I have heard of this -- Ticketmaster tried to sue Microsoft for "deep linking," as it is called. According to story at http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/content/inwk/0416/inwk0026.html, "... ticket broker giant Ticketmaster Corp. filed a lawsuit against the software giant. Ticketmaster (www.ticketmaster.com) alleged that Microsoft's Sidewalk service for Seattle (seattle.sidewalk.com) violated copyright law by linking visitors straight to Ticketmaster's online ordering area." The case settled in early 1999 with Microsoft agreeing not to provide any content (or "deep") links to Ticketmaster's site. The problem with deep linking (in the eyes of the corporation being linked to) is, of course, that it allows visitors to bypass advertising. Personally I think it's ridiculous and is contrary to the spirit of the web, but that's money-hungry corporations for you. http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/property/metatags/Linking2.html has some pragmatic suggestions for deep linking. You could also ask the linked-to site for permission. Since it's such a common practice I can't imagine an educational institution would be sued, especially if you are not receiving any financial gain from the links. I haven't had time to check this out, but here is another page about the issue: http://www.law.gwu.edu/facweb/claw/linking.htm Sorry if this info has already been posted-- I'm on the digest. Take care, Nicole -------------------------- Nicole B. Ellison, PhD --__--__-- Message: 5 Date: Mon, 1 Oct 2001 08:48:25 -0500 (CDT) From: Ed Lamoureux <ell@hilltop.bradley.edu> To: air-l@aoir.org Cc: "St. Mark's School" <stmark@iaonline.com> Subject: [Air-l] "legal" question Reply-To: air-l@aoir.org I webmaster for a grade school. Our principal attended a workshop last week at which a lawyer suggested that any links (on our site) out to other sites MUST go to the HOME page only (no deeper). There was a suggestion that this was mandated by the Digital Millenium Copyright Act and that linking directly to an article of interest, past the host home page, was an infringement. I'm not a legal scholar...though I do try to keep up. This one's new on me. Can those of you with experience in this area comment please. Thanks peace Edward Lee Lamoureux, Ph. D. Associate Professor, Speech Communication and Multimedia Editor, Journal of Communication and Religion Bradley University Peoria IL 61625 ell@bradley.edu http://hilltop.bradley.edu/~ell Fax: 309-677-3446