Categories: OLD Media Moves

Thomson Reuters seeks to copyright a website’s content

Thomson Reuters has sent a letter to MediaName, a media news website in India, saying that it would like to republish its content and will claim the content if the website’s owner doesn’t respond in two weeks, reports Saptarishi Dutta of Quartz.

Dutta writes, “The email was signed by Thomson Reuters’ head of content acquisition for Europe, Middle East and Africa.

“‘As a publisher that has built its business around copyright, it’s bizarre for Reuters to assume that it has the rights if they are not denied the rights,’ says Nikhil Pahwa, editor and publisher of MediaNama.

“MediaNama has subsequently denied free access of its content and Reuters has agreed not to use the articles.

“In an email to Quartz, a Reuters spokesperson said the company was looking into the matter.

“On cue, Pahwa wrote Reuters an email in the same tone, claiming that Medianama would have the copyright to all of Reuters’ content if it didn’t explicitly deny it in two weeks.”

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Chris Roush

Chris Roush was the dean of the School of Communications at Quinnipiac University in Hamden, Connecticut. He was previously Walter E. Hussman Sr. Distinguished Professor in business journalism at UNC-Chapel Hill. He is a former business journalist for Bloomberg News, Businessweek, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The Tampa Tribune and the Sarasota Herald-Tribune. He is the author of the leading business reporting textbook "Show me the Money: Writing Business and Economics Stories for Mass Communication" and "Thinking Things Over," a biography of former Wall Street Journal editor Vermont Royster.