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YouTube Finds Signing Rights Deals Frustrating
Carl Bialik from WSJ writes "YouTube executives are finding it a slog to get all of the necessary permissions to license the songs and shows users are putting on the popular site, the Wall Street Journal reports. 'YouTube or its partners must locate parties ranging from studios to actors, and from music composers to the owners of venues, and get them to sign off. Where they don't succeed, YouTube risks being hit with lawsuits or having to take popular content down. "It's such a mess because the [entertainment companies] have all of these valuable assets that are just locked up with so many people who need to sign off on them," says YouTube Chief Executive Chad Hurley. "I don't know what it requires, if the government needs to be involved," Mr. Hurley laughs. "I don't know."'"
At least you have some entities getting out ahead of this and cooperating with YouTube/Google Video to get their content out there, like the NHL. They're including current games, as well as selected "classics" from previous ones. They're even interested in incorporating user-generated content into the mix...
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What you're missing here is that it's the government's fault for creating our system of copyright without instituting systems to make it simpler.
Now, a lot of the stuff on Youtube is just other people's content that's been put up without their permission. This stuff being on youtube has little cultural value simply because it's available through other avenues, it's not like they're preserving our cultural heritage. But other things, like a music video made by being cobbled together from various sources, can actually be a culturally valuable work - I won't go into how and why, because either you agree or you don't and I'm not going to change your mind here. Obviously most examples of this particular genre are crap.
Our conception of copyright is hampering creativity, not enabling it. The idea of laws is that they are supposed to be in the public interest. If they are not, they should not exist. Hampering creativity is not in the public interest. The government should either streamline copyright, or do away with it entirely. Instead, copyright has been extended twice. A tree jumped out in front of one of the responsible assholes and took care of him, but it was far too late (trees don't move very fast, so it makes sense.) But really we should be looking at the whole concept of copyright and deciding without the assistance of the media conglomerates whether or not it's even a valid concept.
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Not to say that Google are complete idiots, but we all knew this was coming.
Were I behind the reigns at Google, I would have required they at least ink a few big content licensing deals before closing the transaction. In fact, with a bunch of licensing deals in place, possibly even some exclusive ones, I could see justifying a high valuation.
Why pay the huge takeout premium they paid and then have to do all the hard work after the takeout? I meant, the technology is commoditized and trivial, and the userbase can't really be worth that much to a company as big as Google, especially when they already have Google Video and could easily outgrow YouTube by spending a tiny fraction of the takeout price on advertising and promotions.
The whole deal is just downright strange.
This hasn't been so much of an issue with respect to television. The number of outlets providing video feeds is, relatively speaking, quite small, and what they play is sufficiently uniform (or self-created) that a bureaucracy like ASCAP is unnecessary. But this changes with GooTube. Under the current model, YouTube does not have control over what gets uploaded to the site. This means they either have to police the site to be sure copyrighted content stays off -- which is difficult if not impossible, and not what the viewers want in any event -- or they have to slog through the myriad possible copyright owners who could end up on YouTube.
An ASCAP like organization solves this conflict, and it benefits both YouTube and copyright holders. By banding together in this type of organization, the copyright holders can leverage their collective value to extract money from YouTube (and everyone else). That is, all copyright holders acting together will get far more money from YouTube than acting alone. On the flip side, YouTube gets to avoid the significant expense of acquiring licenses (as TFA says), and insure against the always-real possibility of a lawsuit for copyright infringement.
It's a model that has worked in music for many decades, and it's what we need to look for in video.
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It most certainly is the government's responsibility! Copyright law is there to serve the public good by promoting work that is of a benefit to everyone. Copyright is failing to do that in some stunning ways, and has instead become a vehicle for large corporations to continue to milk profits out of their OLD work more than a generation after it was created. That's actually contrary to the stated purpose in the Constitution.
