NYU Law School's Video Teaching Copyright Completely Flummoxed YouTube's Copyright Filters

from the not-this-again dept

You may recall a few years back that Harvard Law Professor William Fisher had one of his lectures about copyright taken off YouTube by a bogus copyright claim from Sony Music. It appears that something new has happened to the Engleberg Center at NYU's School of Law, in which a panel discussion on "proving similarity" in copyright law (a big, big topic ever since the awful Blurred Lines decision came down), was taken down itself. It wasn't just taken down by a single bogus claim, but a whole bunch of bogus claims ("whole bunch of bogus claims" is my band's name, by the way).

The folks at NYU Law know the law (duh), and pointed out that the use here was unquestionably fair use (short clips, used in an educational setting, etc.) and filed various counternotices. And yet, Universal Music said "fuck that" and refused to release the claim:

Now, it's especially interesting that Universal Music Group was the one who refused to back down, given that it was subject to one of the few cases in which it was determined that a copyright claiming entity must consider fair use before making a claim. But, of course, the court also made it clear that if an entity (such as UMG) chose not to do that, there really was no real punishment.

As the NYU folks note, it was unclear if allowing the copyright claim to remain would result in multiple strikes against its account, given that there were multiple claims made on this one video. The only way the issue got resolved... is that NYU was able to raise enough a stink within YouTube:

This would have been a dead end for most users. Unable to understand how the already opaque dispute resolution process might impact the status of their account, they would have to decide if it was worth gambling their entire YouTube account on the chances that their some combination of YouTube and the rightsholder would recognize their fair use claim.

Since we are the center at NYU Law focused on technology and innovation, it was not a dead end for us. We reached out to YouTube through private channels to try to get clarity around the copyright strike rules. While we never got that clarity, some weeks later we were informed that the claims against our video had been removed.

While some may just dismiss this story as yet another wacky case of copyright gone wrong (or, "yet another anomaly"), it highlights a bunch of key points, including the difficulty in fighting back even if you know things are fair use. But, most importantly, it again highlights the serious problem with the EU's Copyright Directive, which requires these kinds of problematic filters to be on basically every internet platform imaginable, massively ramping up how often we're likely to see these kinds of bogus attacks on speech.

Anyway, since NYU was able to get the video put back up, we can now all watch it -- and I'd encourage you to do so. However, it's a reminder that most people hit by bogus copyright strikes probably don't have the connections to get their videos put back up.

Filed Under: automated filters, copyright, education, fair use, strikes, takedowns
Companies: nyu, umg, universal music group, youtube

Using YouTube Takedowns As Extortion

from the if-given-the-power,-it-will-be-abused dept

We've made this point over and over again: if you give people the power to force down someone else's content, it will be abused. We see this most clearly in things like DMCA takedown notices, which are rife with abuse -- either through automated takedowns or just by people who want certain things to disappear. But here's a variation we haven't seen quite as much: DMCA abuse as extortion. This story involves musician/composer Keitaro Ujile who variously goes by Ujico* and Snail's House and who has a pretty big following. As an aside, he describes his electronic music as "Happy Music" and, damn, is it ever. I've been listening to it while writing this post, and you can too at Soundcloud, Bandcamp or... YouTube.

It's that last one that this story is focused on. Because a few of his songs on YouTube currently look something like this right now:

Yup, so someone named Lazy Channel is claiming infringement on three Ujile videos. "Lazy Channel," whoever that is, has his own YouTube page, and it appears to have a bunch of Vietnamese songs on it. It doesn't have many followers (350 subscribers). I'm not linking to it, because no need to give that guy any extra attention, because here's the rather incredible message that "Lazy Channel" sent to Ujile soon after his videos got taken down:

If you somehow can't read that, it says:

Hey ! How're you doing ! As you know 2 videos on your channel has disappear !
In the case you don't know that strike can't retract by youtube if no because of me !
Only me cant retract that strike ! So if you interesting I have a request for you ! Be ready and if you don't ! Good by all social media ! Hope you will reply soon :)

Kinds Regards :D

So, yeah. That's Lazy Channel more or less admitting to attempted extortion. Ujile has counternoticed the claims, but in the meantime has disabled the videos in question in Vietnam.

Seeing all of this so blatantly put forth suggests that this kind of thing is a lot more common than we realize -- but that's almost to be expected when we give anyone the power to takedown videos by claiming copyright infringement -- and setting things up so that the hosting platforms will face massive liability for failing to comply (and comply quickly, with little investigation). In watching people respond to this news, it's interesting to see some people say that nothing should ever get taken down without an investigation -- which sounds like a good idea, but difficult under the law as it stands. And, of course, many, many voices are crying out right now to make these so-called intermediary liability protections even weaker, which will only enable even more such takedowns and extortion.

