Just because a book goes out of print doesn't mean that the author no longer holds his/her copyright to the written material.
You just might begin to make the prior domain registrant money again, more money than you think or make, should the copyright holder have filed for copyright protection.
whether the domain has expired or not is totally irrelevant.
So you'd be willing to do something potentially immoral so long as you could legally get away with it? Wow.
How about this scenario: Google/Yahoo get wise to the practice, they "scrape" Archive.org themselves, and use that data to mark your website's content as "duplicate content" - thereafter forever banning you to the netherworld of their index.
Now, an alternative scenario: You attempt to hunt down the copyright holder and negotiate terms for using their material. You might even find the copyright holder willing to license it to you for free. Of course, you might want to get this in writing. THEN, when someone later challenges your actions - OR maybe copies your copy - that would put you in a position that is a good position to be in.
Think of the possibilities of doing the right thing.
Or not, and have your Adsense account banned and your website banned.
Oh yeah, and remember this: When you take the approach that "it's easier to ask for forgiveness than to ask for permission" you will find that not everyone believes in forgiveness . . . without consequences.
"Yes, I forgive you . . but you're still going to lose your account and have to pay money damages."
Food for thought.
I should explain that the domain i was going to register was for what appears to be a now defunct business. I noticed that it still has some page rank PR4. So i thought i would re register it and try to save the PR somehow.
I personally don't have any moral issues with this since the business is no longer. Some might..
I think if i were to retain anything from the old site it would be to keep the old site structure. Keeping the old pages and removing any content as such.
Thoughts?
I personally don't have any moral issues with this since the business is no longer.
Just because the company is no longer in business means nothing. Presumably, the content was an asset of the company while it was a viable entity, and assets don't just disapper. The principals may have closed the company and restarted as a different entity, transferring/selling the assets to the new company. Or they may have sold the content to one of their partners or creditors when they closed the business.
Anyway.. that is a moral debate, which is unfortunately what this discussion appears to be becoming. And I think the question I'm asking is a valid one.
So... There appears to be nothing LEGALLY wrong with re registering a domain name of a defunct company for the purpose of taking advantage of that domains ranking. Point taken that any content would still belong to the previous owner (or dead guy) and that rebuilding the site as it was is wrong as there still may remain an issue of copywrite even after the business is no longer.
