EvilReads is Andrew Shaffer's blog of publishing humor, news, and opinion.

Shaffer is the author of Great Philosophers Who Failed at Love (Harper Perennial, 2011) and a contributor to The Hunger Games and Philosophy (Wiley-Blackwell, 2012). His writing has appeared in Mental Floss, Maxim, and RT Book Reviews, the romance novel industry's leading publication.

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Thursday
Sep022010

UPDATE: Scribd Responds!

Here's an update to yesterday's post on Scribd.com. In an op-ed column on the HuffPost, Scribd's SVP of marketing writes:

We would never purposefully do anything that would jeopardize our good standing with [our authors]....

Based on recent feedback and to avoid further confusion, we're now making the opt-out option even easier [and giving users the ability] to immediately and permanently remove all your content from the archive....

Additionally, the archive access fee applies only to downloading of documents more than two months old, not to viewing documents on the site using its HTML 5 viewer. (Scribd did tell Evil Wylie that the archive timeframe of two months "is subject to change.")

"We may not execute flawlessly every time," Scribd's SVP of marketing writes on The HuffPost, "but our goal, as always, is to build the best possible platform for content creators to connect with the broadest possible audience."

Is that...an apology? Sounds like they have chosen the side of good in this battle. Too bad--Evil Wylie was so looking forward to seeing Scribd at the evil potluck later this month!

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Reader Comments (4)

It's not an apology if they don't actually change anything. "We're sorry we got caught" doesn't mean you should say "Oh, OK, I guess I'll stop feeling ripped off by that thing you're STILL DOING."

September 2, 2010 at 10:13 AM | Unregistered CommenterApology?

Except for the fact that it should definitely be an OPT-IN-ONLY mechanism, not opt-out, ya, they are moving toward the light side.

September 2, 2010 at 12:24 PM | Unregistered CommenterDerek Martin

@ Apology? -- In this instance, they *did* actually change something by adding the "opt-out" checkbox. As Derek says, this is a step in the right direction.

September 3, 2010 at 11:33 AM | Registered CommenterAndrew Shaffer

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April 26, 2011 at 7:50 PM | Unregistered Commenternoobpc

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