Twitter & Facebook Want You To Follow The Olympics... But Only If The IOC Gives Its Stamp Of Approval
from the what-the-fuck-twitter? dept
It is something of an unfortunate Techdirt tradition that every time the Olympics rolls around, we are alerted to some more nonsense by the organizations that put on the event -- mainly the International Olympic Committee (IOC) -- going out of their way to be completely censorial in the most obnoxious ways possible. And, even worse, watching as various governments and organizations bend to the IOC's will on no legal basis at all. In the past, this has included the IOC's ridiculous insistence on extra trademark rights that are not based on any actual laws. But, in the age of social media it's gotten even worse. The Olympics and Twitter have a very questionable relationship as the company Twitter has been all too willing to censor content on behalf of the Olympics, while the Olympic committees, such as the USOC, continue to believe merely mentioning the Olympics is magically trademark infringement.
So, it's only fitting that my first alert to the news that the Olympics are happening again was hearing how Washington Post reporter Ann Fifield, who covers North Korea for the paper, had her video of the unified Korean team taken off Twitter based on a bogus complaint by the IOC:
Twitter took down my video of the unified Korean team entering the stadium, on the IOC’s orders. pic.twitter.com/umffjawRqG
— Anna Fifield (@annafifield) February 9, 2018
And Twitter complied even though the takedown is clearly bogus. Notice Fifield says that it is her video? The IOC has no copyright claim at all in the video, yet they filed a DMCA takedown over it. The copyright is not the IOC's and therefore the takedown is a form of copyfraud. Twitter should never have complied and shame on the company for doing so. Even more ridiculous: Twitter itself is running around telling people to "follow the Olympics on Twitter." Well, you know, more people might do that if you weren't taking down reporters' coverage of those very same Olympics.
Oh, and it appears that Facebook is even worse. They're pre-blocking the uploads of such videos:
I couldn’t even post it at all on Facebook pic.twitter.com/RNSzsxSthM
— Anna Fifield (@annafifield) February 9, 2018
This is fucked up and both the IOC and Facebook should be ashamed. The IOC can create rules for reporters and can expel them from the stadium if they break those rules, but there is simply no legal basis for them to demand such content be taken off social media, and Twitter and Facebook shouldn't help the IOC censor reporters.
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Filed Under: anna fifield, censorship, copyfraud, copyright abuse, dmca, korea, olympics, takedowns, video
Companies: facebook, ioc, twitter
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The law, if it means anything, be damned
As an aside, if this law is able to be ignored, then what other laws may we ignore? Or, is ignoring laws just a matter of the right influence? If that is the case, then all laws should be ignored and the assumption of the right influence assumed and denial of such be damned. And, BTW, if that is the case, then we should stop funding law enforcement (state, federal, and local), prosecutors offices, attorneys general, and courts. Judges go home (including the USSC), you are no longer relevant. Lawyers, McDonald's might be hiring, but hurry, there are only so many openings, and don't expect to be up front at the cash register, argument is not encouraged there.
In the end, Twitter and Facebook are just looking to avoid the expensive fight that would ensue should they not bow to some 'powerful' organization. Which brings up the question of what 'power' does the IOC or USOC actually have, other than a large pocketbook to initiate expensive (certainly to the accused) litigation? The power to grant rights for certain countries or cities to spend enormous amounts to build infrastructure that will be completely, or significantly, useless after the games for the very short term economic boon from the tourism that the games attract? A proven negative economic model.
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Re: The law, if it means anything, be damned
Penalties might not be all that different if the judge buys their arguments. See copyright law.
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Re: The law, if it means anything, be damned
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Re: Re: The law, if it means anything, be damned
Intellectual property rights last forever.
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Re: Damn the Torpedoes (government)
Hmm, a budding anarcho-libertarian with severe distrust of government and its massive, arbitrary "law".
Masnick is instantly dismissive of such ideological viewpoints as being the ravings of an unhinged fringe. You see -- government people and their whimsical law apparatus are really wonderfully efficient & beneficent to us all -- if only we could just get the "properly enlightened" persons consistently installed in powerful government positions. It is all so simple -- we just need "our guys" running things.
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Re: Re: Damn the Torpedoes (government)
Rinse, repeat.
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I'm past caring at this point.
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Re: I'm past caring at this point.
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Re: Re: I'm past caring at this point.
now I've care nothing for the olympic's themselves, and just wait for the antics of the IOC and related committees every year. It's much more entertaining, but not as filling as .99 Big Mac's...
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Same old IOC
I honestly can't think of any organization that is even remotely close to being a more draconian intellectual property maximalist than the IOC. They make Jack Valenti look as if he was some Creative Commons copyleft reformist by comparison. Even the NFL doesn't go this overboard with the Super Bowl.
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Re: Same old IOC
I am one of the millions that have just given up on the Olympics, i cannot be bothered trying every 4 years to get to watch my favourite sports and eventually after finding them not being able to follow my country or finding it almost impossible with all of the roadblocks.
