Tales Of Collection Societies Gone Wrong: GEMA

from the it-ain't-about-helping-the-artists... dept

We've noted in the past some of the massive problems with various collections societies around the world. These groups are often given something of a monopoly over collecting music royalties, and even though they present themselves as being non-profits designed to help artists, the truth is usually something far different. Beyond abusing their position, their real goal is often not to help all artists, but a small subset at the top. This is what copyright law has pretty much always done. By setting up artificial barriers and monopoly rents, it allows a very few at the top to benefit at a grossly disproportionate level, and it's the rest of the creators who are harmed by this (i.e., if those monopoly rents mean that I need to pay much more than the true market rate to support some top pop star, I'm much less likely to spend money on an up and coming indie musician). The whole recording industry has been built around a few megastars, and it should be no surprise that the industry has used copyright law and collections societies in support of that.

Wolfgang Senges is digging into how this works in Germany, where some are finally questioning GEMA's actions. In delving into how GEMA works, Senges notes that its entire structure is specifically designed to really only give a small percentage of top artists a say in how GEMA operates. Everyone else just gets dragged along for the ride. Is it any wonder, then, that its policies are mostly designed to help those big artists, rather than others?

Filed Under: collections societies, germany
Companies: gema

German Court Says Rapidshare Must Get Magical Powers To Know Which Songs Infringe And Which Do Not

from the how's-that-going-to-work? dept

Last year, the German music collection society GEMA sued Rapidshare claiming that the company had to filter out any infringing content. Of course, this makes little to no practical sense. Rapidshare is a platform that users use to share content. Rapidshare itself has no way of knowing whether the content is infringing or not, and any liability should be on the users, not the platform. But... courts don't always understand such things, and so a German court has now ruled that Rapidshare must stop certain songs from being distributed. GEMA, of course, is thrilled, noting that this means the copyright holders are "no longer required to perform the ongoing and complex checks." But, it means that Rapidshare not only has to perform ongoing and complex checks, it has to do so without having any information on what's legit or not. What if musicians want to share their music that way? What if the use is fair use? RapidShare appears ready to appeal, noting that appeals courts on these issues have been much more reasonable, so they're hopeful that the decision is reversed or greatly limited.

Filed Under: copyright, file sharing, germany
Companies: gema, rapidshare

German Elected Official Switches Parties To The Pirate Party

from the getting-some-attention... dept

Last week, we noted that Germany may be following Australia down the very slippery slope of internet censorship with a secret blacklist of websites that ISPs must block. Not surprisingly, not all politicians in Germany support such a move, and one, Jorg Tauss, was apparently so upset by it, that he's left his own political party and signed on with the German Pirate Party instead, recognizing that being against such forms of censorship is a key plank of the party's platform. That said, the article notes that Tauss may not exactly be what the party is looking for, as he's under a cloud of speculation concerning a supposed investigation into child porn on his computer. He claims that the content was sent to him while he was investigating such content in his role as an elected official, but it could still raise questions, and pending the outcome of the investigation could potentially harm the Pirate Party's reputation if the story is different than his official one.

Filed Under: censorship, germany, jorg tauss, pirate party

As Google Agrees To Delete Unblurred Street View Images In Germany, One Is Used To Solve A Crime

from the well-how-about-that dept

Earlier this week, Google agreed to delete unblurred images in its Street View database. If you don't know, Google Street View involves cars driving around photographing everything, so they can be placed on Google Maps. It's quite useful. However, some folks (and politicians) have been up in arms about the supposed privacy violation of photographing people walking in public (no, I don't get it, either). To deal with this, Google has been blurring faces of people. However, it usually keeps the unblurred versions in a database for future use (and for better training of its blurring mechanism).

However, just as the company agreed to delete the unblurred photos in its German database, over in the UK, such photos may be useful in helping to solve a mugging. The victim of the mugging (amazingly) noticed that one of the Street View photos was taken right before the mugging happened. It involved two guys who stole his bike, and the photo shows the two guys walking right behind the kid. He alerted the police, who got the unblurred image from Google and were able to track down the accused muggers. Of course, it's not clear if they'll actually be convicted or if there's really enough evidence. In the meantime, though, if you're thinking of mugging someone, maybe take a look around to see if there's a Google car driving along side you first.

Filed Under: crime, germany, google maps, mugging, street view, uk
Companies: google

Facebook Loses Infringement Lawsuit In Germany Over Copycat Site

from the competition-ain't-bad dept

This is a bit of a surprise, as it appears that Facebook has lost a lawsuit in Germany against a site it accuses of copying Facebook (but in German). It's certainly true that the sites look quite similar, but the German court basically says that looking close is meaningless. If there's no confusion in what site people are on, there's really not much of an issue. And while the sites do have a lot of similarities, being on StudiVZ it's clear that the site is different from Facebook. While this may just be a German court protecting a local company against an American competitor, it seems like a good ruling from a policy perspective. Let the sites compete in the marketplace, rather than worrying about who copied what from whom.

