Where's the line between a "bait and switch" and just normal contract renegotiations?
You realize that these labels in question are not just typical users: they are YouTube partners with direct contracts and relationships with YouTube. And now, before the next renewal cycle on those contracts, YouTube wants to renegotiate. With 90% of their partners, they have reached a new deal; with 10%, they have not. And thus those 10% will no longer be YouTube partners.
All sounds like pretty straightforward business to me. If that's a bait and switch, then nobody is ever allowed to legally renegotiate any deal of any kind without being accused of the same.
Your argument sounds a lot like the dinosaur music labels: We make shitloads of money, and some artists still get some. So they should be happy. They can't be unhappy with the scraps we leave them.
Okay -- but here's the thing: YouTube is making an offer to get the license to host your videos. If you don't like the offer, because you think it's unfair or exploitative, don't take it. Don't grant them the license.
But now, having not accepted the offer and not granted YouTube a license, what exactly do you expect them to do? You have not given them permission to host your videos — so of course they have to take them down. It would be copyright infringement to leave them up.
Though the details of the deals aren't public, currently it sounds like the only difference is the guarantees/minimum payouts. Which, honestly, is perfectly fair -- it's not saying indie music is worth less per listen, just that it's not as sure a bet for a certain number of listens as the pop hits pumped out by the majors.
It only matters if you are a consumer of their product. The law doesn't touch you if you aren't trying to share their movies or music. So your argument is sort of self defeating, you are only subject to their actions if you choose to be.
That could not be further from the truth. Rarely a week goes by that we don't hear several stories of bogus DMCA takedowns, spurious lawsuits and dishonest threat letters targeting perfectly legitimate content.
When the industry pushes for SOPA-like powers to arbitrarily shut down whatever it feels like online, that effects everyone. When Hollywood gets a through-line to the FBI and has the agency acting as its private police force, that's a national concern.
When the industry pushed for automatic copyright, it became the case for every single person: whether you want it or not, you get a copyright on everything, and it's very difficult to eliminate that copyright -- it's not your choice anymore. When the industry pushed for copyright extension, it applied not only to everyone living and still unborn, but to plenty of people long dead -- it took countless works out of the public domain and flagrantly broke the contract with the public that copyright represents.
it's pretty simple. As long as they are making enough money to keep perpetuating their business models, they will do so, and they will spend the money earned from you to do it.
Again... more power to them! If they can perpetuate their business models, that's fine by me, and I hope they make a profit doing so. They just don't get to change and abuse laws in order to accomplish that, nor should they continue whining about the obstacles they face. So long as they continue to do so, I'll call them "legacy" and feel just fine about it, thanks very much.
You misunderstand if you think I wish to see them die, or if you think I care that much if they change. What I'm opposed to is them attempting to take the third option: abusing and changing laws in the hopes they can survive without adapting.
You ask us to "stop making it profitable" -- but why would we want to do that? I'm happy to see them make a profit. They are the ones complaining that their profit is at risk, and fighting for draconian copyright law and against open network design on that rationale.
It also raises the question: if the stripper had been wearing regular clothes over her getup, would that be strategically covered strategically covered nudity?
The title was just supposed to be jokey... i.e. "who needs 'em" as a way of introducing the topic of indirect interactions between technology and the brain. It wasn't intended to make any kind of serious statement on the necessity/inevitability/anything else of direct brain-computer communication one way or the other.
That said, your analogy baffles me. Neural interfaces are just like condiments? Because, er, they will get us past the singularity? That makes no sense. In fact, if we ever do reach a point where humanity is constantly and intimately connected to technology, something like Soylent would likely be more popular as people turned their attentions away from material stimulation and towards direct sensory stimulation through the brain.
Either way though, at the end of the day, I'm all for continued research on neural interfacing, and have been following it since the first time scientists connected a single brain cell from a slug to a computer chip ages ago.
Care to explain what part you misunderstood? Because my statement is 100% correct -- if they have no copyright on these photos, they cannot control copies of these photos.
It appears that the museum is not trying to claim copyright on anything. They are simply importing "fair use" rules into their terms and conditions for using their website. In other words, they are saying that if (hypothetically) these images were copyrighted but your use would qualify as "fair use", then that use is okay under these terms and conditions too. (Although good luck with enforcing that.)
Even apart from it being unenforceable, it's ultimately legal nonsense. I suppose they could try to argue that someone using the public domain images commercially violates their terms of service... but, how does that really work when copies are ephemeral and infinite? For example, what if I say this:
"I downloaded the high-res image for my personal, non-commercial use: republishing it in my own free archive of public domain artwork. I then began using copies of that public domain art for whatever purposes I damn well felt like, because it's public domain."
That may sound absurd, and it is deliberately so somewhat, but it's still really the central issue: once I've obtained a piece of digital public domain art from their site, they simply have no control over it -- even if we accept that they have control over their "original" downloaded from their site -- because copies of that original can be made trivially and infinitely, and they have no legal basis for controlling copies.
