quote:
Originally posted by Aardvark
@DejaVoo
As Cookie has kinda said, you're releasing this information (anything in your name, personal message, display picture) into the public domain - theoretically once it's out there anyone can do any thing with it - by making these things public that's the choice you have made.
Well, that isn't entirly true though...
There is still a big difference.
You're absolutely right that such things are send to your contacts already and thus it isn't an invasion of your privacy (if you feel it is you can disable those things and the contact wouldn't recieve them).
But that does
not mean they can do anything they want with it!! It is
not put in public domain at all... It is send to your contact only and should stay there unless said otherwise.
For example: when you video-chat to someone, that contact may record the video-chat, even without your approval (this isn't an invasion of privacy) but he may not distribute that video anywhere else without your approval! The same with the text/log of the chat itself, etc...
That difference is extremely important. Unfortunatly many people think that these two things are one and the same, and the one flows automatically out of the other. It is, however, majorly different.
Thus:
quote:
... But it's my information to what I want with now...(if I hadn't deleted the email 
)
Absolutely false!
She gave her permission to you (and the others) to
know the information. She did
not gave her permission to
publish it in any way, nor to
misuse it...
quote:
Originally posted by DejaVoo
Damn, I didn’t mean to offend anyone…
surely didn't offended me though. In fact, you raise good points and stuff which many people ask themselfs too and/or get wrong...
So, as for the DP example, it is the same as with a video-chat. It isn't an invasion of privacy that someone can "steal" it ("copy" it would be better since, as you know, nothing is stolen at all). However, it is not a good sign of trust that the contact will copy and/or redistribute your own made graphic just like that.
But, most of the DPs are graphics which _are_ in the public domain, so there is no real problem with those. Of course, since most of them are in the public domain, or come from the public domain, or many people don't care that others "steal" them, it is very often wrongfully assumed that _all_ DPs are public domain.
But the DP issue, for example, is an issue of
copyright, which is different than
invasion of privacy....
If you put up a DP which you created and it contained your telephone number: it would be an invasion of your privacy if your contact would publish that phonenumber in public, and it would be a copyright breach if he used that DP as his own.
/ 
