Japanese Entertainment Group Demands YouTube Stop Unauthorized Video Uploads
from the good-luck-with-that dept
Apparently, Japan's Society for Rights of Authors, Composers and Publishers is sick of sending takedown notices to Google. After all they were the group that sent notices to YouTube to get them to take down nearly 30,000 videos back in October. Unfortunately for them, it appears that plenty more videos are now online and they don't want to go through the process again. So, they've sent a letter to YouTube basically demanding the company put in place a system to prevent copyrighted material from being uploaded. Perhaps they should ask them to stop all email spam and solve world hunger at the same time. It certainly would be nice, but it's not like they actually can do that. For all the talk about technology magic bullets, it's never going to be possible to really prevent the uploading of copyrighted content. The second someone comes up with something even marginally effective, someone else will figure out a way around it (or move to a more permissive platform that will be even harder to stop). At some point, it's going to occur to these companies that the massive game of whack-a-mole and pass-the-blame isn't just ineffective, it's a huge waste of time from focusing on reinventing themselves to take advantage of these new distribution channels.
Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.
While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.
–The Techdirt Team
Reader Comments
Subscribe: RSS
View by: Time | Thread
30,000 files?
I wonder what Japan's equivalent to Lonlygirl15 is thinking. :)
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
so what you're saying is...
I hate to break this to you Mike but not all companies can be profitable using one of your much tauted "new business models". I find it troubling that most of the times your examples of success are anecdotal at best. Of course some companies will benefit from new distribution models but how long would that advantage (and profit) last once lots of companies start mimicking them?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: so what you're saying is...
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: so what you're saying is...
But I have to agree with your second paragraph. While I like the intellectual property quote from Thomas Jefferson that is posted and reposted here often, I don't not see any sustainable business model proposed here.
I don't believe selling ads instead of charging viewers is a one-size-fits-all alternative model, but I can't seem to recall any other idea being mentioned on this site - or elsewhere, for that matter.
While I positively HATE the extortion tactics and hubris used by the content "owners", I don't know how else they could generate the obscene profits demanded by our capitalist society in order to be considered successful.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: so what you're saying is...
"So basically you're saying it's futile for companies to even hope to protect their intellectual property so they should just sit by and let people steal from them?"
Well, in a nutshell I think thats exactly what hes saying.
It IS futile, and pretty much has been ever since newsgroups have been around (since the dawn of the internet). As technology gets better it becomes even more true.
These companies WILL have to invent new business models to that use new technology as an asset. Mikes "business model" cases may be anecdotal, but that doesnt change the fact that their current models are becoming obsolete, and no matter how many takedown notices are sent, its not going to change. No matter what kind of new laws they are able to pass, or companies they try to sue, artificially propping up their old models in such a way is not going to be a suitable solution.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: so what you're saying is...
: )
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
So...
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: so what you're saying is...
How long do advantages and profits now last with everyone mimicking each other? Whats different about new distribution models?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: so what you're saying is...
He didn't say sit by and let people steal he said "take advantage of these new distribution channels".
They can still protect thier IP(a joke in my book since alot of this material was on TV and already given away). They just need to learn to use these options instead of complaining about them.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
The next day they were all back up.
Tysham: Business that cannot adapt to changing realities will die. Why should we have *sympathy* for them?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
why not just use the current model
plus this would allow far wider distribution of content, how many of those japanese shows would reach an amercan audience without the current illegal channels? this seems like it could only be a good thing to me. anyone see any flaws in this?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: why not just use the current model
They can't because thats what makes it cost-prohibitive... It's too expensive to do it that way. It's only cheap to do it in a manner that does not allow room for an actual profit.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: why not just use the current model
why not simply give youtube or whoever is hosting the vids a cut of the advert profits from the shows or pay for the bandwidth usage? they wouldn't even need to admin the servers. how much could it possible cost to slap on some copy protection, just enough to make the average person unable to copy it? and look at TV right now, you can still watch the and griffith show and leave it to beaver. wouldn't the intial cost of security be paid off eventually? the life time of these shows (until formats changes or new mediums become available) could be nearly indefinite.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: why not just use the current model
Answer: It would cost more money than you would make in advertising revenue.
why not simply give youtube or whoever is hosting the vids a cut of the advert profits from the shows or pay for the bandwidth usage?
