I wish them luck on proving a conspiracy to start with, that is a pretty doubtful concept.
it's also legal tiddly winks for another reason: Many of those companies operate in China under a different corporate structure than in the US, and different again in their home (depending on where they live). Almost everything that happens in China is done on a joint venture basis with a local company, which means they are suing entities that aren't directly involved in the Chinese market.
Finally, I doubt they will find anything that can suggest that the operation was based in the US, or that any of the infringing took place in the US.
They are doing it here mostly because in China, they would pretty much get laughed out of court (if they even made it that far).
VX, it is never a question of stopping piracy as an absolute. It's the idea of making piracy less desirable, less easy, and less accessible.
Basically, it's a risk / reward deal. If the risk of putting the material out there is higher, it is less likely to happen. As there are only a very small number of people actually streaming the material, taking them on does in fact have an effect on piracy, because it makes the pirated material less accessible.
This is especially key on live events. We aren't talking about a torrent downloaded later, but rather a live stream of an event which is very specifically a "scarce commodity". This isn't something being openly broadcast, or performed in an open public place, it is an event in a closed establishment, distributed only to paying customers.
I suspect they would have less of a problem if the event showed up a few days later as a torrent, because their remaining value is only as replay on Spike.
Pay for Play, when properly disclosed, is legal. There are plenty of examples of it out there. Payola is a different game, where amounts are paid in private, without disclosure.
The recent issues of bloggers and such being required to disclose when they are paid for posting or have a relationship with companies they are posting about. When it's done above board and clearly, it is acceptable and legal.
Maybe you can provide some evidence to back that up. I won't hold my breath.
The question was how best to exploit that fickle market. At the time, a major record company might release upwards of a hundred singles a week. Then as now, maybe 10 percent of those would become hits, or at least make a profit for the label. Radio airplay was the easiest way for an artist to get exposure and sell records, but with singles pouring into the stations at such a fast clip, labels needed a way to distinguish their songs from those of their competitors. Since this was before the era of MTV and slick promotions, bribery seemed the way to go. Record labels hired promoters who paid deejays to feature songs by favored artists.
Derek, the answer is an absolutely vapid piece of writing, because it offers nothing. If they were truly offended by the level of secrecy around the talks, they would be in public being vocal about it, and not wanting to negotiate until things are put in public. They are not doing that.
Their reply is just one of those "we gently agree with you, now leave us alone" type of answers that tells you that absolutely nothing is going to come from it. They have no intention of action, no real sympathy, just a pat on the head and please go back to your room sort of answer.
As I said, if someone had said that the secrecy was bad for cows, their response would be some sort of bland sympathy for the impacted cattle, and "have a nice day". It's a non-answer, not some major policy statement.
If they have gone public with a major policy statement, had a press conference, summoned leaders, invited cameras, whatever, it would be something of action. This is just a buried comment that wouldn't have existed without the leading question asked by the citizen.
Again, I think you are playing a very technical card that isn't exactly correct.
If you want to guide people to an image, you would just link to it.
If you want to include and image as an integral part of your website, it is part of your page. I look at the source code of the site, and it's right there, you putting the image into the page.
A browser renders what is in the HTML. It doesn't make it up, it gets it's instructions from somewhere, the person who published the page, which includes the integral image, not matter where it comes from.
The Perfect 10 case revolves around "frame" of an image, with a very narrow scope in regards to Google's image search. That is significantly different from an image inline in the middle of a blog posting, example.
Thus, if I host my own image, and you open the webpage, you have now (based on your reasoning) made a direct infringement of my images by displaying them on your home computer.
This is the funniest part, because you ALMOST get it, and then fail because you are trying too hard to make reality match your views.
If you host your own image, and you write a webpage that includes it, you are specifically granting viewership rights to it as part of that webpage. You are NOT granting someone the right to take that image and use it somewhere else. You are granting the rights of viewership. Rendering of the webpage is at your instruction, not at the end user's instruction. You set up the image links, you are responsible for them. The end user does not control what appears on your page, you do.
It's incredibly funny to watch your tie yourself in knots on this one.
Since the very beginning of radio, musicians and labels have paid radio stations for airplay. It's called payola.
