City Of London Police Keep Shutting Down Websites With No Court Order

from the how-is-that-legal? dept

We've highlighted a number of stories recently about the City of London Police, who have partnered with a few legacy players from the entertainment industry, and are using a bunch of taxpayer money to try to shut down websites the copyright industry doesn't like -- based on no clear legal reasoning or authority. They often seem to just rely on their name and bogus threats to get registrars to kill sites -- a process that has been found to violate ICANN policies for registrars. However, most registrars just give in, because the City of London Police just look so damn official.

Over the weekend TorrentFreak noted that a few more sites have been shuttered based on no court order, no judicial findings, but just the City of London Police's say so. This includes FileCrop, a site that hosted no infringing files at all, but which is just a search engine. Once again, the police make no effort whatsoever to hide the fact that they're doing the bidding of the legacy entertainment industry -- directly linking to their favored sites and flat out saying that they're supported by BPI, IFPI, FACT and the Publishers Association. Whether or not the sites that are being taken down are, in fact, violating the law, everything about this process is highly questionable. Taking down websites without a court order is a blatant attack on free speech. And, yes, while the UK does not have the same free speech traditions as the US, it does still hold itself out as being a believer in free speech. It is difficult to see the shuttering of a website without any due process as little more than blatant censorship.

Perhaps even more troubling is the fact that this censorship is proudly done to support legacy industries who see the internet as something to be shunned and attacked. How would people respond if the City of London Police suddenly, with no court order, shut down BSkyB and proudly announced it was doing so with the support of the BBC? Or shut down AirBnB and announced it was doing so with the support of the British Hospitality industry? Or shut down EasyJet and did so with the support of British Air? Wouldn't people be outraged?

Filed Under: city of london police, domains, restistrars, search engines, takedowns
Companies: bpi, fact, filecrop, icann, ifpi, publishers association

Copyright Maximalists Can't Help But Inject Bogus 'Copyright Wins!' Argument Into Google/Publisher Settlement

from the seriously? dept

In the wake of the settlement concerning book scanning by Google and a variety of book publishers, the Copyright Clearance Center issued one of the more ridiculous statements concerning the situation, in which they basically read into the agreement something that was never there:

"Today's news not only further establishes the value of copyright, but also points to the importance of working with rightsholders when undertaking mass digitization. Collaboration is key when it comes to copyright."

First of all, nothing in the seven-year fight or the settlement helped to "establish the value of copyright." Quite the contrary. It seemed to show what a disaster copyright is today in that it could be used to delay the creation of an amazing resource for the world through highly questionable copyright claims. As for the argument that it's important to "work with" rightsholders when doing things like this, that too is misleading. All it showed is how those rightsholders can hold up the useful creation of such a resource -- and highlight why "permission society" is holding back innovation and better tools for learning and education.

Filed Under: book scanning, copyright, settlement
Companies: copyright clearance center, google, publishers association

Publishers Can't Seem To Celebrate The Ebook Boom Without Slipping In Odes To Copyright

from the not-quite-right dept

The BBC reports on the success of ebook sales in the UK, which are up by 188% compared to last year. This is great news for authors and e-commerce. Ebook reading devices have become increasingly easy to use and the online shops for ebooks are getting far more user-friendly by the day. Although I’m not fully converted myself yet (still unsure about the digital right management controls and the unnecessary high prices), about half the books I read are ebooks and most other documents I read are on tablets and computers. The non-believers are slowly but surely being proven wrong and the market is speaking for itself.

The piece by the BBC, which praises the market developments for consumers and authors alike, includes an odd quote, which seems more like pro-copyright lobby-speak and out of place in the article:

"The huge increase in digital sales shows how rapidly readers and publishers are embracing e-book reading," said Richard Mollet, the trade body's chief executive (Publishers Association, ed.). "Whether books are enjoyed physically or electronically, publishers will continue to invest in exciting authors and titles. They can do this because of the stability provided by the UK's robust and flexible copyright framework. This is why The PA is at the forefront of calls to government to ensure that copyright is not eroded and that creators' rights are protected and supported online."

It is surprising in several ways that Mr. Mollet mentions the copyright framework. First, if this is true under today's system, why is his association actively pushing for stricter, less flexible copyright laws? Second, why is the current copyright framework more suitable for book authors and not musicians and movie producers, whose lobbyists are standing in line to complain about the current system? And why does the journalist bother to mention this in the quote at all, when the whole article is a praise of the market adapting to consumer needs?

