This iteration of the Quiz series started out as a fun project with a lot of the material readily available and only needed to be coalesced in an entertaining form. A few of the things I set out to leverage were:
- Wikipedia, as a source list of the most famous and iconic songs of their respective era, especially those featured in the Billboard 100
- Google & Youtube, for its structured url patterns to the musical clips, using the relevant information (eg, song name & artist) as parameters. An interesting (and virtuous) side effect of being as specific as possible was not just to get the right clip, but actually linking to the official version, which consistently came first when available.
- songlyrics.com, for its structured url patterns to the actual lyrics
The thinking here was that an ebook version would put the source material 1 click away from the reader, with a QR code providing similar service on the paper version. Heavily relying on URLs meant taking the chance that the link would break sometime in the future, making the book less relevant, even though the questions on the quiz should still stand the test of time. On the flipside, it created an opportunity to heavily automate content while staying clear from copyright concerns. It also didn't feel like misusing the original material, to the extent it would actually generate traffic to it.
So I set out to implement this using a trusty Excel spreadsheet, a Word template and some code to tie everything up. I even went as far as designing a book cover I was feeling pretty good about. It felt pretty close, but for an elephant-sized assumption.
See, the whole premise of the quiz was kind of a "fill the blank" / singalong quiz which I thought could be both fun and produced quickly. My understanding at the time was that getting some lyrics excerpts on print would not get me in hot copyrighted waters thanks to the Fair Use doctrine. As it turns out, there's a giant shadow cast by an extensive precedent in the matter, Castle Rock Entertainment, Inc. v. Carol Publishing Group Inc., which hits a little too close to home, as it relates to a copyright infringement from a Seinfeld trivia book... Even with the facts from the case being different, I was definitely peddling in murky waters. After getting second opinions from people smarter than me I gathered that:
- the length of any excerpt does not matter, if it's distinctly recognizable (the whole point of a quiz!)
- the purpose of the excerpt matters as much as the excerpt itself (eg, educational vs commercial)
- while a "fill the blank" format hits all the wrong notes, a more factual format (ex: what song got the Emmy Award for XXX in 20YY) is actually safe to use
That last point means the book isn't necessarily dead in the water, but it drastically limits the amount of automation that can be done: each Q & A now would need to be finely chiseled to provide some entertainment value.
The bottom line: I put the cart before the horses!
Cheers,
Ady
0 Comments