Fox Uses Bogus DMCA Claims To Censor Cory Doctorow's Book About Censorship
from the but-of-course dept
Torrentfreak has discovered that News Corp's Fox studios has been sending DMCA notices taking down Cory Doctorow's latest book, Homeland, which is available under a Creative Commons (Attribution-Noncommercial-NoDerivs) license, and can be freely shared. The issue? Fox is trying to take down unauthorized copies of its TV show that goes by the same name. And, in its rush to take down anything and everything that might possibly be its TV show, Doctorow's authorized novel is collateral damage. The really crazy thing is that it should be obvious to any human looking over these takedowns that it's not the TV show, as all of the links tend to have Doctorow's name in them:When TorrentFreak asked Doctorow for comment, he joked, "I think you can safely say I’m incandescent with rage. BRING ME THE SEVERED HEAD OF RUPERT MURDOCH!" But, perhaps there's a more serious response. In response to Doctorow tweeting about this last week, Paul Levy from Public Citizen -- famous for defending people on the internet (including, at times, us) from bad things -- responded by asking Doctorow if he wanted to litigate.
@doctorow want to litigate?
— Paul Alan Levy (@paulalanlevy) April 19, 2013
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Filed Under: chilling effects, cory doctorow, dmca, homeland
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I've seen talks Doctorow has given about the evils of DRM and I agree with him there. Has Doctorow ever said why he publishes with DRM?
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That is protecting his use of DRM free books, and presumably against someone else wrapping it in DRM.
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http://craphound.com/homeland/download/
Tor went _all_ DRM-free last year. But they've always published Cory's book as DRM-free. In any case, read the text at the link above.
Don't go for the information third-hand.
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'When we made this discovery back in February, Doctorow was more understanding. He told us that Tor Books sends out DMCA notices with his authorization, but only in instances where the book is wrapped in DRM, or when there’s another violation.'
it still doesn't alter the fact of what is happening here. and as for collateral damage, i reckon it's bull shit. Fox is doing this on purpose. there is no bigger self righteous, blame switching arse hole that Murdoch. even when he was giving evidence over the phone hacking in the UK, he refused to take any responsibility for it, when it was his business!! what a prick!!
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An aside:
OOTB this is how to use a loopy link.
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Really? Because I just copied my copy from one folder on my computer to another, an act rendered impossible by the presence of Digital Restrictions Malware.
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It's a simple oversight that's creating an inadvertent abuse of the DMCA: there's no way these automated systems are actually downloading the offending content and ensuring that the content is indeed infringing.
I am certain that nobody is trying to censor Doctorow's book, but the fact that he used the same title as a television show makes it easy for the Fox's automated system to inadvertently flag the wrong thing.
The thing is, this is a fairly simple fix, and it's all technological: the automated system being used by DTecNet ought to actually check the file type and size before sending out a DMCA notice.
The thing is, I don't think this means Copyright is broken. This means that one particular enforcement system is broken: DTecNet needs to do a better job of actually determining whether a file actually infringes before filing a DMCA.
Doing so by name alone is not good enough.
From what I understand, there are remedies in the system for Doctorow, and I imagine he will be exercising them. Personally, I want to see this battle play out.
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Unfotrunately, since DTechNet is being used by BIG companies, the chance that more files will be mistakenly-DMCAed is HUGE!
Doctrow shoud sue Fox for damages.
Fox would lose, then be forced to sue DTecNet for failure to provide contracted services (by providing a defective product)
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What I could see working is automated analysis of the content of the video file: it would have to be rendered and compared to an official version of the work. If the first 10 minutes or so matches up, then it could be flagged as a match.
The thing is, I'm of two minds on this topic: as a software developer, I don't like piracy, but as a freedom-loving Human being, I want to see the Copyright trolls shut down hardcore.
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If you are going to state that your copyrights are being infringed, you need to know your copyrights are actually being infringed. The copyrighted work is the entirety of the work, not the title, not the type, and certainly not the size. And with the Lenz v. Universal case, the copyright holder also has to take Fair Use into account as well. If you can't automate that, then you have no business filing a DMCA notice (under penalty of perjury I might add).