Some record companies have illegally paid to get music on the radio that otherwise would not make playlists, or specifically to keep others music off the playlists. For the most part, it's used to get airplay for crappy acts with little or no hope to getting noticed.
It isn't how the system works, it's how corruption works. That is a very different animal.
If Krist Novoselic does not like his music on YouTube, he should simply not use it.
Sadly, on of the ongoing issues with "user submitted content" websites is that the artist doesn't get to make that choice, "fans" make that choice. This isn't something that is easily within his control.
he goes on and on about how great things like YouTube and Twitter are for promoting his music -- while also wishing they would pay him for promoting his music.
He probably looks at youtube as essentially the same as radio or MTV. They get the use of the product for a small fee, and in return, they get to sell ads. While it does promote the music to some extent, it more often promotes the youtube brand as well. The more people that come to Youtube to see their videos, the more youtube profits.
It's sort of your typical "smart - dumb" play. I think he is smart to realize that his music still has both value and price. The longer the price remains at zero, the more likely the value will approach it.
UFC faces a problem that every content producer faces, which is if you don't do something about piracy in it's infancy, you may not be able to handle it later.
The costs right now are higher than the losses, but at the same time, it is also keeping the piracy from becoming ingrained. They risk looking like grinches to a small number of people today, but if they only start to address the issue when it becomes 20 or 30% of the potential viewership, they will have already lost the battle.
UFC is very good about promoting their product and putting a fair amount of their stuff out there in the public (specifically on SpikeTV). In fact, Monday will be their first live fight night for free on Spike. There is pretty much something UFC related on at least a couple of times a week.
It's really too bad that a few individuals are down to debating the person rather than debating ideas. It's one of the reasons I use to post with about 100 different handles, just to stop people going personally negative all the time.
You got it right, I suspect that Mr F. Off writes a lot of non-committal government correspondence.
But with direct linking and hotlinking, you're never making the copy of the copyrighted material. So there is no infringement on your part.
I don't think so. If it appeared on your website (as a hotlinked image) it would still be publishing. Publishing, by definition, means that everything on the page was "published". Copyright means the rights holder can choose where his or her images are published.
Otherwise, you get into a legal sink hole where you host all the illegal images in a place where they are either not illegal or copyright isn't respected, and suddenly you have a website full of material that isn't infringing. That would make no sense. It would allow a 100% end run on all things copyright.
Again, if the images were of an act that is illegal in the US, but legal in other countries (some countries allow topless / nudity at 16, example), would you be putting up child porn? The answer is yes, because you have published the image. Hotlinking isn't any different, you have published the image, and as such, violated the rights of the copyright holder.
Well, it's a bit of a tougher question to answer, because there is still a legal hole when it comes to websites.
The hole: Is a webpage an integral publication, or is it something else?
When a user looks at a page, they see an integral page. They see it as one published page (for that second). Yet, many of the elements can come from third parties (see the issue with playlists and myspace to see how that goes to crap). But the user doesn't know (or doesn't care).
In inline (hotlinked) image appears to be part of the website. As such, is the image "published"? It's an important legal question, because publishing or republishing is one of those terms / concepts that can trigger a claim of copyright infringement.
Another way to look at it might be this:
if you own a website, and you inline link 300 pictures of child porn, are you a child pornographer? I would say that you are very likely to find yourself spending time in a small, locked room with a guy named Bubba for about the next 10 - 20 years.
So if that act would get you in legal crap, why would it be any different for any other inline image?
This is a big battle in Canada as well. The networks and such want to get paid, because while the networks as a group are making money, the reality is that the smallest players have either been swallowed up (City, A Channel, Chum), are losing their asses bigtime (Global) or are running on the public dole (CBC). The local end of things is losing money hand over fist, and each of the networks including the CBC have been forced to shutter stations and terminate local news coverage, just to stay viable.
A more viable market model for the networks is to have only one "east" and one "west" network feed that runs 24 hours per day, don't broadcast locally at all, and just present via cable / sat. All of the local stuff is expensive as hell to do. They either want enough income to support the local model (which actually does matter) or to be able to walk away from regional broadcasting altogether, perhaps replacing it with a network repeater system.