When the rights are removed from the IOC and given to a better organisation who is not just in it for the money then maybe i will spend my time looking to watch sports i enjoy, but until then like millions of others i have just given up and refuse to waste my time with the Olympics.
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The good news is the 4th Circle of Hell has some vacancies...
It used to be about the sport. Then it was about the money.
I gave up watching the Olympics in 2012 (London) when the IOC scumbags were putting masking tape over the tiny manufacturers logo on the gents urinals at the stadium toilets. That, and blasting around the UK confiscating children's home made cakes from charity fetes, because they had the audacity to bear the 5-rings of the Olympic symbol.
Not sure if they're more scummy than performing rights collection agencies though... but it's close.
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Re: Same old IOC
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Main reason to watch the Olympics:
To show support for North & South Korea's combined team in the Olympics, in the hope that their collaborating on this might help lead to peaceful resolution of their differences and the whole nuclear situation.
Main reason to boycott the Olympics:
To denounce the gross misconduct and abuse of trademarks/copyright being committed by the IOC.
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AND the winners are decided in advance, based on international trade agreements. Give us gold and you get X Y or Z reduced tariffs.
Doesn't help that Qatar bribed it's way to host the soccer world cup in 2022 and plans to arrest/torture and rob anyone they consider "looks gay". Also women tourists won't be allowed except in special separate areas wearing full-on head coverings or they're subject to arrest and beatings.
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Re:
While that's brutally true of several previous Olympics, it's an unfair claim in this case.
The Pyeongchang Olympic Stadium won't be left to rot. It was built specifically for the 2018 Olympics and will be torn down immediately after. The same goes from several other venues.
Don't you feel better now?
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Re:
Clearly, the point of the Olympics is the creation of excuses to raid the taxpayer coffers at will. Several people make bank on the endeavor while everyone else suffers as a result.
There are many rather humorous rationalizations, for example they claim the creation of many jobs ... too bad most of them are minimum wage and limited duration. There is no boost to the economy, more like a bust.
But someone is making out ... just don't tell them it is socialism that gave them that money.
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Pointless Olympics
Complete waste of time and resources that could be better spent elsewhere.
And should it be that the money monkeys feel that there could be larger profits available in the "middle east" then they are on a serious loser. By all means play your little boy games of football/soccer. Most of the world is not actually interested in your less than amusing pastime.
Go on .. I dare you.. Stage the Olympic games in somewhere like Qatar, with all the female athletes and girls like these
https://www.olympic.org/rugby/rugby-7-women
Should make for a very interesting venue
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Re:
I hear your comments about Qatar, which has the added controversy over it's suitability to host sports such as football due to it's extreme heat.
I was going to counter your comments about wasted infrastructure, with details on how London has re-purposed it's 2012 Olympic facilities, but then I found this:
http://uk.businessinsider.com/abandoned-olympic-venues-around-the-world-photos-2015-8/#now-che ck-out-how-preparation-is-going-for-rio-2016-55
https://www.theguardian.com/sport/gallery/2017/feb/1 0/rios-olympic-venues-six-months-on-in-pictures
Sad.
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Posting images from a pre-scripted sport event where the winners are decided years in advance? Taken down without argument.
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As for the 'lympics? Yeah, OK, that sure is something special you got there. Yet more 20th century garbage shaped and channeled through gatekeepers and assholes with mind-numbingly shitty everything.
It'll be neat when all these IP whores become adults. Too bad we'll all be dead. Actually, it'll be neat when we're all dead.
Event list and a camera selection. Pony meet automobile, automobile pony. Hi. Hi.
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Re:
Those work the the few who are prepared to do some work to build and maintain their social networks, news feeds etc. That is the same sort of people who partook in bulletin boards/Fidonet and the underground magazines/music etc. For the majority of people the network effects of centralized platforms with all the network effects that go along with them is that makes the Internet useful.
That has little to do with laziness or convenience, but rather the lack of skills and/or the confidence to do their own curating. Also, Google, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube etc. give them a place to start looking, where with highly distributed systems, the first task is finding where to start looking.
Also, podcasts and videos, if they gain popularity, need more bandwidth up than is typically available through a domestic ISP,making use of server hosts/virtual servers along with a content delivery network, which is complication most people are not prepared to deal with. So platforms are often enable people to publish, by dealing with all the associated distribution and bandwidth problems for them.
That reporter could have posted their video via a torrent sites, but then 99% of the target audience would not be able to find it, as most people do not have a clue about how to find torrents.
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Fallow the Olympics for a century or two
verb. to leave alone for a while, to disengage from
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Re:
More importantly, any prohibition on a ticket probably wouldn't have impact on anything more than local law, and certainly not international law. If that fine print exists, it nourishes the IOC's perspective that the own pictures I might take, in violation of my rights (at least in the US). I take a picture in Korea, upload it via a VPN to some platform in the US and the IOC only comes after it only if ads are served on that platform (or the platform is large enough to gain their notice) seems pretty fishy.
Just because the IOC says they own my pictures or videos doesn't mean they do.