Cory should sue. Fox should lose. DTecNet should go out of business. But increasing the check for filesize and type simply reduces the space required to look into. It doesn't tell you that you've found an occurrence of infringement.
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The 'problem' is that piracy is so wide spread doing it by hand and having to _actually_ validate each one would take way, way to much work and make the DMCA pretty much ineffective. (Problem in quotes because I would actually like to see the perjury penalty applied for misuse!)
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The problem with the DMCA takedown regime is that it's not practical. It never was when it was first proposed, and never will be. The big publishers didn't care if the powers granted by the DMCA would actually be usable, they just wanted the power.
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So? Open the file, join the stream and see what comes up. it should be relatively clear at that point, and you're not breaking any laws if you have the authorisation of the copyright holder to do that. The size of the torrent file alone is irrelevant, unless you subscribe to the lie that offering a link or torrent file is the same as hosting the content itself.
Once again "it's too hard" is NOT a valid excuse for taking shortcuts with copyright enforcement - especially when those shortcuts lead to independent artists and creators getting shut down despite not breaking any laws, let alone the service providers being hammer for things they had no involvement with one way or the other.
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He should
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There is precedence the other way though. I believe a game of Quake III was used (though I believe it was unsuccessful,) in Mojang vs. Bethesda. But it ended up being settled anyway and Mojang essentially won because they were allowed to keep the "Scrolls" name.
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Just because some frivolous lawsuits are filed does not make all lawsuits frivolous. In this case, it wouldn't be frivolous, and that makes you seem foolish for trotting out the tired old "sue-happy Americans" cliche.
In summation: get bent.
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Thanks for pointing out the absurdity of this blog.
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Fixed that for you.
It can't be denied that an increasing number of DMCA requests turn out to be bogus, just like this one. If the copyright maximalists insist on being allowed to file overly large amounts of takedown requests, then it's only right that they be *required* to ensure that their claims are accurate.
A sensible precaution would be to make *any* false DMCA claim punishable by perjury. This would prevent occurrences like the article and may reduce the amount of claims filed overall.
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First fine 1 x 10^0 -> $1
Second fine 1 x 10^1 -> $10
Third fine 1 x 10^2 -> $100
Fourth fine 1 x 10^3 -> $1,000
Fifth fine 1 x 10^4 -> $10,000
Sixth Fine 1 x 10^5 -> $100,000
Seventh fine 1 x 10^6 -> $1,000,000
Eighth fine 1 x 10^7 -> $10,000,000
Nineth fine 1 x 10^8 -> $100,000,000
Tenth fine 1 x 10^9 -> $1,000,000,000
Eleventh fine 1 x 10^10 -> $10,000,000,000
Twelfth fine 1 x 10^11 -> $100,000,000,000
Thirteenth fine 1 x 10^11 -> $1,000,000,000,000
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And just because some ACs are idiots does not make all ACs idiots.
Just you, boy.
Thanks for pointing out your own absurdity.
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Fair enough. Since you've got it all figured out, please enlighten us: what is the ratio of abuses to legitimate actions beyond which a law is in need of revision? Relatedly, what is the ratio beyond which reporting on the abuses is appropriate?
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Out of tens of millions.
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But reporting on them is absurd?
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As Leigh said previously, at minimum 3% is around 600k bogus claims. Why should that ever be acceptable?
The companies responsible need to be brought to account and punished.
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So if you occasionally get speeding tickets when you weren't speeding but you were driving a car that was the same color as a speeding car, that would be OK because some speeding tickets are given to the actual speeding car?
Also, instead of the police, you were pulled over by a private company that had no legal requirement to make sure you had actually broken any laws.
Thanks for pointing out the absurdity of your comment.
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Unless you are the RIAA or the MPAA, then you have the federal government skip the entire legal process and just start seizing everything they possibly can.
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Like the one met in the dajaz1 case?
