The thing that kind of pisses me off about the Youtube copyright takedown stuff is the first company to really complain about it - back in 2007 - was Viacom. They cried that users shouldn't be...
The thing that kind of pisses me off about the Youtube copyright takedown stuff is the first company to really complain about it - back in 2007 - was Viacom. They cried that users shouldn't be able to just upload their content. Ok, fine. Problem was, they were uploading their own clips and then requesting takedowns on them to make it look like unauthorized uploads were a big problem on Youtube. Viacom sued Youtube for a ridiculous sum of money and they (Viacom) ultimately lost; but in spite of that, it attracted unwelcome scrutiny to Youtube so that soon, every company (WMG was awful for this for the longest time) was demanding takedowns and so many videos got removed, killing a big part of 'early' internet culture... so what are the lessons to be learned? 1) Viacom are scumbags and they should have been punished more harshly than they were and 2) Someone has to stand up to nonsense like this before it picks up steam... I'm very much an 'information wants to be free' type person and I don't think having stuff freely available online is as damaging as corporations think it is
The simple solution is to make bad faith takedowns expensive for the trolls that file them. Right now they just flag everything with no due diligence, and youtube is somehow expected to eat the...
The simple solution is to make bad faith takedowns expensive for the trolls that file them. Right now they just flag everything with no due diligence, and youtube is somehow expected to eat the expense of validation. If it starts costing the trolls every time they file a bogus claim they'll clean up their acts immediately. Youtube could charge them punitively for the claims that are bogus.
Really though, it comes back to the foolishness of copyright itself. Laws that are literal centuries old and intended to govern a printing press shouldn't be extended into the digital age. We need something that's more along the lines of a profit-rights system, and then when disputes happen, we worry about who gets paid and allow claims on the revenue rather than taking things down. Use whatever media you like, just expect that you'll be paying some of your revenue to the rights holders for that use.
It's ridiculous that this feature took so long to arrive. Before this, YouTubers had to upload the video to a second test channel, to see if it would get blocked. (And even that wasn't perfect,...
It's ridiculous that this feature took so long to arrive. Before this, YouTubers had to upload the video to a second test channel, to see if it would get blocked. (And even that wasn't perfect, since sometimes the video would pass on the test channel but would get claimed on the main one.) It won't protect creators from manual claims, but it's a lot better than not being warned at all.
Are YouTube's rules too harsh, or is it simply necessary for appeasing rightsholders and advertisers?
It's a compromise. Nothing about US copyright law requires that they be proactive. Under S. 230, as long as they have a mechanism for copyright holders to DMCA videos and comply with the...
It's a compromise. Nothing about US copyright law requires that they be proactive. Under S. 230, as long as they have a mechanism for copyright holders to DMCA videos and comply with the takedowns, they can maintain safe harbor status.
However, many of the early Youtube hits were funny people doing funny things to hit music; Youtube would have no choice but to take them all down if they were DMCA'd. So the compromise is that Youtube would proactively algomagically detect copyright violations and grant the ad money from those to the music industry - in return, the music industry would refrain from DMCAing everything.
I'm not sure how this would look in Youtube today. These days, the big youtubers are more professional, and more conscious. It's no longer randos casually making funny videos - it's people who try to become amateur content creators. They use royalty free music, or licensed content from stock providers.
Could Youtube revert to a passive take? Maybe. Not super obvious, though.
The thing that kind of pisses me off about the Youtube copyright takedown stuff is the first company to really complain about it - back in 2007 - was Viacom. They cried that users shouldn't be able to just upload their content. Ok, fine. Problem was, they were uploading their own clips and then requesting takedowns on them to make it look like unauthorized uploads were a big problem on Youtube. Viacom sued Youtube for a ridiculous sum of money and they (Viacom) ultimately lost; but in spite of that, it attracted unwelcome scrutiny to Youtube so that soon, every company (WMG was awful for this for the longest time) was demanding takedowns and so many videos got removed, killing a big part of 'early' internet culture... so what are the lessons to be learned? 1) Viacom are scumbags and they should have been punished more harshly than they were and 2) Someone has to stand up to nonsense like this before it picks up steam... I'm very much an 'information wants to be free' type person and I don't think having stuff freely available online is as damaging as corporations think it is
The simple solution is to make bad faith takedowns expensive for the trolls that file them. Right now they just flag everything with no due diligence, and youtube is somehow expected to eat the expense of validation. If it starts costing the trolls every time they file a bogus claim they'll clean up their acts immediately. Youtube could charge them punitively for the claims that are bogus.
Really though, it comes back to the foolishness of copyright itself. Laws that are literal centuries old and intended to govern a printing press shouldn't be extended into the digital age. We need something that's more along the lines of a profit-rights system, and then when disputes happen, we worry about who gets paid and allow claims on the revenue rather than taking things down. Use whatever media you like, just expect that you'll be paying some of your revenue to the rights holders for that use.
People will, and I don't know if they're right, say that Youtube has to shoot first and ask questions later because that's how the law works
It's ridiculous that this feature took so long to arrive. Before this, YouTubers had to upload the video to a second test channel, to see if it would get blocked. (And even that wasn't perfect, since sometimes the video would pass on the test channel but would get claimed on the main one.) It won't protect creators from manual claims, but it's a lot better than not being warned at all.
Are YouTube's rules too harsh, or is it simply necessary for appeasing rightsholders and advertisers?
It's a compromise. Nothing about US copyright law requires that they be proactive. Under S. 230, as long as they have a mechanism for copyright holders to DMCA videos and comply with the takedowns, they can maintain safe harbor status.
However, many of the early Youtube hits were funny people doing funny things to hit music; Youtube would have no choice but to take them all down if they were DMCA'd. So the compromise is that Youtube would proactively algomagically detect copyright violations and grant the ad money from those to the music industry - in return, the music industry would refrain from DMCAing everything.
I'm not sure how this would look in Youtube today. These days, the big youtubers are more professional, and more conscious. It's no longer randos casually making funny videos - it's people who try to become amateur content creators. They use royalty free music, or licensed content from stock providers.
Could Youtube revert to a passive take? Maybe. Not super obvious, though.