The funniest part of this story (and the one that Mike would love) is the cable and sat companies are running the counter site:
Campaigns like this are why I tend to object to the term "DRM Tax". Using the word TAX is an attempt to scare consumers, to make them angry and upset, rather than to truly explain the nature of the situation. The cable companies fail to explain how they in facts of the situation, such as that they already pay the cable only channel companies significant money per user. They fail to explain how they in fact need Canadian content to be able to bring in more US programming (there are ratios here of Canadian to US channels), etc. They fail to explain to the public how they often take off hours times for cable channels and turn them into infomercial channels, not for the benefit of the broadcaster but for the benefit of the cable company, etc.
We don't know how good or bad Google Labs is (they are generally pretty quick), but the same could be said for Apple: The concept for this isn't something that came up in five minutes over lunch. Submitting it in June 2008 would likely mean that it was someone's idea 6 - 12 months earlier, if not longer.
For Google, the time from June 2008 (when the patent was submitted and published) and Feb 2009 is more than long enough to get something done.
I do think that Apple and Google could end up with an ugly, drawn out prior art fight in the near future. I think that Google may have a good case about latitude being blocked by Apple. However, since Google is starting to border on being a monopoly all by itself, I suspect they will let this one slide. I doubt they want any official types looking at their current plans and situation.
When you pretty much have to "join a community" to be able to install and maintain an OS, I consider it pretty much a fail. An OS needs to be a thing that just works, you ignore it, when you plug something new it, it works, etc.
Microsoft and Apple pretty much have the market cornered on functional OSes that don't require users to also be techies.
Linux is a great operating system, but it requires a level of technical ability and interest that most end users aren't going to want to spend.
It's a government granted system for blocking competitors.
No, it's a systems granted by the people to prevent duplicators. What Apple appears to be trying to do is as you say, which is NOT what the patent system is about.
It looks like they would have one hell of a prior art fight on their hands. However, if Apple had submitted the idea a couple of years back and the application is pending, then it might have been to their advantage not to give a duplicate product shelf space, as that would give Google some pretty good legal arguments to work with.
What is the date of the patent application? June 30, 2008
I am not suggesting the reply is from a citizen or group of citizens, but rather a UK official REPLYING to a citizen, in a manner that is pretty much a brush. They agree that "secrecy is bad, m'kay" but they aren't doing anything about it.
I suspect if the citizen had said the deal is bad for cows, the reply would have been some sort of agreement about cows.
Sorry RD, but you can try stuffing words in my mouth, but it would help. You really should take your meds, you have been doing so good with them recently.
You might want to try better tin foil too, this brand seems to be leaking.
2004 Total Movies Released: 567 Total Combined Gross: $9,327,315,935
2005 Total Movies Released: 594 Total Combined Gross: $8,825,324,278
2006 Total Movies Released: 808 Total Combined Gross: $9,225,689,414
2007 Total Movies Released: 1022 Total Combined Gross: $9,665,661,126
2008 Total Movies Released: 1037 Total Combined Gross: $9,705,677,862
2009 Total Movies Released: 1177 Total Combined Gross: $7,596,626,766
The 2009 number was only up until september. The actual number of releases should, in theory, have followed along to hit somewhere around 1400-1600 movies.
that would be 50% more movies than last year, and almost 3 times as many releases as 2004, with only a 25% increase in income.
So what you are saying it that Torrent Freak is wrong, and Mike was working from incorrect numbers?
Anyway, if you follow along the numbers, you can see that the 567 movies in 2004 made much more per movie than the current releases have done. Oddly, in 2004, movie file sharing was difficult to do (most people didn't have enough bandwidth to really do it in a timely manner). It's a big change, and I won't even get into discussing the effects of inflation and general costs on making movies.
Bottom line, there were more movies, they made not that much more money, which means less income per movie.
On the post: CyberSitter Sues The Chinese Government (In Los Angeles) Over Green Dam Filters
it's also legal tiddly winks for another reason: Many of those companies operate in China under a different corporate structure than in the US, and different again in their home (depending on where they live). Almost everything that happens in China is done on a joint venture basis with a local company, which means they are suing entities that aren't directly involved in the Chinese market.
