UFC Claims Copyright On Video Of The Crowd At Its Events?

from the that-doesn't-seem-right dept

Wed, May 4th 2011 3:07pm — Mike Masnick

Rob points us to news about a fight that broke out in the audience at a UFC event in Toronto recently. Of course, we couldn't care less about the fight itself, but what's interesting is that the video of the fight in the audience has been taken down, due to a copyright claim from UFC:

At least for the time being, you can still see the video elsewhere, and I can't see how UFC has any sort of reasonable copyright claim on it. Whoever took the video may have a copyright claim, but UFC? Perhaps it can make a weak argument that some of the audio in the background is UFC's? But even then it seems like the claim is a huge stretch. Perhaps UFC thinks it automatically gets the copyright on anyone fighting on the premises? Once again, this seems like a case of copyright being used to censor content someone doesn't want people to see/hear/read, rather than a legitimate use of copyright.

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

Filed Under: copyright, crowd, ufc, video

19 Comments

If you liked this post, you may also be interested in...

Reader Comments

Subscribe: RSS

View by: Time | Thread

Anonymous Coward, 4 May 2011 @ 3:31pm

Was is shot by the UFC video people or some random crowd member?

Seems bogus, unless they have some ridiculously broad language on the back of tickets saying purchasers assign all rights in photos/videos taken at the event.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
- G Thompson (profile), 4 May 2011 @ 9:52pm
  
  Re:
  Which would even then due to case law regarding tickets, contracts, and articles of sale be voidable
  
  And unless the person who had filmed the crowd was under an employee relationship (again highly unlikely) only THEY have ability to decide who can breach THEIR copyright.
  
  Also if UFC try to state that it was THEIR crowd even that has no standing since it was full of humans, is absolutely not a static medium and can in no way be held as a copyrightable medium owned by a corporation.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - Sean T Henry (profile), 5 May 2011 @ 6:57am
    
    Re: Re:
    It seems like UFC is making a bad mistake here. If they claim that they control the copyright over a fight that took place in the crowd and was filmed by someone in the crowd. Then it would be reasonable that they were endorsing an unsanctioned UFC fight at the event since they control everything going on in the arena.
    
    This could possibly make it easier to open UFC to liability for any injuries caused at the event. The reason for this is because they treat the fight in the crowd just like they would if it was a sanctioned UFC fight but did not have signed wavers for the two crowd fighters.
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - Anonymous Coward, 5 May 2011 @ 10:08am
    
    Re: Re:
    I'm not sure what you're referring to regarding voidable contracts.
    
    The cameramen at the UFC event don't necessarily have to be employees for UFC to have a claim. I'd be shocked if they didn't have an agreement assigning whatever rights they may have to UFC.
    
    As for a copyrightable medium, it's not the humans that's the medium; it's the videotape (or hard drive, or whatever they're recording on).
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Anonymous Coward, 5 May 2011 @ 6:29am
  
  Re:
  Parent is correct. Occasionally other sporting leagues, including MLB, have attempted to enforce such claims. I'm not aware of any such claims being enforced by a court - usually it doesn't go that far.
  
  Of course, your license doesn't actually have to be enforceable to provide a plausible basis for a DMCA takedown claim.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
Anonymous Coward, 4 May 2011 @ 4:02pm

Considering the hellish time they had getting into the Ontario market, they probably are trying to downplay any negative stories.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Not That Chris (profile), 4 May 2011 @ 4:30pm

Fight at UFC 91
The other interesting thing to note is that there appears to have been another fight at UFC 91 a few years ago that's still readily available on YouTube. It seems to not be quite as nasty as the one at 129, but you can see the ring for a couple of seconds. But still, these videos have obviously been on YouTube for years now, so why the sudden change of heart on the most recent?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
StrongStyle81, 4 May 2011 @ 4:44pm

UFC was probably just upset that fan fight was more entertaining to watch than GSP vs Shields was. Other than that the ppv was fantastic. The highlight being Machida retiring Couture with the frigging Crane Kick from Karate Kid. The best part is, evidently Steven Segal told him to do it.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Capitalist Lion Tamer (profile), 4 May 2011 @ 5:19pm

Who you calling "we," Mike?
I'm very interested in the outcome of the "Fight Away from the Fight," which will probably go down as one of the all-time great crowd fights.

