Point2 encourages publishers to play nice

Yardi subsidiary Point2 is changing its data distribution policies to align with what it believes to be the interests of MLSs, associations, brokers and agents in the US, similar to what it has introduced in Canada with the Canadian Real Estate Association (CREA). Since Yardi purchased Point2, they have renewed determination to protect the data rights of agents, brokers, and their partner associations of REALTORS® and MLSs.

In the past, the default distribution setting for Point2 has been broker-opt out rather than broker opt-in. WAV Group has never been in favor of broker opt-out programs. Broker opt-out means that unless notified by the listing broker, Point2 distributed the listing data to all of its publisher recipients. The big problem with this policy is that the broker was subject to the publisher's terms of use for the data, which might be contrary to the best interest of the broker. For many brokers, the portal's terms of use are fair – but for others, they are not.

Point2 is now in the process of notifying publishers that they must conform to a set of fair use terms if they want the convenience of broker opt-out data. If they do not conform to the new terms, the data to that publisher will be switched to opt-in. As of January 1, 2013, any publisher not conforming to the new agreement will see somewhere between 200,000 and 1.2 million listings taken out of their Point2 feed.

Some of the key terms of the agreement are as follows:

• The license only grants the publisher the ability to display listings on authorized websites, effectively eliminating the problem of resyndication without a license.
• The relevant owner of the listing content retains all rights, title and interest, and ownership in the data, effectively resolving the issue of publishers selling data, creating derivative products with the data, etc.
• Publisher must agree to install a web bug that allows Point2 to track: number of times displayed in search results, number of views, number of click throughs, number of leads.
• Content may not be used for any purpose when a listing is not active. This is huge, as it cures the problem of stale data languishing on publisher websites and the display of sold data.
• Publisher may not use the personal contact information of agents or brokers to market to, or contact that agent or broker, nor will it supply that information to any third party.
• Publisher must display the clickable URL of content owner, show the branding in a prominent way, display email in a non-scrapable way, and display the contact phone number.
• Publisher will not capture any consumer prospects or leads and resell or divert them to any third party.

WAV Group thinks that this may be the first step toward turning the tables on syndication and actually requiring publishers to pay a license fee for the opportunity to display broker data. Move did something similar to this when they purchased Listhub, adding in a publisher grading system to their dashboard. This goes a bit farther. It will be interesting to see if Move reacts and adopts the same terms as Point2.

Here is a copy of the Point2 License agreement. It was provided to WAV Group for feedback with permission to publish. Point2 is not a WAV Group client.

To view the original article, visit the WAV Group blog.