Finally, I doubt they will find anything that can suggest that the operation was based in the US, or that any of the infringing took place in the US.
They are doing it here mostly because in China, they would pretty much get laughed out of court (if they even made it that far).
On the post: UFC Plans To Sue Individuals, Despite The Cost Being More Than Any 'Loss'
Re: Re:
Basically, it's a risk / reward deal. If the risk of putting the material out there is higher, it is less likely to happen. As there are only a very small number of people actually streaming the material, taking them on does in fact have an effect on piracy, because it makes the pirated material less accessible.
This is especially key on live events. We aren't talking about a torrent downloaded later, but rather a live stream of an event which is very specifically a "scarce commodity". This isn't something being openly broadcast, or performed in an open public place, it is an event in a closed establishment, distributed only to paying customers.
I suspect they would have less of a problem if the event showed up a few days later as a torrent, because their remaining value is only as replay on Spike.
On the post: Nirvana's Bassist: I Don't Understand Having ISPs Regulate Copyright Files, But I Support Bono's Position Anyway
Re: Re: Re: Re:
The recent issues of bloggers and such being required to disclose when they are paid for posting or have a relationship with companies they are posting about. When it's done above board and clearly, it is acceptable and legal.
Maybe you can provide some evidence to back that up. I won't hold my breath.
http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/2176/whats-the-story-on-the-radio-payola-scandal -of-the-1950s
The question was how best to exploit that fickle market. At the time, a major record company might release upwards of a hundred singles a week. Then as now, maybe 10 percent of those would become hits, or at least make a profit for the label. Radio airplay was the easiest way for an artist to get exposure and sell records, but with singles pouring into the stations at such a fast clip, labels needed a way to distinguish their songs from those of their competitors. Since this was before the era of MTV and slick promotions, bribery seemed the way to go. Record labels hired promoters who paid deejays to feature songs by favored artists.
Any questions?
On the post: UK Agrees That ACTA Secrecy Is Not In The Public Interest
Re: Re: Re: Re: Yet again, Anti-Mike worded something badly
Their reply is just one of those "we gently agree with you, now leave us alone" type of answers that tells you that absolutely nothing is going to come from it. They have no intention of action, no real sympathy, just a pat on the head and please go back to your room sort of answer.
As I said, if someone had said that the secrecy was bad for cows, their response would be some sort of bland sympathy for the impacted cattle, and "have a nice day". It's a non-answer, not some major policy statement.
If they have gone public with a major policy statement, had a press conference, summoned leaders, invited cameras, whatever, it would be something of action. This is just a buried comment that wouldn't have existed without the leading question asked by the citizen.
On the post: Is Inline Linking To An Image Copyright Infringement?
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Permission
If you want to guide people to an image, you would just link to it.
If you want to include and image as an integral part of your website, it is part of your page. I look at the source code of the site, and it's right there, you putting the image into the page.
A browser renders what is in the HTML. It doesn't make it up, it gets it's instructions from somewhere, the person who published the page, which includes the integral image, not matter where it comes from.
The Perfect 10 case revolves around "frame" of an image, with a very narrow scope in regards to Google's image search. That is significantly different from an image inline in the middle of a blog posting, example.
Thus, if I host my own image, and you open the webpage, you have now (based on your reasoning) made a direct infringement of my images by displaying them on your home computer.
This is the funniest part, because you ALMOST get it, and then fail because you are trying too hard to make reality match your views.
If you host your own image, and you write a webpage that includes it, you are specifically granting viewership rights to it as part of that webpage. You are NOT granting someone the right to take that image and use it somewhere else. You are granting the rights of viewership. Rendering of the webpage is at your instruction, not at the end user's instruction. You set up the image links, you are responsible for them. The end user does not control what appears on your page, you do.
It's incredibly funny to watch your tie yourself in knots on this one.
On the post: Nirvana's Bassist: I Don't Understand Having ISPs Regulate Copyright Files, But I Support Bono's Position Anyway
Re: Re:
Since the very beginning of radio, musicians and labels have paid radio stations for airplay. It's called payola.
Some record companies have illegally paid to get music on the radio that otherwise would not make playlists, or specifically to keep others music off the playlists. For the most part, it's used to get airplay for crappy acts with little or no hope to getting noticed.