IMHO, the laws should be written such that "violation" of copyright is always permitted unless someone complains (thus, you can't be put in jail for violating the DMCA or sued for other copyright related laws) and sent you a cese and decist letter first, which you ignored. Second, licensing should be automatic. That is, You Tube should be able to pay the copyright-holder-of-record or put aside a fund for a copyright holder to claim from, in an amount that is based on a percentage of the gross revenue associated with the infringement. This amount should be high, but not punative (maybe 25-30%), essentially allowing You Tube (only as a single example) to operate, but incenting licensing negotiation for better deals.
Of course, we all know that life+n years is unworkable, as we've all read far too many very thoughtful people write essays on the subject of the harm that that does to the commons. I think it's prety obvious, based on that, that Byrne and other treaties need to be re-negotiated, and laws changed to reflect a more reasonable period. I could see a case for 40 years, but I think the scale needs to be more flexible for those elements that are part of our cultural makeup. Perhaps 20 years, renewable twice, but with an automatic expiration if it is determined to be one of the top 1000 or so most circulated items after the first renewal period starts. That way, if a movie becomes so iconic that nearly everyone owns a copy (e.g. Star Wars), then it would expire around 20 years later, after the owner has clearly made enough money to have rewarded his or her investment of time and energy, and it is now of more value to the culture to release it than to continue to reward one person. Think about that. Star Wars: A New Hope, under this scheme, would have been public domain starting in 1997. Empire in 2000. Lucas was stupidly rich by that point, and would only lose the copyright IF he was stupidly rich. It's a perfect, self-correcting system, lacking only a government system of tracking the most widely circulated copyrighted works, which would also be a boon for the consumer and artist (as current industry tracking is designed to promote specific items and limit rewards to artists).
Who said it was more valuable? The point is not that it is priceless, but rather that it is not worthless.
It is a creative activity, and the purpose of copyright law is to promote creative activities, not to protect the jobs of professionals. We must encourage creativity from everyone, even those who turn out not to be very good at it; universal participation is the only way to guarantee that the talented will discover their abilities in time to contribute to society. If copyright law has evolved into something that is more concerned with protecting existing works than with incentivising new works -- if it has evolved into something that is stifling any form of creative expression, no matter how trivial or pointless you may think that form -- then it is broken, and should be fixed.
Besides, your "amateur piecing together work done by professionals" may be another person's "subversive genius deconstructing modern culture". Consider Duchamp's Fountain, one of the most significant sculptures of the 20th century; to a connoiseur of ceramics, no doubt it's just an amateur rotating a urinal that was manufactured by professionals with lots of skill who devoted a lot of time to developing that urinal, but for some reason more people remember the guy who rotated it than the guy who actually designed it...
Assuming you intended to ask "how do we know whether it would do more harm or more good", the answer is that we don't know, but we can make a fairly shrewd guess by looking at history. From history, we see that lax copyright has rarely prevented creative geniuses from producing amazing works of art.
For example, Shakespeare's works were constantly copied, with poor-quality pirate editions often hitting the streets before his authorized publishers had finished setting their type. This did not prevent him from writing more plays. On the contrary, it created a situation where he had to keep writing more plays to earn a living! If Shakespeare lived today, he could just write Hamlet and then retire, secure in the knowledge that he, his children, and even his grandchildren would have a secure source of income from the royalties. He wouldn't have any pressing financial reason to write e.g. King Lear. Perhaps he'd write it anyway; perhaps he wouldn't. People are motivated by things other than money. The point is that copyright law deals primarily with money, and modern copyright law would reduce, rather than increase, the financial incentive for a modern Shakespeare to continue to produce plays.
Can you think of any counter-examples? Are there any geniuses we can identify who only produced great works of art because they would be protected by copyright, or geniuses who refused to produce great works of art because they considered copyright protections inadequate?
I think I see where you are getting at. I envision a television channel that plays music videos, perhaps it could be like a radio station but instead of just playing the songs they would play the music videos. Plus, instead of disc jockeys, or D-jays, this music television thing would have video jockeys or V-Jays. I do think the name, "Music Television", is too long though for today's fast paced society, it needs a shorter name. I think, M, for Music and TV for televsion would work well together. Yes, I think this could be done. In fact, I now only think this will work but I want it, I want my MTV.