This is why we keep talking about the importance of things like the DMCA's safe harbors or platform immunity under CDA 230. CDA 230, in particular, helps prevent these kinds of scams (outside the copyright context, which isn't covered by CDA 230), and it's yet another reason why we're so concerned about SESTA. While that bill claims to be targeting platforms that are profiting off of sex trafficking, it will open up a massive power for those who wish to abuse the system, demanding content get taken down at the risk of criminal penalties, and even if the demand is entirely bogus, the risk and liability may be so large that many platforms will just comply.

So, yes, this situation with Ujile is unfortunate and must be a real nuisance for him -- especially since too many strikes will get his entire YouTube account with its 65,000 subscribers shut down (another "feature" of the DMCA that the legacy industries demanded be included in the law, and which they've been seeking to expand via lawsuits lately). But it's also an unfortunate example of how putting liability on platforms enables and encourages this kind of extortion and (importantly) harms actual creators like Ujile. To hear the RIAA/MPAAs of the world, we need to weaken protections for platforms to help artists. Yet, here is a clear example where it's enabling real harm for an actual artist. So where is the RIAA and those others speaking up for Ujile and how unfortunate it is that he has to go through this experience now?

Filed Under: dmca, keitaro ujile, snail's house, strikes, takedowns, ujico, youtube
Companies: youtube

The Massive Overreaction To Uber's Response To JFK Protests

from the calm-down-people dept

Okay, let's start this out by admitting that there are plenty of reasons that people really dislike Uber, and I know that some people have a kneejerk hatred for the company. For a variety of reasons, in some people's minds, Uber represents the very worst of Silicon Valley. While I do think that the company has had some issues -- especially around privacy -- many of the complaints around Uber have been greatly exaggerated or distorted. But none have been quite as ridiculously distorted and exaggerated as the online reaction Saturday night to Uber's decision to drop its infamous "surge pricing" at JFK due to protests there. That resulted in a "#DeleteUber" hashtag going viral and being passed around by many, many people -- including many of my friends who I normally agree with on most things.

The whole thing doesn't make any sense to me and seemed quite ridiculously unfair to Uber (and, sure, some will argue that the company deserves whatever shit it gets, but to me it lessens people's credibility when they throw a fit over something where it appears they took things entirely out of context). So here's the background. As you are, by now, no doubt aware, on Saturday night there were protests all around the US, mainly at major airports, concerning people who were arriving from overseas at those airports, and being barred (or worse, sent back on other flights) in response to President Trump's new executive order concerning individuals born in seven particular countries. As part of this, the NY Taxi Workers Association announced a one-hour work stoppage to protest the executive order:

That afternoon, entirely separate from this, Uber announced that it had turned off surge pricing at JFK:

This resulted in many people assuming that this was Uber "breaking the strike" and basically undermining the protest message made by the NYC taxi drivers. And with many people already predisposed to dislike Uber, a meme was born. This was complicated even further by the fact that Uber's CEO, Travis Kalanick, is on one of Donald Trump's "economic councils." Some argued that it meant that he was supportive of Trump and all of Trump's plans, even as Kalanick made it clear that he didn't support the plan and planned to use his access to tell Trump why the plan was bad. But, it didn't matter. Tons and tons of people started tweeting that Uber was evil for supporting Trump and "breaking the strike."

But this makes no sense. The more I looked at it, the more I realized that no matter what Uber did, some people would have likely twisted it into being a way to bash Uber. Here were the options:

• Leave surge pricing in place: People would still argue that Uber "broke the strike" and, even worse, they'd argue that the "greedy" company was "profiteering" off of it by charging much higher rates. Dropping surge pricing actually decreases the supply of drivers, decreases the profit for the company and actually doesn't help Uber very much, because it means longer waits and fewer riders and drivers.
• Stop offering service to/from JFK: People would argue that this was Uber actively working to stop people from getting to the protests, especially since there was a period of time when the police were blocking the AirTrain, which is JFK's main connection to the NYC subway system.
• Stay silent: If only that were possible. My twitter feed over the weekend was full of reporters from major publications tweeting out over and over again their demands from basically every tech company to put out a statement or do something. And, indeed, Uber's CEO had sent out an email making it pretty clear that he didn't support the executive order at all, and that they were actively looking to help Uber drivers who were impacted by all of this.

And then, of course, there was the final option, which was dropping surge pricing, which was probably (quite reasonably!) seen inside the company as a show of support for the protestors, in that they were making it cheaper for people to get to and from JFK to take part in the protests.