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This is the spirit of the Olympics
Well, the reason the Olympic games were revived was that they were a Panhellenic event in disregard of ongoing armed conflicts inside of Greek. People found that impressive enough to revive the idea.
It's sort of sobering when the International Olympic Committee nowadays has a worse grasp of the Olympic spirit than the North Korean military dictatorship.
I mean, what else but boycott them can a potential spectator conscientiously do these days?
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Re: This is the spirit of the Olympics
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2008-03-12/russian-officials-bust-fake-olympic-vodka-ring/1070702
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Los Angeles Olympics 1932, 1984
Guess what the Olympic Committee demanded happen to the sign in 1984?
In this instance, the Committee backed down. The sign is still there.
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A possible rationale
I think the reasoning here might be something like:
If you start out with the assumption that the performance itself is what is copyrighted (or similar - I'm not entirely up on the terminology surrounding the are of intellectual-property law dealing with live performances), then the fact that the video belongs to the reporter becomes irrelevant, because it's what the video depicts that belongs to the IOC.
I don't think that's a particularly good avenue to have exist, but I suspect that under current law it in fact does.
If anyone can think of a counterexample - by which I mean, a case where having this type of restriction available would be a good thing - I'd be interested to hear of it.
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It’s Not Just The Olympics ...
... seems many of the other major international sporting events are just as bad:
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Public domain
For now use "Titanic's sister" for Olympic.
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Another reason to not bother with the Olympics
There are a few tiny tiny exceptions on some of the more obscure sports. But mostly it's a battle of rich kids vs rich states. Who really cares at that point?
On top of this, it's an incredibly weird collection of sports that make no sense. Who the hell actually does bobsledding in the off season? Ever gone pole vaulting on holiday? How about Ski Jumping? Gymnastics? Didn't think so.
And then there's curling and Foosball - which both have me asking, why the hell isn't billiards and poker included?
Running, jumping, Skiing, Snowboarding, skating, weight lifting etc, these are sports people can relate to - all around the world - as they are either activities we've all done as kids, or things we enjoy as personal hobbies, or in the case of weight lifting, is just universally impressive, so these type of sports give everyone the world over a real appreciation for extreme talent.
But why the hell do I care about a bunch of rich kids in a giant toboggan flying down an ice track? And why the hell are horses allowed? Has anyone even thrown a javelin for it's intended purpose in the last 1000 years? And why are we throwing cannon balls? That's never been useful, we made cannons to do that for us! And while we are guns, who gives a flip how accurate you are with your dinky air rifle while your wrapped in a stiff suit? - Being an American, I find that one the most laughable, real accuracy, by those who actually use guns for sport, defense, and hunting, is done with high powered rifles, or normal revolvers and pistols, and the best in the world don't need a stiff suit to stuff all the bullets in the same hole.
The Olympics, really, has turned into a rich kids talent show instead of a true coming-together of the world to show the best talent their common youth has to offer in sports the world over can relate too. And THAT I think is most tragic.
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IOV, Climax of Justive
Who ever and whatever says or likes, this IOC in its present form must somehow be dealt with, resolutely and rigidly. Questions and problems follow the organization for quite sometime from at least early sixties of the century past. Ol Games’ exorbitant program, discrimination on political grounds in downright violation of the Olympic Charter, setting up all sorts of strange sub-organizations like WADA and CAS with as strange authority, vague wordings and concepts like manipulation of competition, numerous standing and ad hoc committees, commissions, boards and panels, multiple bans and “rules”, controversy with the International Summer and Winter Sports Federations (IFs), continental National Olympic Committees associations, etc. The Games have long turned to a set of World Championships in different sports while composition of the IOC per se is the Areopagus of ultra conservative “members” who had devalued and corrupted the whole of the Olympic movement and the Games proper.
Let alone the Games being a site of different political stand-offs, etc., to name a few of its faults.
All this has been made possible due to an unrestrained commercialization of the games and, consequently, the so-called Olympic movement. The financial well being of the IOC and the Games is based, as is well known, on the US aggressive government structures’ financial infusion, along with U.S. television companies and advertisers, as aggressive.
It is understood, reform of the IOC and its creations like WADA and CAS, long overdue, and would call for a serious, large-scale effort, revision of the whole philosophy and concept of the anti-doping controls. The notorious WADA/IOC list of forbidden substances has been growing, new methods of camouflaging those substances contained in the athlete’s body being developed exponentially. Casting a retrospect look, one should also keep in mind that the start to this phenomenon had been laid out by the East German (GDR) chemists and a specific personage (name secret), a Nazi scientist held in GDR who paid for his safety (and life) by developing methods and drugs of hiding doping never sharing those with their Soviet masters. Former head of the USSR Sports Committee International Directorate Dmitri Prokhorov (†) told the story speaking to the Moscow Research Institute of Sports staff way back in 1974. Reunification of Germany ostensibly put an end to that dirt but they would not be Germans had they curbed that effectively and for goods.
In no way such effort, that of exposing the IOC and its presidency’s vicious practices should be stopped.
In no way should its conduct toward Russian athletes be left without proper consequences.
Lev Zarokhovich,
Moscow
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