EFF Gears Up To Fight Back Against Bogus YouTube Takedowns

from the fair-use,-huh? dept

Last month, we were a bit surprised by claims from an NBC Universal representative that filtering technology in use today could distinguish between fair use and infringement when it came to content online. That was a surprise to us, because we've seen no such technology -- while seeing plenty of bogus takedowns. That's only increased in the last few weeks since Warner Music decided to demand more money for any video on YouTube that included Warner Music Group music, leading to many videos being taken down. The response is not just pissing off and damaging Warner's own musicians, but also many, many fans whose videos almost certainly do not infringe or are covered by fair use rules. Warner's public response to all of this, by the way? "No comment."

The EFF is noticing this as well and is pointing out that it correctly warned that various automated filtering technologies wouldn't take fair use into account and would cause many more problems. Now, the EFF is clearly looking for a test case, asking those whose videos have been taken down, despite clear fair use -- such as the teenaged girl who's video of herself singing "Winter Wonderland" was removed -- to contact the EFF. I expect we'll see lawsuits filed in short order.

Filed Under: copyright, fair use, videos, youtube
Companies: eff

More Bands Suffering From Warner Music's YouTube Demands

from the screwed-that-one-up,-didn't-ya? dept

We've already covered how some Warner Music musicians are pissed off about Warner Music demanding more money for its music showing up on YouTube, and now it's also causing additional problems for musicians. For example, the band Death Cab for Cutie has YouTube videos of its music on its own website... but not after Warner Music's actions forced them offline. People on the band's own website clicking to view its own videos are told that they are not available due to Warner Music. At some point, you have to wonder when Warner Music is going to realize just how badly it's screwed this up.

Filed Under: copyright, death cab for cutie, takedowns, videos
Companies: warner music group

Monty Python's Meaning Of Free: The Holy Grail Of Massively Increased Sales

from the and-that-is-the-speed-of-an-unladen-swallow dept

Last year, we wrote about Monty Python's decision to put all its content online for free hoping that would drive people to buy more of its scarce goods -- such as DVDs. And, as a bunch of you have submitted, it appears to have worked wonders. Monty Pyton's DVD sales jumped an astounding 23,000% and are now the number 2 best selling item in the Movies & TV category on Amazon.com. Who was it that said "you can't compete with free" again?

Filed Under: business models, monty python, scarce goods, videos, youtube

YouTube Bans Video Essayist; Apparently Commentary No Longer Considered Fair Use

from the sigh dept

On Wednesday, at the Congressional Internet Caucus' State of the Net 2009 conference, during the panel on digital copyright, NBC Universal's Alec French made the case for technology-based filters on various websites, claiming that the filtering technology is so incredibly good these days that it can even understand fair use, and not block it. That seemed like quite a claim, and one at odds with pretty much everything we've seen. Of course, it may be in how he (and the entertainment industry) defines fair use. The example he gave was a Saturday Night Live video that was stitched together from clips from various newscasts, rather than the original SNL video. French pointed out that the software could tell the difference, and such a clip would be allowed to stay up.

Unfortunately, things don't always work that way in reality. Michael Geist points out that YouTube has banned a video essayist, claiming that his commentary videos, which included clips from various movies, had to be taken down due to copyright violations -- and since it happened three times (yay, three strikes), his entire account was banned. So, here's a case where it seems that since the clips were used for commentary -- which is a clearly accepted fair use -- and, yet not only were the videos taken down, the guy's entire account was banned.

Geist points out that this isn't YouTube's fault, since it's just obeying the DMCA. But he does fault the DMCA for creating such a chilling effect on commentary and creativity. But there's a larger point too. French insists that computers can somehow tell what's fair use and what isn't -- at a time when humans still argue about it pretty much every day. I'm sure there will be some copyright system supporters who speak up in the comments (as they often do) that we're crazy to think such videos were fair use. Given that, how can anyone actually believe that a technology system can accurately determine in any automated way what is and what is not fair use?