I'm confused... Now you want the content owners to PAY youtube?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Re: why not just use the current model
the profits wouldn't be in dollars paid to them by youtube anyway, they would be in promotion. since companies have to spend so much money to get ads onto television in the first place, some free advertising and publicity would more than offset the perceived loss of "sales".
if you have a bunch of crappy youtube copies of your videos online, why not leave them there and post links to places where your merchandise can be sold?
i have never purchased a dave chapelle DVD, but i paid $20 for a T shirt that says "i'm rick james bitch!". too bad comedy central doesn't sell thank kind of stuff or i'd have bought it from them.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Everything's Copyrighted
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Everything's Copyrighted
Yeah, that's the point: uploading content you didn't create is illegal. Way to catch on. Redistribution of copyrighted material isn't even remotely covered by fair use, unless you really are just using a snippet in a larger work you created yourself.
Supposedly, that's the point of YouTube: to exchange user-created content. It's not supposed to be a bittorrent replacement.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Everything's Copyrighted
The article itself says the goal is to "prevent users from uploading videos that would infringe copyrights" - which is what you're defending, but not what Anon was commenting on.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Everything's Copyrighted
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Everything's Copyrighted
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
The company should deal with the uploaders
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
i'm sure you(goo)t0000b would love to find ways of not allowing "protected" video, but if they spend all their time there, the site would falter. and is japan's *aa version doing anything about it themselves? or do they think C&D letters are they only way to protect? they should be activly involved in software development to check for (C) files.
yes, there are very many users on the t0000b who post (C) vids. there are many users on the t0000b who post "legal" vids as well. YT could just delete the accounts of those who post (C) vids, but with the ability to get free email addy's and ways to hide the IP addy.
so, it's not just YT's sole responsibility. the problem is bigger than any one person/company
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Won't take much
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Won't take much
Care to post a link about the yakuza/content connection?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Here it is
http://www.riaa.com :)
Sorry, couldn't resist.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
I'd siding with the content owners on this one...
If I tell you that you do not have permission to use my material, I don't mean now, I mean from now on.
I think the host should face fines for each infringement that is not removed in a timely fashion from there on out. And if the host cannot figure out how to do that, then the host does not need to be in the business of hosting.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: I'd siding with the content owners on this one
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: I'd siding with the content owners on this
Clearly, we do live in different worlds. I'm staying far away from yours.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: I'd siding with the content owners on
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
soloutin? have a huge DB of "banned" material, and every submission must check against known copyrighted material. if it is, it's rejected, if not, the video is posted. considering the volume of traffic, i doubt this would work, because it'd take weeks for the video to pop up on yt. and what about if i have the middle 15 minutes of a show, and someone posts the first 15 (an overlap of say 7 minutes) the db would have to add the new stuff because it is part of the old copyprotected stuff.
theres not a whole lot yt can do, except take down when copyrighted stuff is posted. however, they have a service to host videos. users are the ones responsible. remember that. yt does take down when notified. maybe the IP providers should start suing those who submit vids to yt
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
I'm siding with reality on this one...
That would be fine and dandy if they had an infinite amount of time and resources. But reality begs to differ. You'll never be able to find every offense, that much is simple.
"And if the host cannot figure out how to do that, then the host does not need to be in the business of hosting."
Same thing could be said about spam and probably a variety of other things.
I think what should be focused on is what does this tell us? The scattered episodes of Naruto (one example of copyrighted material) found on YouTube have hundreds of thousands of views for a reason. People have an interest of watching (and rewatching) this at their leisure and not some preordained schedule. (Perchance the reason for the popularity of DVRs?)