Yup -- it'd be hard to pin down exact numbers, but it seems clear that copyfraud is just as common (if not moreso) than piracy, and almost certainly much more common on a commercial scale.
the museum does still have a right to control how photographs they paid to have done are used.
Sure -- if they print out some physical photos, or if this had been shot on film, then they would own those prints / negatives just like they would own any other property.
But they have no control over how copies of the photos are used, because that's what copyright covers. So if they choose to make the photos available digitally, they have no control over what people do with them after that, and no right to stop people from taking copies or tell them what they are allowed to use those copies for.
Sadly, there's no simple answer to any of this stuff (even though there should be).
Firstly, on the subject of straight digitization, it's extremely hard to make any argument under copyright law that simply scanning/digitizing something earns you a copyright over it -- but it's also true that museums, archives and plenty of others claim this copyright anyway as a matter of course. In theory, this was made clear in a 1999 lawsuit that flatly stated "exact photographic copies" of public domain images do not receive a new copyright, but that doesn't seem to stop anyone, and I'm not aware of any major recent cases that have really tested the rule, though I'm probably missing something.
Certain things are clear though, and one is that work or "sweat of the brow" does not establish a copyright. Copyright is for creativity, not effort, which is why a database of facts like phone numbers -- though difficult to assemble -- does not receive a copyright. Of course, even here, people still claim otherwise. Further complicating things is that Europe does have a special "database right" -- though there is pushback.
Then there's the question of photographing sculptures. As noted, it's a bit of a grey area, in theory coming down to a fair use/transformative work determination, which is notoriously ill-defined. Unfortunately, the outcome is often ludicrous, such as with the US post office losing a lawsuit over a stamp with a photo of the Korean War Memorial. If you look at that post, you'll see that the photo is pretty much the definition of a "creative" and "original" take on the sculpture -- it's shot on a snowy day in high contrast and a bleached out colour palette -- but it was found to be infringing on the sculptor's copyright. AFAIK the suit is still in court to determine damages -- with the sculptor requesting millions, after being originally awarded $5000, which the appeals court agreed was too low for some reason. Making things even more idiotic is that the war memorial is on public land and is owned by the Federal Government -- but the government didn't acquire the copyright or release it to the public domain in any way.
The same thing gets raised regarding street art. Photographers are often forced to settle for publishing shots that contain street art in public places -- and not just shots square-on showing the art, but other unrelated photos that happen to include the artwork.
Not all traditions are ancient! Maybe this is my Canadianness showing, but foam beer koozies with hockey team logos on them are definitely a tradition :)
Yeah but the growler trend (which admittedly I'm not a part of, but the cap looks neat) appears to be more about buying something nice that you don't necessarily drink all at once, even if it's just a matter of having a pint tonight with dinner and one again tomorrow.
On the post: That Story You've Read About YouTube 'Blocking' Indie Artists... Yeah, That's Not Accurate
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You realize that these labels in question are not just typical users: they are YouTube partners with direct contracts and relationships with YouTube. And now, before the next renewal cycle on those contracts, YouTube wants to renegotiate. With 90% of their partners, they have reached a new deal; with 10%, they have not. And thus those 10% will no longer be YouTube partners.
All sounds like pretty straightforward business to me. If that's a bait and switch, then nobody is ever allowed to legally renegotiate any deal of any kind without being accused of the same.
On the post: That Story You've Read About YouTube 'Blocking' Indie Artists... Yeah, That's Not Accurate
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Okay -- but here's the thing: YouTube is making an offer to get the license to host your videos. If you don't like the offer, because you think it's unfair or exploitative, don't take it. Don't grant them the license.
But now, having not accepted the offer and not granted YouTube a license, what exactly do you expect them to do? You have not given them permission to host your videos — so of course they have to take them down. It would be copyright infringement to leave them up.
On the post: That Story You've Read About YouTube 'Blocking' Indie Artists... Yeah, That's Not Accurate
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On the post: Funniest/Most Insightful Comments Of The Week At Techdirt
Re: Re: Re: legacy
That could not be further from the truth. Rarely a week goes by that we don't hear several stories of bogus DMCA takedowns, spurious lawsuits and dishonest threat letters targeting perfectly legitimate content.
When the industry pushes for SOPA-like powers to arbitrarily shut down whatever it feels like online, that effects everyone. When Hollywood gets a through-line to the FBI and has the agency acting as its private police force, that's a national concern.
When the industry pushed for automatic copyright, it became the case for every single person: whether you want it or not, you get a copyright on everything, and it's very difficult to eliminate that copyright -- it's not your choice anymore. When the industry pushed for copyright extension, it applied not only to everyone living and still unborn, but to plenty of people long dead -- it took countless works out of the public domain and flagrantly broke the contract with the public that copyright represents.
it's pretty simple. As long as they are making enough money to keep perpetuating their business models, they will do so, and they will spend the money earned from you to do it.