Like "Zowitzki v. Nelson" during the Hagler-Hearns rematch, in which Nelson suckerpunched Zowitzki for "eyeballing" his girlfriend. Ralph "The Mouth" Zowitzki responded with something unprintable (mainly because it was unintelligible) before wrapping up Nelson in a very-ironic full nelson and pinning him to the very sticky floor.

At this point someone threw up, but various reports fail to say who. Possibly Nelson's girlfriend, who was on her 5th and 7th Quaalude. Witnesses reported last seeing her "listing badly to starboard" before sinking entirely out of sight somewhere between the 3rd and 5th rows.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Anonymous Coward, 4 May 2011 @ 5:33pm

UFC was almost banned for being ultra violent then rules changed and now UFC tries to brand UFC as a healthy sport, non violent.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
AWA, 4 May 2011 @ 7:10pm

Perhaps It's a Contract Issue
I'm not sure if there are any terms applied by UFC on tickets to their events. But, if so, they could perhaps try to make a contract-based argument. Perhaps something like this: "as part of the terms of your buying a ticket and attending the event, you agree to forego recording anything happening in the venue and, should you decide to record anyway, you automatically assign the copyrights in all such recordings to UFC." I'm just supposing here...
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Whatnobodyfightfairandsquareanymore?, 4 May 2011 @ 7:39pm

Heres a fresh link.
http://74.6.117.48/search/srpcache?ei=UTF-8&p=ufc+129+and+crowd+brawl+caught+on+tape& fr=yfp-t-701&u=http://cc.bingj.com/cache.aspx?q=ufc+129+and+crowd+brawl+caught+on+tape&d=270 25322033547690&mkt=en-US&setlang=en-US&w=cf6da850,8eb7e92c&icp=1&.intl=us&si g=tZ01frkwv0iB9A1mhWHSLQ--
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
- harbingerofdoom (profile), 4 May 2011 @ 7:45pm
  
  Re:
  not found or access denied.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - Jay (profile), 4 May 2011 @ 8:20pm
    
    Re: Re:
    It's a cache, click on switch the player and it will play.
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
Anonymous Coward, 4 May 2011 @ 7:40pm

I don't call 3 on 1 a fight.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
teka, 4 May 2011 @ 9:48pm

everyone with the "maybe there was language on the back of the ticket.." defense that woulc allow UFC to claim ownership, back off that a little bit.

Just sticking some text on the back of something i hand you does not suddenly create a legal contract, else i could just as easily claim that "by reading, posting or otherwise attending a thread here on techdirt, hearafter known as "techdirt", you are required to send 10% of your weekly earnings to me"

Venue owners and event creators just stick that stuff on there to cow you into following it. I have seen the same thing with security guards at galleries claiming "you have to delete that image from your camera or you will be arrested"

this is not to say that you could not be Ejected from an event for failing to listen to a guard/etc, but that is a different matter altogether
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Anonymous Coward, 5 May 2011 @ 10:18am
  
  Re:
  It may not always create a binding agreement; but it doesn't always *fail* to create a binding agreement.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
Chosen Reject (profile), 5 May 2011 @ 5:44am

I'm fairly certain that without the incentive of copyrights, the filmer would have not bothered creating this video. I just thank my lucky stars that we have promoted the progress here and given this amateur director an incentive to create.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Anonymous Coward, 5 May 2011 @ 10:10pm

Mike, seriously never divert traffic to Ebaums World. The webmaster there is made of scum and must never get money out of the internet any more than he has already.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]