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If I understand correctly, the domain name seizure has nothing to do with RIAA's members recovering damages. The domain name seizure is to stop further propagation of illegal content.
The damaged parties, the ones whose rights are violated as part of the illegal file trading, still have to use the civil court system to recover damages.
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If the government wants to view it as they have the right to take a domain, then they could be just a tad less hypocritical and still afford the websites the protections of section 230. A website is not liable for the actions of their users.
The whole thing is so obviously corrupt. The government just rushes to seize anything, no matter how legal it is in the country of its operations. The US is not the king of the internet and the gov should stay the heck away from trying to police the entire thing.
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one for the lawyers
Does the presence of the string "Homeland" in a file name constitute a good-faith belief that the material is infringing?
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You haven't been following the Prenda stories?
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IMO, filing a DMCA notice based on a filename alone should be considered abusive.
Now I can see how it would be prohibitively expensive to download every single infringing work out there, just to prove that it's actually infringing, it's simple for people to put up a file named "Homeland" that has nothing to do with the TV show.
It sounds to me like DTecNet just isn't doing enough to verify the content they're filing takedown notices on. That doesn't mean the company should be put out of business, but I think a major overhaul of their methodology is in order here... along with an injunction to force them to stop filing takedowns until they have proven that their new system doesn't file false positives.
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The same was said not to long ago about Copyright Trolls. That is currently working out so well for Prenda.
There is always a first time for everything.
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therefore it seems that the solution must also be extrajudicial. there should be some way we, the people, should be able to call out and publicly shame those that abuse the dmca takedown provision.
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I agree, though this would be a perfect case for the owner to strike back. They took down material that was commercially available, which they had no copyright for, and as a result, it hurt another company. If anything should be considered unlawful interference of a business model, this should. This would be a perfect case for testing the limits of DMCA.
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Good point, and one thing it relates to is the constant bickering on how Google does not enforce removal of copyrighted content the same way it enforces the removal of child pornography.
If these guys have such a hard time knowing what is, and isn't infringing, how is Google supposed to do it?
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"Homeland" was the title of a book even before Doctorow's came out. Beyond that, it's an actual word. It should be obvious to anyone that if you blindly send takedowns based only on a title containing "Homeland", you're going to get loads of material that aren't the TV show.
I hope he litigates and gets not only damages but an injunction prohibiting them - both Fox and DTecNet - from sending takedown notices when they don't know what they're taking down.
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Absolutely. The Twilight guys got away with it too.
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Something must be fishy if he's not willing to force people to pay for his work!
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OOTB in to defend Fox’s shenanigans in 5…4…3…
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Gosh, you're as eager to see me as 10-year-old girls are to see Justin Bieber!
When will you dolts get over the us-them, for-with, Mike-Fox FALSE dichotomies? I'm be against Fox AND Mike, or ANY number of wrongs, all at the same time.
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That just so happens when you've earned yourself a reputation as moronic ankle-biter. Tough luck.
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It will show just how flawed their system really is.
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So what happens to Fox now?
Why is it only the general public and fan/link/news sites that get taken out and issued lifetime-crippling fines?
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There's too many links to check!
2nd point is that all publicity is GOOD publicity: as a practical fact, this lifts obscure crap with FREE publicity.
3rd: "The really crazy thing is that it should be obvious to any human looking over these takedowns that it's not the TV show, as all of the links tend to have Doctorow's name in them:" -- NO, WAIT A SEC! You've said MANY times that it's NOT obvious, Mike! "Doctorow" could just be the tag name of a pirate: they've an urge to tack their names on what they stole.
No, I'm not defending Fox, just pointing out that the usual canards here can apply in the other direction.
Anyhoo, I encourage Doctorow to sue. -- What have I got to lose? He either takes a bit of Fox's money, or the case flops, perhaps even backfires and the automated take-down systems based on mere text are better validated.
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2. There's publicity, and there's egg-down-your-face scenarios.
