting but that's all that's been mentioned. So I click on the touchstone and there's still no real description of the book and the reviews, if there are any, tend to be quite vague about content.
I thought the summary bit was the best place to put the jacket blurb as it helps me to keep track and if everyone else can see it, surely it helps them too?
I know the reviews have to be your own and enjoy writing mine but if the publishers have put a description on the book I can't see the harm in using it as long as it's not used as a review.
I'm confused now as to if I should bother with the summary bit or not.
I thought the summary bit was the best place to put the jacket blurb as it helps me to keep track and if everyone else can see it, surely it helps them too?
I know the reviews have to be your own and enjoy writing mine but if the publishers have put a description on the book I can't see the harm in using it as long as it's not used as a review.
I'm confused now as to if I should bother with the summary bit or not.
9lorax
The intended use of the summary was as a title/author field; it's automatically populated for some add-books sources, and more recently they started auto-generating it for others.
However it's certainly true that (a) this doesn't actually add any information not available in other fields, and (b) it may not be obvious that "summary" means "summary of the information" rather than "summary of the book", and lots of people use it as you do, for a summary of the contents. I would rather see summary-of-contents, which is likely to be highly spoilery, in the Summary field (which I rarely look at) than the Review field.
However I think it's probably wise to write your own summary rather than copy it from elsewhere -- if it's not okay to copy it, then it hardly makes a difference which field you copy it into.
However it's certainly true that (a) this doesn't actually add any information not available in other fields, and (b) it may not be obvious that "summary" means "summary of the information" rather than "summary of the book", and lots of people use it as you do, for a summary of the contents. I would rather see summary-of-contents, which is likely to be highly spoilery, in the Summary field (which I rarely look at) than the Review field.
However I think it's probably wise to write your own summary rather than copy it from elsewhere -- if it's not okay to copy it, then it hardly makes a difference which field you copy it into.
10QueenOfDenmark
I think I'll just leave that bit blank from now on then. Why though, can we copy the front of the book but not the back?
(I'm sorry, I was the child who always said "But Why?" It's a difficult habit to shake).
(I'm sorry, I was the child who always said "But Why?" It's a difficult habit to shake).