Again... more power to them! If they can perpetuate their business models, that's fine by me, and I hope they make a profit doing so. They just don't get to change and abuse laws in order to accomplish that, nor should they continue whining about the obstacles they face. So long as they continue to do so, I'll call them "legacy" and feel just fine about it, thanks very much.
On the post: Funniest/Most Insightful Comments Of The Week At Techdirt
Re: legacy
You ask us to "stop making it profitable" -- but why would we want to do that? I'm happy to see them make a profit. They are the ones complaining that their profit is at risk, and fighting for draconian copyright law and against open network design on that rationale.
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On the post: DailyDirt: Who Needs A Neural Interface?
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On the post: DailyDirt: Who Needs A Neural Interface?
Re: Who Needs Condiments For Food?
That said, your analogy baffles me. Neural interfaces are just like condiments? Because, er, they will get us past the singularity? That makes no sense. In fact, if we ever do reach a point where humanity is constantly and intimately connected to technology, something like Soylent would likely be more popular as people turned their attentions away from material stimulation and towards direct sensory stimulation through the brain.
Either way though, at the end of the day, I'm all for continued research on neural interfacing, and have been following it since the first time scientists connected a single brain cell from a slug to a computer chip ages ago.
On the post: Metropolitan Museum Of Art Claims Copyright Over Massive Trove Of Public Domain Works
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On the post: Metropolitan Museum Of Art Claims Copyright Over Massive Trove Of Public Domain Works
Re: Re: Re: Possibly not copyrightable, but...
On the post: Metropolitan Museum Of Art Claims Copyright Over Massive Trove Of Public Domain Works
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On the post: Metropolitan Museum Of Art Claims Copyright Over Massive Trove Of Public Domain Works
Re: Terms and Conditions
Even apart from it being unenforceable, it's ultimately legal nonsense. I suppose they could try to argue that someone using the public domain images commercially violates their terms of service... but, how does that really work when copies are ephemeral and infinite? For example, what if I say this:
"I downloaded the high-res image for my personal, non-commercial use: republishing it in my own free archive of public domain artwork. I then began using copies of that public domain art for whatever purposes I damn well felt like, because it's public domain."
That may sound absurd, and it is deliberately so somewhat, but it's still really the central issue: once I've obtained a piece of digital public domain art from their site, they simply have no control over it -- even if we accept that they have control over their "original" downloaded from their site -- because copies of that original can be made trivially and infinitely, and they have no legal basis for controlling copies.
On the post: Metropolitan Museum Of Art Claims Copyright Over Massive Trove Of Public Domain Works
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On the post: Metropolitan Museum Of Art Claims Copyright Over Massive Trove Of Public Domain Works
Re: Possibly not copyrightable, but...
Sure -- if they print out some physical photos, or if this had been shot on film, then they would own those prints / negatives just like they would own any other property.
But they have no control over how copies of the photos are used, because that's what copyright covers. So if they choose to make the photos available digitally, they have no control over what people do with them after that, and no right to stop people from taking copies or tell them what they are allowed to use those copies for.
On the post: Metropolitan Museum Of Art Claims Copyright Over Massive Trove Of Public Domain Works
Re: Re:
Firstly, on the subject of straight digitization, it's extremely hard to make any argument under copyright law that simply scanning/digitizing something earns you a copyright over it -- but it's also true that museums, archives and plenty of others claim this copyright anyway as a matter of course. In theory, this was made clear in a 1999 lawsuit that flatly stated "exact photographic copies" of public domain images do not receive a new copyright, but that doesn't seem to stop anyone, and I'm not aware of any major recent cases that have really tested the rule, though I'm probably missing something.
Certain things are clear though, and one is that work or "sweat of the brow" does not establish a copyright. Copyright is for creativity, not effort, which is why a database of facts like phone numbers -- though difficult to assemble -- does not receive a copyright. Of course, even here, people still claim otherwise. Further complicating things is that Europe does have a special "database right" -- though there is pushback.
Then there's the question of photographing sculptures. As noted, it's a bit of a grey area, in theory coming down to a fair use/transformative work determination, which is notoriously ill-defined. Unfortunately, the outcome is often ludicrous, such as with the US post office losing a lawsuit over a stamp with a photo of the Korean War Memorial. If you look at that post, you'll see that the photo is pretty much the definition of a "creative" and "original" take on the sculpture -- it's shot on a snowy day in high contrast and a bleached out colour palette -- but it was found to be infringing on the sculptor's copyright. AFAIK the suit is still in court to determine damages -- with the sculptor requesting millions, after being originally awarded $5000, which the appeals court agreed was too low for some reason. Making things even more idiotic is that the war memorial is on public land and is owned by the Federal Government -- but the government didn't acquire the copyright or release it to the public domain in any way.
The same thing gets raised regarding street art. Photographers are often forced to settle for publishing shots that contain street art in public places -- and not just shots square-on showing the art, but other unrelated photos that happen to include the artwork.
"Mess" is definitely the most appropriate word.
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