Shockingly, YouTube NOT Blamed For Teen Web Attack
from the really? dept
Last week, there was plenty of news about a group of eight Florida teenagers who purposely lured another teen into someone's home and then beat her while filming the attack -- which they specifically planned to put on YouTube in an attempt to "get famous." While there have been some attempts to point a finger of blame at YouTube and MySpace, it looks like the press isn't jumping on that bandwagon as quickly as you might expect. Rose M. Welch writes in to point to an Associated Press article that quotes a bunch of people pointing out that YouTube is not to blame and has nothing to do with this attack. Some point out that those sites gave us a record of the attack to make it easier to capture and prosecute those responsible -- while others point out that "the public" is equally as responsible for wanting to watch that kind of attack in the first place. Either way, it's nice to see the AP quickly come out with a clear defense of why YouTube isn't the problem here.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.
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Filed Under: blame, videos, violence, youtube
Companies: google, youtube
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The endangered creature, so rarely seen in the wild!
Ladies and Gentleman, I give you:
"Common Sense!"
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Point the finger
Blame the parents who let their kids be parented by TV and other forms of electronic mediums rather than personal interaction.
I was stunned when this happened -- but worse yet is the lack of accountability assigned to the parents and others around who let their kids become such monsters!
'Nuff said.... time to step down from my perch... and grab another beer.
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News Source Titles are Misleading/Stupid
Umm, they didn't attack YouTube, they attacked a human. Poor wording I guess. Anything to get the catch-word YouTube in there.
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Re: News Source Titles are Misleading/Stupid
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My 2
Her mother says she was talking bad about them online, or something to that effect. I don't see where that's an excuse for conspiring to brutally assault someone, and then post a video of it online for posterity. Does she really think that's okay?
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hey!
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just, lul.
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another thing...
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All criminals should video their crimes
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and now for the update...
The girl who was assaulted is still in the hospital, but last Friday Dr. Phil's staff posted $30,000 bail for one of her attackers so that the assailant could be on his show.
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Dr. Phil and the "Running Man"
If the Dr. Phil show is trying to do some good by bringing some awareness to violent teenage predators and educate them he should donate the advertising revenue to develop programs that have a long lasting effect for years to come.
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Did it work ?
I'd say they at least have become infamous. I think the victim gets all proceeds from movie & book deals.
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It is you tube's fault
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Blame
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youtube beating vid
http://machinist.salon.com/blog/2008/04/10/beating_video/
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Re: Point the finger
Learn your facts. Violent crime is going down. From the DOJ
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Re:
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Who needs YouTube when you have Broadcast News?
The irony of the whole thing is that many more people have seen the video replayed endlessly on national newscasts than would have ever seen it on YouTube.
EG
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Lets all video tape up beating up on 1 girl
Video Camara = $200.00
House, planning, myspacecomments = $0.00
Factthat you can't take a skinny girl by yourself and have to show the world your an idiot! Priceless
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Small step
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Re: Small step
What if I was to go on youtube and say I am in possession of a nuclear device and a gigantic drill capable of piercing beyond the earth's crust down to its core and causing a worldwide volcanic eruption? For kicks, we'll even go with the whole corny back story about being named Dr. Evil and the like. To me, I'm just jokingly reciting lines from the first Austin Powers movie. To youtube, it's funny. There are 2 ways this can turn out badly.
1) If I'm not joking (and I obviously would be - I would never use a nuke so recklessly) and youtube doesn't report it, then the entire world gets covered in magma and many millions die. Was youtube to blame or was it just that I'm an evil SOB?
2) Youtube could be obviously aware that it was a joke but required to report it to the authorities as a threat. It eventually makes it to DHS by which time it has gone through so many transcriptions that what I said looks nothing like what Dr. Evil said in the Austin Powers movie and it looks almost like a credible threat. DHS sends agents that come and get me in the middle of the night, hogtie me and send me to gitmo, where I spend the next 6 years being tortured for what would be at best a copyright violation if I quotes too much of the movie to fall under fair use.
Ok, sure, technically there is a third option...
3) Jack Bauer teleports to my location, shoots me, and then teleports to the next internet goofball's house and continues shooting them all until the world is safe
But I don't watch 24 and prefer the Chuck Norris jokes over Jack Bauer, so whatever.
Alas, the real moral of this story is that if every threat on youtube was reported to the authorities (FBI, CIA, Secret Service, whoever) the vast majority of youtube would be in some form of jail, foreign or domestic, and all the good videos on youtube would be either the star wars kid or some kind of animal. (I mean, hell, even the leave Brittney alone chick is a threat to homeland security IMHO - she's harboring a terrorist responsible for raping hundreds of thousands of ears!) The best course of action is, unfortunately, just to let those who makes threats on youtube continue to make them and respond after the fact, or else, we all get convicted with crimes that 99% of us would've never committed.
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its stupid!!!!!
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