Talk of the Sound has determined that the licensing fee for the The New York Times copyrighted material published by the City School District of New Rochelle in a recent newsletter from the Athletic Department includes $437 for electronic use and $380 for print use – a total of $817.00.
The material, an article on weight training by Jane Brody published in The Times on December 13th, was lifted without attribution by Dr. John Magnotta, the Athletic Director for the City School District of New Rochelle who sought to pass the work off as his own.
A price quote from The New York Times requested by Talk of the Sound requires that the District first show how the content will be used, obtain a license from The New York Times and pay the associated fees for electronic and print use.
Please be advised, the reuse of the copyright material will incur a fee for the proper permission license. Your rate is as follows.
Newsletter – Electronic Distribution, 1 edition, up to 500 recipients, English, one time editorial use of text only (pulled quotes not included): $ 437.00
Newsletter Print, 1 edition, up to 25,000 copies, North American distribution, English, one time editorial use of text only (pulled quotes not included): $ 380.00
Please note, a layout of your newsletter must be submitted for approval before permission is granted.
Please advise if you wish to proceed and I will be more than happy to supply you with a license agreement in the next 3-5 business days.
As the Athletic Director, Magnotta is involved with decisions to suspend students from athletic participation which can include suspension based on violating the school district’s Code of Conduct which includes plagiarism as a grounds for disciplinary action. Magnotta not only plagiarized the content in his newsletter but by transmitting the newsletter via email violated the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, 17 U. S. C. Section 512(c) and the City School District policy on copyright infringement. It is also a violation of the School District’ s Acceptable Use Policy. Fines for unauthorized reproduction of copyrighted material can go as high as $150,000 per use.
UPDATE: After getting a price quote, we informed the New York Times that Dr. Magnotta would need a special license that would allow him to cut and paste in various sections of the Brody article to create a one-page version that will fit within page 2 of the newsletter, using the same title as the original article, but without any reference to the original article or that the New York Times is the source or that this was written by Jane Brody so that it would appear that the article was written by Dr. Magnotta and not Ms. Brody. We sought to confirm whether such a license would cost the same or be extra and how much it would cost to repurpose the content in any way he sees fit? The Times was also informed that the newsletter was already published last week and distributed without permission or obtaining a license or paying any fees. A copy of the newsletter was was sent to The Times as well.
Here is their response.
We can not approve the attached layout. The New York Times copyright content is not to be modified/ altered; proper citation must be given to the publication. Please see below:
Licensee shall provide a conspicuous credit notice as follows: “From The New York Times, [issue date] © [year of publication] The New York Times. All rights reserved. Used by permission and protected by the Copyright Laws of the United States. The printing, copying, redistribution, or retransmission of this Content without express written permission is prohibited.”
It appears the New York Times does not offer a license to its content which allows school administrators to plagiarize copyrighted material.
UPDATE: According to the Cambridge Who’s Who Directory for John Magnotta
Ph.D. in Secondary Education; Master’s Degree in Physical Education; Bachelor of Science in Physical Education; Coursework, Arizona State University; Coursework, University of California, Santa Barbara; Coursework, Springfield College; Coursework, Northern Illinois University
Affiliations Awards:New York State Council of Administrators; American Alliance for Health, Physical Education, Recreation and Dance; Editorial Board Member, Strategies Journal, National Association for Sport and Physical Education
Apparently, Magnotta received his Ph.D. from Arizona State University in 1986. We are currently efforting further information on his doctoral work.
RELATED: New Rochelle Athletic Director Plagiarizes from New York Times Article in District Newsletter