It isn't how the system works, it's how corruption works. That is a very different animal.
If Krist Novoselic does not like his music on YouTube, he should simply not use it.
Sadly, on of the ongoing issues with "user submitted content" websites is that the artist doesn't get to make that choice, "fans" make that choice. This isn't something that is easily within his control.
On the post: Nirvana's Bassist: I Don't Understand Having ISPs Regulate Copyright Files, But I Support Bono's Position Anyway
He probably looks at youtube as essentially the same as radio or MTV. They get the use of the product for a small fee, and in return, they get to sell ads. While it does promote the music to some extent, it more often promotes the youtube brand as well. The more people that come to Youtube to see their videos, the more youtube profits.
It's sort of your typical "smart - dumb" play. I think he is smart to realize that his music still has both value and price. The longer the price remains at zero, the more likely the value will approach it.
On the post: UFC Plans To Sue Individuals, Despite The Cost Being More Than Any 'Loss'
The costs right now are higher than the losses, but at the same time, it is also keeping the piracy from becoming ingrained. They risk looking like grinches to a small number of people today, but if they only start to address the issue when it becomes 20 or 30% of the potential viewership, they will have already lost the battle.
UFC is very good about promoting their product and putting a fair amount of their stuff out there in the public (specifically on SpikeTV). In fact, Monday will be their first live fight night for free on Spike. There is pretty much something UFC related on at least a couple of times a week.
On the post: UK Agrees That ACTA Secrecy Is Not In The Public Interest
Re: Re: Yet again, Anti-Mike worded something badly
You got it right, I suspect that Mr F. Off writes a lot of non-committal government correspondence.
On the post: Is Inline Linking To An Image Copyright Infringement?
Re: Re:
I don't think so. If it appeared on your website (as a hotlinked image) it would still be publishing. Publishing, by definition, means that everything on the page was "published". Copyright means the rights holder can choose where his or her images are published.
Otherwise, you get into a legal sink hole where you host all the illegal images in a place where they are either not illegal or copyright isn't respected, and suddenly you have a website full of material that isn't infringing. That would make no sense. It would allow a 100% end run on all things copyright.
Again, if the images were of an act that is illegal in the US, but legal in other countries (some countries allow topless / nudity at 16, example), would you be putting up child porn? The answer is yes, because you have published the image. Hotlinking isn't any different, you have published the image, and as such, violated the rights of the copyright holder.
On the post: Is Inline Linking To An Image Copyright Infringement?
The hole: Is a webpage an integral publication, or is it something else?
When a user looks at a page, they see an integral page. They see it as one published page (for that second). Yet, many of the elements can come from third parties (see the issue with playlists and myspace to see how that goes to crap). But the user doesn't know (or doesn't care).
In inline (hotlinked) image appears to be part of the website. As such, is the image "published"? It's an important legal question, because publishing or republishing is one of those terms / concepts that can trigger a claim of copyright infringement.
Another way to look at it might be this:
if you own a website, and you inline link 300 pictures of child porn, are you a child pornographer? I would say that you are very likely to find yourself spending time in a small, locked room with a guy named Bubba for about the next 10 - 20 years.
So if that act would get you in legal crap, why would it be any different for any other inline image?
On the post: The Next Big Battle: Cable TV vs. The Internet
Re: The owner of fox news said...
http://localtvmatters.ca/
This is a big battle in Canada as well. The networks and such want to get paid, because while the networks as a group are making money, the reality is that the smallest players have either been swallowed up (City, A Channel, Chum), are losing their asses bigtime (Global) or are running on the public dole (CBC). The local end of things is losing money hand over fist, and each of the networks including the CBC have been forced to shutter stations and terminate local news coverage, just to stay viable.
A more viable market model for the networks is to have only one "east" and one "west" network feed that runs 24 hours per day, don't broadcast locally at all, and just present via cable / sat. All of the local stuff is expensive as hell to do. They either want enough income to support the local model (which actually does matter) or to be able to walk away from regional broadcasting altogether, perhaps replacing it with a network repeater system.