Filed Under: chilling effects, commentary, copyright, fair use, filters, takedowns, videos

YouTube Removing Sound From Music Videos Rather Than Takedowns?

from the hurray-for-bad-user-experiences dept

Damon writes in to point out what seems like a strange decision on YouTube's part. In response to at least some complaints from record labels concerning music videos, rather than take down the whole video, as was done in the past, apparently it's just removing the sound, leaving odd, slightly creepy, soundless videos. The end result? Annoyed and confused users having a bad experience. Update: So it turns out that YouTube gives users the option of muting the sound or having the whole video removed. Still seems like an odd way to handle the issue.

Filed Under: copyright, takedowns, user experience, videos
Companies: youtube

MySpace Video Blocking Not An Antitrust Violation

from the well,-good dept

Brad Greenspan, who at one point was CEO of Intermix, the spyware/adware firm that originally created MySpace, has been complaining for years that News Corp. engaged in fraud when it purchased Intermix in order to get MySpace at a discounted price. A court found nothing to support this, pointing out (yet again) that the acquisition was agreed to by both parties. However, that hasn't stopped Greenspan, whose own competitive startup Live Universe filed an antitrust lawsuit against MySpace for blocking Live Universe videos from MySpace profiles.

How is this possibly an antitrust issue? Well, that wasn't clear to anyone... least of all to the courts apparently. After first losing at the district court level, an appeals court has now found no validity in the antitrust claims either, sending Greenspan back to the drawing board for attempts to find ways to suck some more money out of News Corp.

Filed Under: antitrust, brad greenspan, videos
Companies: live universe, myspace, news corp

Warner Music Musicians Pissed Off About YouTube Dispute

from the as-they-should-be dept

Warner Music's dispute with YouTube, where Warner Music suddenly claims that YouTube needs to pay more has been pretty silly from the outset. We pointed out that Warner has almost no leverage here. Warner Music needs YouTube a hell of a lot more than Google needs Warner Music to allow its content on YouTube. As if to drive that point home, some Warner Music artists are up in arms over the latest moves. Amanda Palmer, an artist signed to Warner subsidiary Roadrunner, is not at all happy about where things stand:

in other words, roadrunner is a subsidiary of warner and i'm stuck in hell with madonna and the other poor bastards, because warner wants more money. even worse, warner has almost no bargaining power...they're not even in the top ten of labels who have huge artists with material streaming on youtube. they're just starving for cash right now and they're doing anything they can think of to come up with cash. it's abSURD. they are looking for money in a totally backwards way.

money that, i should point out, i would NEVER see as an artist. if they got their way and youtube decided to give them a larger revenue share of the videos, it's very unlikely it would ever make its way into the artists' bank accounts....

did i mention that being on a major label is starting to seem like.....not such a grand idea?

You can bet that there are many more musicians feeling similarly right now -- and it's only going to make it more difficult for Warner Music (or any of its subsidiaries) to sign new artists or to retain the ones (like Amanda) who feel screwed over by the latest move -- all of which Warner will surely claim were done in order to "protect the interests of the artists."

Filed Under: amanda palmer, videos
Companies: google, warner music group, youtube

Record Labels Learning They Have Little Leverage On YouTube

from the well,-look-at-that... dept

Over the weekend, the story made the rounds about Warner Music's dispute with Google over getting money from YouTube videos. As we discussed in our post on the topic, it seemed like Warner had very little leverage here: Google has no legal responsibility to pay anything, and removing the videos from YouTube seemed a lot more likely to harm Warner Music and its artists than Google. As noted by some folks, for many kids these days, YouTube is how they find and listen to music these days. Forcing your songs off YouTube would be like demanding their removal from the radio twenty years ago.

Yet, more details are coming out on this story, and it appears that both Warner Music and Google may recognize Warner Music's precarious position here. In fact, it appears that it wasn't Warner Music that demanded its music be taken down. Instead, reports are coming out saying that Warner instead went to Google with higher monetary demands, and it was Google's response to start pulling the music down, to demonstrate to Warner Music that YouTube is a lot more valuable to Warner Music than Warner Music is to YouTube (a lesson that Warner Music execs desperately need to learn).