Filed Under: copycat, germany, social networking
Companies: facebook, studivz

Is Germany Following Australia Down The Slippery Slope Of Internet Censorship?

from the hopefully-not dept

Via Slashdot we learn that Germany is the latest country to consider a censorship regime that would create a blacklist of sites that ISPs would be required to block. As with most such things, the official claim is that this would be to block out child porn. Of course, this is a head-in-the-sand approach to fighting child porn. It's about trying to pretend it's not there, rather than tracking down those actually responsible. Those who really want access will find it elsewhere through non-blocked sites or groups. Except now it will be more underground and harder to track. But, more importantly, in setting up any sort of secret censored list, you can pretty much guarantee that the list will be abused. A similar attempt in Australia, where again everyone was told it was about stopping child exploitation, was recently revealed to have a lot of other stuff on the list -- such that only 1/3 was actually about preventing child porn. The article linked above shows that Germans have teamed up to protest such a censorship regime -- and have done so in a very constructive manner -- suggesting much more reasonable alternatives. Now we just need to see if politicians recognize that there are better solutions before just jumping on the easy censorship "for the children" bandwagon.

Filed Under: censorship, germany

German Court Says 'Accidental' File Sharing Isn't A Crime

from the accidentally-on-purpose dept

Michael Scott alerts us to the news that a court in Germany has found that accidental file sharing is not a crime. In this case, it involved a guy using file sharing software, where he didn't realize that anything he downloaded was automatically shared. For that reason, he was found not guilty of sharing the same content. Of course, as the article notes, this isn't likely to be meaningful in other lawsuits in Germany for a variety of reasons, including the lack of precedential power of court rulings, and the fact that most copyright cases in Germany are civil, rather than criminal cases (this one was criminal, because of the nature of the content). Still, in an era when "accidental infringement" has become pretty much the norm, it's nice seeing a court realize the problems of charging someone for infringing by accident.

Filed Under: accidental file sharing, crime, germany

T-Mobile Germany Tries The Jedi Mind Trick With Mobile Skype

from the no-it-isn't-yes-it-is-okay-it-is dept

The Skype app for the iPhone proved to be an instant hit, topping App Store download charts around the world, including Germany, where T-Mobile reminded its customers that using Skype, or any other VoIP app, could get them kicked off its network. The operator now says it's "looking at different ways of dealing with VoIP", perhaps including offering some special plan where users would have to pay some fee to use VoIP. It also says it's not actively blocking any voice apps, although when it begins selling the Nokia N97 smartphone later this year, the Skype application that's normally pre-installed on the device will be stripped out. T-Mobile's justification for removing the app is great: it's not because they don't want people undermining voice revenues by using Skype, but because "by not putting Skype on, subscribers could choose from a number of VoIP apps, and not be limited to just one." That's as opposed to having Skype pre-installed, and customers being able to download and install any other VoIP app alongside it. Only in the world of mobile operators does removing choices for customers actually increase customer choice.

Filed Under: germany, mobile, skype
Companies: t-mobile

German Movie Studio Demands Cash From People It Thinks Shared Its Movies Online

from the and-here-we-go... dept

While the recording industry made the fateful (and self-destructive) decision years back to start suing file sharers directly, the movie industry, for the most part has avoided going down that path (in part after witnessing how badly it failed for the RIAA). The movie industry has been quite active in trying to shut down file sharing systems and sites, but for the most part has avoided accusing home consumers of infringement. It appears that may be changing in Germany. Michael Scott alerts us to the news that a major German movie studio has started sending out threat letters to 500 people (out of a list of 10,000) that it believes shared some of its movies. The letter demands $1,000 per infringing work, or promises a lawsuit. What's unclear is how this list was created, and how accurate (or inaccurate it is). Demanding $1,000 from people without any real proof that they did anything illegal certainly seems to come quite close to the classic definition of extortion. We've see how some have used similar shakedown letters for profit, and it makes you wonder why they're allowed at all.

Filed Under: file sharing, germany, lawsuits, movies

Pirate Party Banned From German Site That 'Pirated' Facebook

from the funny-that... dept

A bunch of folks have sent in the story on TorrentFreak about how the German social networking site, StudiVZ, has refused to allow The Pirate Party to create a campaign site, despite setting up campaign groups for every other political party campaigning for office. Chances are that this is just a screwup, where someone at StudiVZ was unfamiliar with the fact that The Pirate Party is a legitimate political party. However, what seems exceptionally ironic is the fact that StudiVZ is involved in a long and ongoing lawsuit with Facebook for copying Facebook's look and feel. Not only that, but StudiVZ's founder "freely admits that he took some of the basic ideas of Facebook and simply improved them." Thus, in the parlance of copyright maximalists, StudiVZ "pirated" Facebook. And, yet, now, it's shut down The Pirate Party's own site.

Filed Under: germany, pirate party
Companies: facebook, studivz