The funniest part of this story (and the one that Mike would love) is the cable and sat companies are running the counter site:
http://www.stopthetvtax.ca/
Campaigns like this are why I tend to object to the term "DRM Tax". Using the word TAX is an attempt to scare consumers, to make them angry and upset, rather than to truly explain the nature of the situation. The cable companies fail to explain how they in facts of the situation, such as that they already pay the cable only channel companies significant money per user. They fail to explain how they in fact need Canadian content to be able to bring in more US programming (there are ratios here of Canadian to US channels), etc. They fail to explain to the public how they often take off hours times for cable channels and turn them into infomercial channels, not for the benefit of the broadcaster but for the benefit of the cable company, etc.
It's ugly.
On the post: Apple Blocks Google App From iPhone While Trying To Patent The Same Invention?
Re: Re:
For Google, the time from June 2008 (when the patent was submitted and published) and Feb 2009 is more than long enough to get something done.
I do think that Apple and Google could end up with an ugly, drawn out prior art fight in the near future. I think that Google may have a good case about latitude being blocked by Apple. However, since Google is starting to border on being a monopoly all by itself, I suspect they will let this one slide. I doubt they want any official types looking at their current plans and situation.
On the post: Why Does Microsoft Limit Netbooks?
Re: Re: Re:
Microsoft and Apple pretty much have the market cornered on functional OSes that don't require users to also be techies.
Linux is a great operating system, but it requires a level of technical ability and interest that most end users aren't going to want to spend.
On the post: Apple Blocks Google App From iPhone While Trying To Patent The Same Invention?
No, it's a systems granted by the people to prevent duplicators. What Apple appears to be trying to do is as you say, which is NOT what the patent system is about.
It looks like they would have one hell of a prior art fight on their hands. However, if Apple had submitted the idea a couple of years back and the application is pending, then it might have been to their advantage not to give a duplicate product shelf space, as that would give Google some pretty good legal arguments to work with.
What is the date of the patent application? June 30, 2008
When was Latitude released? February 2009
It looks like Apple may have been first.
On the post: Google Isn't Targeting iPhone Users; It's Targeting Everyone Else (Maybe)
Re: Nuclear patent strike
On the post: UK Agrees That ACTA Secrecy Is Not In The Public Interest
Re: Clarification to the above:
I am not suggesting the reply is from a citizen or group of citizens, but rather a UK official REPLYING to a citizen, in a manner that is pretty much a brush. They agree that "secrecy is bad, m'kay" but they aren't doing anything about it.
I suspect if the citizen had said the deal is bad for cows, the reply would have been some sort of agreement about cows.
On the post: Will France's Three Strikes Law Matter?
Re:
On the post: Sony Won't Support Its Own Movie For An Oscar Over Misplaced Piracy Fears
Re: Erm..
You might want to try better tin foil too, this brand seems to be leaking.
On the post: Sony Won't Support Its Own Movie For An Oscar Over Misplaced Piracy Fears
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
2004 Total Movies Released: 567 Total Combined Gross: $9,327,315,935
2005 Total Movies Released: 594 Total Combined Gross: $8,825,324,278
2006 Total Movies Released: 808 Total Combined Gross: $9,225,689,414
2007 Total Movies Released: 1022 Total Combined Gross: $9,665,661,126
2008 Total Movies Released: 1037 Total Combined Gross: $9,705,677,862
2009 Total Movies Released: 1177 Total Combined Gross: $7,596,626,766
The 2009 number was only up until september. The actual number of releases should, in theory, have followed along to hit somewhere around 1400-1600 movies.
that would be 50% more movies than last year, and almost 3 times as many releases as 2004, with only a 25% increase in income.
http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20091027/1255556697.shtml
http://torrentfreak.com/son y-ceo-pleads-poverty-but-the-movie-industry-is-loaded-091027/
So what you are saying it that Torrent Freak is wrong, and Mike was working from incorrect numbers?
Anyway, if you follow along the numbers, you can see that the 567 movies in 2004 made much more per movie than the current releases have done. Oddly, in 2004, movie file sharing was difficult to do (most people didn't have enough bandwidth to really do it in a timely manner). It's a big change, and I won't even get into discussing the effects of inflation and general costs on making movies.
Bottom line, there were more movies, they made not that much more money, which means less income per movie.
Carry on.
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