I brought this point up with some on Twitter, and their response was that even if it was well intentioned, it didn't matter, because the impact was to "undermine" the work stoppage. That's also silly. Of all things, my undergrad degree is actually in labor relations, and that included multiple semesters of labor history and studying all sorts of things related to work stoppages and the like. When the point of a work stoppage is to push for better wages, then obviously, scabs or breaking a strike, is reasonably problematic to that strategy. But that's not what the NYC taxicab drivers were doing. They weren't making Donald Trump's life any harder (I'm reasonably assuming, he wasn't waiting for a cab from Terminal 4). What they were doing was a symbolic protest to make it widely know that they don't approve. And they accomplished that mission. Uber's decision had no impact on it (and, arguably, drew more attention to the protest).

So, sure, if you don't like Uber for this, that, or the other thing, feel free to continue to dislike Uber for those reasons. But if you deleted your Uber app because you thought it somehow "broke the strike," you massively overreacted and got sucked in by a meme that involved taking things out of context and misrepresenting reality.

Admittedly, there was one thing that Uber could have done, and didn't -- which was the strategy that its main competitor Lyft did take: announcing plans to donate $1 million to the ACLU (over the course of four years) directly in response to the executive order. This is actually a really great move by Lyft, and kudos to them. Kalanick later announced a $3 million "legal" fund to help Uber drivers, but that's not quite the same thing. Directly donating to organizations that will fight the executive order is a great thing and Lyft deserves lots of kudos for it -- but it's still a bit silly to argue that every company had to take that step to not be the target of a massive negative campaign.

Filed Under: immigration, jfk, protests, ride hailing, ride sharing, strike breaking, strikes, surge pricing
Companies: lyft, uber

Buying Adwords Isn't Quite The Same Thing As Striking...

from the collective-advertising? dept

Forget collective bargaining or a sitdown strike, it appears that Britain's largest private-sector union is engaging in... well... buying some Google ads in protest. The Times Online tries to make this out to be an alternative to a strike or a walkout, and even implies that buying a few Adwords on Google to show their displeasure with the retailer Marks & Spencer would have a similar impact. It's difficult to see why buying some ads on the Marks & Spencer ad is going to have much of an impact at all on any negotiations with the union. The article is actually fairly weak -- not explaining clearly that the union is just buying ads that anyone could buy. It makes it sound as if the union is doing something special to have its complaints seen on Google. It also doesn't mention that M&S could just outbid the union to get a higher ranking in the ads and to explain its side of the story. It is nice that the group is trying alternative means to get its point across, but it hardly seems worth comparing it to a strike, as the article implies.

Filed Under: advertisements, adwords, labor protest, strikes
Companies: google, marks & spencer

Royalty Agreements Holding Up Necessary Change In The Music Industry

from the need-a-clean-break dept

Eliot Van Buskirk over at Wired's Listening Post has an interesting article about the latest music royalty battle: focused on royalties for songwriters and music publishers. He likens it to the TV writer's strike issue, and sides with the songwriters, noting that the recording industry needs to encourage songwriters to write good songs, and stiffing them won't help. However, I disagree that the best way to do this is to agree to what the songwriters are asking for -- which is a larger defined cut of any use of their songs. Just as the TV writers are wrong in pushing for an extra cut of internet revenue, the same is true in this situation. Yes, in both cases, it's totally understandable and reasonable to feel sympathy for the writers -- who are often squeezed out of money and treated unfairly by the big entertainment companies. I'm not denying that at all. However, it's the very structure of this compensation that's going to cause more harm than good in the long term. It will limit the options for the entertainment companies, and allow others, not tied to those legacy agreements, to run rings around them. It provides a crutch for the songwriters, allowing them to lean on that, rather than embrace important new business models. These types of agreements will only slow down the adoption of new models and will only make it less likely that people can earn a living from writing either TV shows or music.

Why? Well, with regards to music, the trend is clear that the music world itself is increasingly moving towards free music. That's just basic economics at work. Yet, by tacking on a defined royalty on each download or streamed song, it makes it much harder for anyone tied into that royalty system to actually embrace the opportunities that free music provides. And if you recognize that those opportunities are likely to be even larger than the existing market, then by agreeing to these royalty payments, the songwriters are actually limiting their own market potential. In the end, all it does is artificially inflate prices, leaving more efficient and innovative solutions to route around the existing songwriters, rather than rewarding them. Just like everyone else, songwriters will need to learn to change the way they're compensated. Trying to inflate the old, obsolete system won't help things. It will only make it that much more difficult for the entire industry to change.

One other aside on all of this. In the comments, more than a few times, we've had discussions where people have suggested that the models we've discussed wouldn't work for songwriters, specifically, claiming that the old system is fine, but any new system would never work -- ignoring the many ways it could work (using a straightforward pay-for-hire setup, for example). However, it's interesting to see that relying on the supposedly "successful" old model is starting to come under stress from everyone else in the industry. It highlights, once again, that when we talk about these models, it's silly to compare the "old way" and any "new way." It's more important to recognize that the old way just isn't sustainable. You need to compare the new models to what the old models are trending towards.

Filed Under: royalties, songwriters, strikes