3. So it's not obvious, and corporations should never sue for anything. I actually want the MPAA to come up with a film called "The", and then see them sue every file with "The" in the title.
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No, I'm not defending Fox, just pointing out that the usual canards here can apply in the other direction."
How about those issuing the takedowns maybe, you know, INVESTIGATE and VERIFY before taking an ILLEGAL action to remove content that THEY DO NOT OWN? How about that, blue? How about they take some actual RESPONSIBILITY instead of just shooting at every single thing that MIGHT POSSIBLY be infringing?
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The blinding hypocrisy is only one of his many failings.
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Mot true, I've personally seen ebooks as 19 MB PDFs. What should be checked is tags, not file size.
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They should know because they are the ones doing the authorizing. But if they do NOT know, then they should not state that they have a good faith belief that the work is infringing.
"There's too many links to check!"
That's sad, but that's Fox's problem. And the solution is not to take down everything. That would have been like the Boston police arresting everyone in the greater metropolitan area on the grounds that there were "too many people to check".
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It's funny how that's the defence used by the corporate worshippers, but the reverse - "How could Google possibly know whether any given one is authorized if Fox can't even tell?" - is usually rejected when that's pointed out. Their real aim is just to pass all responsibility on to 3rd parties and collect in court when they fail to achieve the impossible.
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Talk about missing the forest for the trees.
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Idiot. Who would know better whether a given work is authorized than the ones responsible for licensing that work in the first place?
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By comparing file size/type? Too lazy to do it? Don't issued DCMA notices. It's almost too easy, isn't it?
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Perhaps if they had incentive to ensure that they were actually making a factual claim, they would take the time to check.
As I said above, the penalty of perjury for any false DMCA claim is sensible, and also well overdue.
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And it also involves someone who cares about the issues involved, and someone from Public Citizen is asking if he wants to litigate. This means they may not settle for a small amount, as might otherwise happen. This may not end well for Fox and DTecNet.
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And when you violate someone's civil rights, you can ask for more than statutory and real damages: you can also get punitive damages, which can add up to a lot more than just Doctorow's lost revenue.
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http://us.macmillan.com/homeland-1/CoryDoctorow ($18)
He just doesn't go after people who share the digital version because he uses the digital version as a promotional tool to advertise the print version, as well as promote the Cory Doctorow brand, among other things.
By taking down these files, they are censoring his advertising which can directly effect his book sales, and hurt his brand.
And yes, lots of people will buy the print version of something that they can get in an electronic version for free. Scott Sigler is another great example of this working.
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Sadly, it's not only tough, but a direction he's unlikely to follow, since he's someone that doesn't depend on court action and fantasy figures to make a living. A pity, because what's really needed is some push back from the people being negatively affected by the corporate push to "protect" their product at all costs.
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And if you attempt to answer the second question, please provide your peer-reviewed source.
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At a guess, the moment when a corporate product is taken down by an independent's attempt at DMCA protection, at which case they'll argue for protection against DMCA notices. Which they will then ignore as soon as they stand to benefit again - see also: fair use.
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Is there any non-infringing Homeland TV show content other than the content on fox.com? Remember, you are dealing with dinosaurs here. The whole "Web 2.0" thing is alien to them, and they wouldn't take down content on their own website.
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. . . We can dream, right?
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Either that or it will be just another 'nuisance' and they'll go about their business (that's more likely) but at least it will be a bit of a sting.
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I think in this case it should be obvious - the system is 100% automated with absolutely NO checks, and errors are made all the time. If the system worked reliably most of the time, they could say that they have good faith in their automated system, but with the number of errors that DO happen (and they know about these) I don't think that 'good faith' can be applied here.
I don't know if a Judge would agree with that reasoning, however.
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Yeah, on the surface, that sounds reasonable. But in the case I recall the standard being set such that you had to be a mind reader to prove it, making it impossible to get actual relief for a false take-down.
Isn't something like a false DMCA filing accusation supposed to fall under the lighter civil burden of proof, anyway?
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Seek an injunction
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If people are getting strikes over this ...
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