Let's face it, the copyright system, robust or useless, hardly comes into the equation concerning the recent success of the ebooks market. Ebooks are among the easiest things to pirate. In fact, it is very easy to download zipped files containing thousands of digitized books. Ebook publishers are thus effectively—and successfully—competing with an abundant free supply of their goods.

Fortunately for books publishers, they have had several valuable case studies from which they could learn, namely the decade-long failed attempts of the music and movie industries to cope with the advent of the internet. After wasting gazillions on litigation and lobbying, these industries came to understand that the user does actually spend money on media when it is made easy.

In short, success of content business models depends on the user experience you offer your customers, not more or less strict copyright regulation. It also seems very hypocritical for content lobbyists to praise the copyright system when the market is doing well, and blame the same system when the market is not performing to their wishes.

Filed Under: competition, copyright, ebooks, exaggerations, richard mollett, uk
Companies: publishers association

UK Publishers Association Outraged It Wasn't Consulted Ahead Of The Public Over Open Access To Publicly-Funded Research

from the entitlement-much? dept

While the global boycott of Elsevier by academics continues to gain momentum and signatures – at the time of writing, the number is approaching 9000 – there's an open access storm in a teacup brewing in the UK.

The main grant-giving body in the UK, Research Councils UK (RCUK), spends around $4.8 billion each year supporting research across all fields. Since that money comes from the British taxpayer, the RCUK adopted an open access policy some years back:

As the public bodies charged with investing tax payers money in science and research, the Research Councils take very seriously their responsibilities in making the outputs from this research publicly available -- not just to other researchers, but also to potential users in business, Government and the public sector, and also to the public.

That open access policy was fairly lax, and so it is proposing to tighten up the publishing requirements for research that it funds, as an article in the Times Higher Education (THE) explains:

The policy, which RCUK hopes to adopt by the summer, stipulates that the final version of papers produced with funding from any of the science research councils must be made freely available online within six months of publication.

Sounds pretty reasonable, you might think -- after all, this still allows commercial publishers six months' exclusivity for work that the public paid for. Indeed, many open access advocates would say that it is too generous, since the public really has a right to see the work it funded as soon as it is published.

And yet some people aren't happy about the RCUK's plans:

the Publishers Association, which represents UK publishing companies, criticised the proposals and said it had not been consulted.

Well, here's an amazing coincidence: I am a UK taxpayer, and therefore contribute directly to the funding of all this research, and yet strangely the RCUK didn't consult me either. Maybe it thought I could just read the short consultation document it has now released (pdf) and offer my thoughts based on that, along with everyone else.

Which, of course, the Publishers Association is also welcome to do. Apparently, though, it thinks it is entitled to preferential treatment here, largely on the basis that its members have been allowed to profit from restricting access to publicly-funded research in the past, and therefore have a right to dictate terms of its release in the future:

"No evidence or impact assessment is offered for the effect of six-month embargoes on the large majority of articles published [in] subscription [journals].

But why should it make such an assessment? What the RCUK is talking about is possibly reducing slightly the huge profits publishers have been making from restricting access to public-funded research. It's not depriving publishers of what is rightfully theirs, it's giving back to the public what should never have been taken away in the first place.

This is why the whole open access debate -- both in the UK and US -- is surreal: publishers are trying to argue that they have a right to windfall profits from work done by publicly-funded researchers. Of course the publishers always insist that they do make a contribution -- in fact, the Publishers Association makes precisely that claim in the article quoted above, along with a few others:

"[The policy] takes no account of the role of publishers in scholarly communication, makes no reference to sustainability or the management of peer review, offers no practical policy for funding [author-pays] open access while dictating firm and onerous requirements for mandatory deposit on short embargoes."

But scholarly publishers do practically nothing. Academics carry out the research, and write it up -- zero cost to publishers. They then submit the paper to a journal's editor, who sends the paper out to referees for review. Generally, the editor and referees are academics who carry out all this work for nothing, simply because it is an accepted thing to do in their culture. Once the paper is accepted, the publishers might, at most, edit and format it before sticking it up on a Web site -- none of which is an onerous task demanding subscriptions running to thousands of dollars a year.