Warner Music's response, apparently, has been to try to pretend it has some leverage, supposedly leaking a somewhat questionable story that it, and other major record labels, are preparing to launch a "Hulu for music." However, as Greg Sandoval notes in the News.com link in the paragraph above, this seems like little more than idle speculation by the labels. They had talked about this months ago, and have done nothing since. Instead, it was a bluff by the record labels in a weak attempt to convince Google that it needs to play ball or face competition. Google is likely to call the bluff -- because Google still recognizes what the record labels seem to have trouble recognizing. The power of YouTube isn't in having a site that plays videos, it's in the audience -- and you don't recreate that overnight.

Filed Under: copyright, leverage, videos
Companies: google, warner music group, youtube

Warner Music Taking Its Music Off YouTube And Going Home

from the still-not-getting-it dept

Warner Music desperately wants people to believe that it's not the evil record label that people make it out to be, but it's going to have a very difficult time proving that's true when it keeps doing strategically braindead things like pulling all its music off of YouTube because it's upset Google won't pay more money. This is classic Warner Music. The company almost always overvalues its music, compared to the services that help promote that music, and is always demanding a larger cut. Last summer, it did a similar thing and pulled its music off of Last.fm. With plenty of other startups, the company has a history of suing until they agree to cough up a huge chunk of equity. This, of course, is the same company whose boss, Edgar Bronfman Jr. just a year ago declared that the industry had made a mistake in going to war against consumers, ignoring the fact that it was his own speech back in 2000 that basically kicked off that war.

To be honest, Warner Music should be hugely thankful that Google is paying the company anything for music on YouTube. Legally, Google has no reason to pay a dime. Thanks to the DMCA safe harbor provisions, if Warner wants to go after anyone, it should be going after those who upload the videos, but Google worked out a totally unnecessary (and somewhat questionable) deal to pay the labels for a promise not to sue users. However, it looks like Warner Music is getting excessively greedy again. Perhaps it's the recent reports that Warner's larger competitor, Universal Music is bringing in significant cash from YouTube that got Bronfman and crew angry, but it's doing exactly the wrong thing in pulling its videos.

Pulling the videos off of YouTube doesn't punish Google. It punishes fans: the folks who Warner desperately needs on its side, though it's been failing at that for a long, long time. Google's response should be "good riddance." Let's see how Warner Music copes with angry musicians who want fans to promote their music on YouTube, while seeing plenty of other bands build up larger audiences that way.

Filed Under: copyright, music, videos
Companies: google, warner music group, youtube

Man Who Re-Uploaded Viral Baby Swinging Video Charged With Child Abuse?

from the are-they-serious? dept

It's really stunning how often we see the wrong people being blamed for things. It seems like once the internet gets involved, government officials let their brains go away. The latest example is sent to us by reader Stack, and it involves a man in Australia who has been charged with publishing child-abuse material. What did he do? He took a video of a man swinging a baby around, that was already all over the internet, and being shown on various news programs, and uploaded it to a video sharing site, LiveLeak, which focuses on videos of news or current events. To be clear: the guy who's being charged is not the guy in the video, doesn't know the guy in the video and had absolutely nothing to do with the video whatsoever, other than uploading it to LiveLeak.

As noted, the video itself is widely available. This guy was just sharing it on yet another video sharing site... and yet he gets charged with publishing child abuse materials. Should all the news programs that are showing the video be charged as well? It's a viral video. That means people share it. It's raised some interesting and important discussions about whether or not the guy in the video was putting the baby in danger (though, the baby apparently didn't seem to mind), but to charge this guy for simply distributing the video makes no sense at all. It's yet another indication of the nanny-state mentality where governments somehow decide that people shouldn't even be allowed to see anything controversial, lest they be so weak that they immediately have to copy it. Most humans don't work that way, and one of these days, maybe government officials will figure that out.

Filed Under: australia, child abuse, videos, viral