Maybe that should clue in the people the copyright holders about something. If they did something similar, they'd get the traffic and ad revenue would soar. Not to mention all the merchanise they could promote to people who are actually interested!
The smart companies will learn to thrive and grow from this. The rest will complain and moan.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
HA
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
why soo much whining
I want to see a model/graph of people with a real intent to purchase who abdicate this choice in lieu of seeing a poor quality video. if someone really wanted this, they would want the picture and sound quality of the real item, if not its not a lost sale if someone watches a crappy low bit rate version of it. they wouldn't have purchased it anyway. and for the people who did watch it and liked it, youtube could therefore be a catalyst in the purchase decision.
all in all this is another napster debate and some douche like Lars Ulrich will whine about how people who can't afford his shiity music aren't buying it. obviously!! you can only say a sale is lost if there was intent to purchase. however now this debate will lead to further restrictions beacause the content is already protected by youtube and is only availiable for viewing and not download.
hopefully dumb companies with poor revenues won't try to bring youtube down
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
Title V of the Telecommunications Act of 1996 (the "Communications Decency Act") contains the section known as the "Good Samaritan Act", which protects ISPs from liability for third party content on their services.
YouTube is acting well within these laws. Responsibility for the content uploaded to YouTube remains entirely with the users who upload the content. Responsibility to have any allegedly infringing content taken down remains entirely with the copyright holders.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Just give everything away for free
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Just give everything away for free
Why has ITMS sold over a billion songs? They provide extra services that many deem are worth the price, like easy searching for songs/albums/artists, consistent quailty/bitrate of the files, seamless iPod integration, no fear of downloading spyware/viruses, etc. ITMS is competing very successfully with giving everything away "for free."
Also, you are confusing digital goods with real, tangible goods (food, clothes, etc.). With digital goods, after a song file is created, it can be copied an unlimited number of times with virtually no cost. The same can't be said of food and clothes.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
AC #29
The internet is not a "necessary" service, and seems to mostly promote brainless simpletons like yourself infringing on others' intelligence.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Japanese or US rights?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Japanese or US rights?
Unless of course, the uploader actually owned the copyrights...
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
The problems with this idea are obvious, in that it would take far too long to scan all frames, so it would have to be scanned for key frames, like whatever is always present in the show. THis would flag that te clip came from a certain series. THis could easily be circumvented by stripping off the titles/frame that appears before ad breaks, but this would take time and effort, so piracy would for a short time be slightly reduced.
This idea could also be used for searching video clips by programme, since the frame where the title appears could be OCR'd and stored in the dataabse with the file, and ince the series is found by a simple frame by frame analysis (which need not scan every frame, only a few, unless there was a convention that markers were placed on the first frame or something), it would not be tto hard to mark specify withthe serise detatils the time reange after which you would expect tot see the title. HTe possibilites are amazinge, but so would be the required server space. TO carry on withthe theme, biometric analysis could be used to find outthe actors, and similar software could be used to identify the filming location. I could go on all day, but maybe I shoud just work out the software and sell it to Google for a few Million instead.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Japanese need to wake up.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Japanese need to wake up.
Yes... yes you are. go away ignoramus.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
#43
still a hulleva lot of cpu time
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Japanese need to wake up
For example did you know that only japanese snow gear is sold in japan because they have 'different' snow to everyone else in the world.
Nice marketing aye.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
It's inevitable
Like I said, the old television business model is becoming outdated . At least for prerecorded tv. The sooner businesses learn this and start using it to their advantage, the sooner more profit opportunities will open up. That's it.
No matter how many lawsuits are made, piracy will continue. If the viewer can't get what they want on YouTube, they'll go somewhere else. The same arguments being made now, as when they originally released TiVO, and even later the VCR. Yet both those technologies are still here. In a consumer driven capitalist society, where we are taught since infancy to find the best deals, we say: why pay when I can get it for free?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]