Huh? Totally Clueless German Court Says ContentID Isn't Good Enough, YouTube Must Block Infringement By Keywords
from the total-failure dept
We've discussed a few times the legal fight in Germany between YouTube and the overbearing collections society GEMA. German law is a bit bizarre in that it has very little regard for secondary liability protections, and often seems to default to blaming third parties for the actions of their users. On top of that, GEMA is incredibly powerful and controlling in Germany. When I was there a few years ago (in part to discuss this case), I had musicians explaining to me that they had "secret websites" because GEMA wouldn't let them offer their own music for free. The GEMA/YouTube dispute centers around the fact that GEMA wants YouTube to pay a fixed fee every time a video that includes a GEMA-covered song is played (and GEMA has actually suggested the fee for each stream should be identical to the cost of a download -- no joke). After suing YouTube/Google, GEMA refused to negotiate, making Germany the only modern country in the world in which a collection society didn't work out a deal with YouTube (and meaning that Google started blocking tons of music videos in Germany).Unfortunately, the court has now ruled in the case, and the results seem ridiculous. It has said that YouTube is liable when users post videos (third party liability concepts still just don't make sense to German courts). Even more ridiculous, however, is that the court has said that YouTube's famous ContentID system is not enough. Instead, it must also install a keyword-based filter to block GEMA songs from being uploaded. Keyword-filters? Really. We've done this before a bunch of times and it doesn't work. At all. Keyword filters are really stupid ways to deal with these kinds of things. First off, they tend to block all sorts of legitimate content. But, more importantly, users figure out how to get around them in less than an hour. They just start coming up with easy-to-decipher substitutes. Comparing a keyword filter to ContentID is like comparing a human strapping on wings to a modern fighter plane. One of them works and can actually get the job done. One of them just makes you look like an idiot.
The only "concession" the court appears to have given YouTube is that it only expects such filtering to work going forward, rather than having them search the archive. That, of course, is barely a concession at all. If I remember correctly, this particular court, in Hamburg, is somewhat notorious for siding with copyright holders, so I wouldn't be surprised to see an appeal on this case...
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Filed Under: contentid, filtering, germany
Companies: gema, youtube
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(it worked with sopa after all...)
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"YouTube is not available in Germany due to GEMA's massive sense of entitlement and technological cluelessness. Please tell them what you think about their nonsense by contacting them at:"
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Long gone are the days that court cases were simply two farmers fighting over who owns a cow. The cases now are complicated and deal with many topics we cannot expect all judges to understand. Judges simply cannot be computer experts, chemists, biologists, engineers, and pharmaceutical experts.
The system need to be updated to account for the nature of modern cases.
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You could buy the worldwide rights to a Sony Music Entertainment song, and upload it to YouTube (as is your good right if you buy the rights) and GEMA will still block it, because they do not care if you have a license or not. They just see content they want money for and will remove anything they want to.
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Keywords?
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Wow, Mike you are one hell of a sore loser. Suck it up, buttercup, there is more coming.
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Speaking just for myself, I can't wait until IP maximalists have completely destroyed everything the internet has made possible. Then, people will either wake up, grab their pitchforks, and string the Big Content fatcats up by their necks, or they'll remain cattle and always wonder why the class divide seems to get wider and wider.
Either way, we'll know what people are really made of.
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Ohh.. lolbigcontentfatcats.com the next big thing on the web!
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And they won't sell more because of it. Tough luck.
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Cut em off first, negotiate second.
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Heheh that was hilarious....shares in German companies have crashed to all time lows and the German government has seen its popularity drop by around 30%.
Oh yeah and tens of thousands of Germans lost their jobs...all because of the copy maximalists....
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Seriously, that says alot about Ip maximalist and their supporters: they're a bunch of crybabies that is ok withn hurting others for their own sakes. Typical.
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Entertainment lawyers are entertaining, and being one can pay slightly better than bookies or a manager. But oh well...they decide to have an ego, and choose lawyering in entertainment got some reason. It's a dying industry to be in.
Soon I would suggest they move into insurance lawyering or accident lawyering. :-)
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Bad analogy.
Yves Rossi does not look like an idiot - unlike GEMA!
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GYW5G2kbrKk
Even though the video is admittedly fake, he still looks cool.
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Germans seem to prefer powerful controlling authorities
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The List
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Word filter
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FOOOOOK OFF as the Irish Say...
YAAAHOOOOOOO....
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dont let that headache hit you on the way out
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Agree. Block Germany.
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the reason for this is the judge(s) dont have to have any knowledge of how the Internet works or any knowledge of copyright. listening quietly to the entertainment industries bullshit, then agreeing with it, is so much easier than trying to decipher what is right and what isn't and then making a ruling based on the law!
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Find out the list of keywords, make public domain films, upload them to YouTube, then demand explanations from GEMA why the videos were taken down.
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The easy and safest solution for youtube is to ban all GEMA uploads, even those by GEMA.
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PPDE thanks
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Avatar.2009.1080p.BluRay.DTS.x264-ESiR.mkv
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ContentID system
A friend of mine is a member and webmaster of a local karate club. He wanted to upload a video of a recent competition on YouTube, but the video was repeatedly blocked because some unknown company "R.I." claimed copyright infringement. Nowhere did it say what it claimed copyright about. Indeed, in the end my friend got so annoyed that he completely removed audio from the film. BUT! It was still blocked for infringement! It was a video captured with a private video camera with no sound, and still it gets flagged. It is impossible to get any additional information about the alleged infringement as the "R.I." is not sufficient information to determine anything.
And they want to make the system even worse in Germany? They are truly insane.
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VPN
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Youtube & GEMA
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