Of course, that makes the reference to the "sustainability or the management of peer review" rather rich, to say the least: publishers have little to do with either -- academics handle it for nothing. And as for "funding [author-pays] open access", well, guess what? If institutions don't have to pay high subscription fees, they can afford to cover the open access ones. Indeed, as Techdirt pointed out last year, the profits alone from academic publishing would be enough to fund open access to every research paper in every field.

So the question once more is not: How will we pay for open access? But rather: Why on earth are we still paying publishers for so much less than what we could have for a lower price with immediate open access?

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Filed Under: open access, publishers, uk
Companies: publishers association

UK Publishers: Fair Use Would Put A 'Chokehold On Innovation'

from the say-what-now? dept

We've mentioned a few times that the UK is running a big review of copyright laws in the country, with a focus on questions having to do with fair use and other exceptions to copyright law, and how they impact innovation. While we're still a bit skeptical -- in part because the last such review (the infamous Gowers Report) was almost entirely ignored when it argued against extending copyright law (and even hinted that reducing it would be better) -- we were encouraged to find out that some of the most knowledgeable people around on copyright law were included on the team. James Boyle, in particular, has been quite vocal about the need for actual empirical evidence, rather than just buying the claims of "harm" from industry types.

The review panel recently closed their request for comments, and some folks are publishing their own comments. A really fantastic one is from Glyn Moody, who highlighted actual data and research, and pointed out where the industry's claims were flawed. It's a very powerful analysis, and I hope that the people on the review committee will take it seriously.

At the other end of the spectrum, however, is a trade group representing publishers in the UK, The Publishers Association Limited. While (as of this writing) I cannot find anything on the organization's own website concerning their filing, they did send out an email to various folks, and Shane Richmond kindly forwarded it on to me. It's stunning in its backwards thinking -- and for its complete lack of factual evidence to back up its claims. The Publisher's Association merely listed out a bunch of bullet points, and we'll take a look at a few:

radical changes to IP laws would fly in the face of expert opinion -- senior executives across the whole sector emphasise the importance of the current IP framework in driving innovation and delivering growth.

Except almost none of that is accurate. Tons of experts have gone into great detail on the problems of copyright law today. But, of course, the Publishers ignore all of this. They only asked senior execs who receive the bounty of having a strong government monopoly if that monopoly was important. It's like asking a kid if candy is good for them, and then using that answer as the evidence that candy is good for children.

introducing elements of an American style fair use exception would create legal ambiguity and put a chokehold on innovation. There is no evidence that it would have a positive effect on overall levels of innovation and growth.

And this is the guffaw-inducing claim. The US has a long history of case law around fair use, and while there are ambiguities, the idea that it would put a chokehold on innovation to allow people to do more with copyrighted works is simply laughable. The Publishers support this with absolutely no evidence. And, of course, the biggest evidence comes from us right here in the US, where we did implement just such a fair use regime, and it did not lead to any chokehold on innovation.

in ten years of surveying British companies on barriers to innovation, the UK Government has not found evidence that companies believe the IP regime to be a barrier to their growth.

I don't quite know the details of this particular study, but the issue that David Cameron raised when he initiated this review of copyright law remain pretty key: all of the big US tech and media companies rely heavily on fair use. If UK companies don't think they need fair use, they may not realize just what they're missing.

barriers to growth and innovation are not the fault of copyright law, but are caused by copyright infringement, the wider business environment and inefficiencies in the licensing system.

[citation needed] All of the (non-industry) evidence suggests otherwise. That's what Glynn's submission highlighted in many points. So why would the Publishers make a claim that is so easily refuted by the evidence?

proposals to tackle these problems are in train and Government has a critical role to play in speeding up implementation of the Digital Economy Act and in supporting industry efforts to reduce the incidence of copyright infringing weblinks being prominently displayed in search engine results.

Yes, this is the Publishers' big solution for innovation: making linking illegal and kicking people off the internet. So very forward thinking of them. Of course, it's no surprise that a big trade group representing a bunch of legacy players who hate change would argue against change based on nothing more than fear and an unwillingness to adapt. However, one hopes that the review committee will put such comments into their proper context.

Filed Under: copyright, fair use, glyn moody, innovation, publishers, uk
Companies: publishers association