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Dance Copyright Enforced by DMCA
goombah99 writes "The "creator" of the Dance move known as the electric slide has filed a DMCA based takedown notice for videos he deems to infringe and because they show "bad dancing". He is also seeking compensation from the use of the dance move at a wedding celebration shown on the Ellen Degeneres Show. Next up, the Funky Chicken, the moonwalk, and the Hustle? More seriously, does the DMCA have any limit on its scope?"
Richard Silver is lucky that noone's managed to copyright crap web pages. His page (with animated email gif & quicktime plugin required) does not leave a font, colour, alignment, highlighting, style or indentation untouched.
My eyeballs feel.... violated.
There are shills on slashdot. Apparently, I'm one of them.
No more copyrighted music at weddings without a license. I'm sure somebody owns the copyright on "Here comes the Bride". You can license it for your wedding at the low low price of $1995.
1) The DMCA is not an organization, it is a law. Laws get enforced. They don't go around doing the enforcing.
2) The claim has yet to be upheld (enforced) by any court or other governmental body.
3) Even if the letter is acted upon and the video is removed, that still doesn't indicate whether or not the DMCA is being properly applied (if not, then the DMCA can't be demonized in this situation). All it means is that someone decided removing the video was the easiest way to handle a potential problem.
Maybe this guy thought the DMCA was the Dance Millenium Copyright Act and wanted send the dance dance people to sing sing.
the Pogo!
Zoid.com
How about stretching and yawning at the same time! I'll make billions!!!
That's just copywrong.
https://www.eff.org/https-everywhere
When YouTube/Google turn on their revenue sharing plan for video makers, this is going to get ugly. One of the tenets for "fair use" is whether or not the use of the copyrighted material was whether the intent was of a commercial nature or not. Once revenue sharing starts, millions of legally "naive" video uploaders are suddenly going to find themselves thrown into the nasty side of the fair use litmus test. Watch how the DMCA takedowns and litigation filings skyrocket once money is involved (as it always does).
Robert Oschler - RobotsRule.com
Should it be patented or copyrighted?
I guess that mean we must stop moonwalking all over the place or be sued by Michael Jackson.
The more the law is used like this, the more it will be seen as absurd. When the DMCA is used to stomp on uses of technology the wider public can't understand it. When it's used to stop you from being filmed dancing a certain way in public it's understandable by everyone.
Unavailable for comment.
They say the first thing to go is your penis. Well, it's either that or your brain. I forget which...
...but since this is the internet, I'd probably make more money if I copyright the 'Dirty Sanchez', 'Standing up in a shower doing it from behind' and 'Two midgets, a trapeze and the running start'.
The summary for this story is just weird. The DMCA is just the method of enforcement, because the performance is being displayed online.
Choreography is just one of the items that are protected by copyright, which is listed in 17 USC 102:
(a) Copyright protection subsists, in accordance with this title, in original works of authorship fixed in any tangible medium of expression, now known or later developed, from which they can be perceived, reproduced, or otherwise communicated, either directly or with the aid of a machine or device. Works of authorship include the following categories:
(1) literary works;
(2) musical works, including any accompanying words;
(3) dramatic works, including any accompanying music;
(4) pantomimes and choreographic works;
(5) pictorial, graphic, and sculptural works;
(6) motion pictures and other audiovisual works;
(7) sound recordings; and
(8) architectural works.
This statute was last revised in 1990. The DMCA did not add anything to it. I don't know how long choreography has been protected by copyright, but I would gamble that it's been at least fifty years or so.
He's not trying to stop people from doing the Electric Slide, he's trying to stop people from doing it incorrectly! He's mroe than willing to share the correct steps with everyone!
Of course trying to drill the correct steps into the thick booze-addled skulls of all the way-behind-the-curve morons that show up at people's weddings and make asses of themselves may be just a much a fool's errand as...well...getting Slashdot idiots to read articles!
You're using her as bait, Master!
makes me wish the electric slide was suddenly turned into the electric water slide.
This trick wouldn't work. He has no obligation or need to respond. If he owns the copyright, unless and until he issues you a license, you're out of luck.
Long before the DMCA, copyright subsisted in choreography (and thus dance moves) both at a statutory and common law level. I don't have my IP text with me to give cites, but if someone could help out I'd appreciate it.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Next up, the Funky Chicken, the moonwalk, and the Hustle?
Michael Jackson has patented the melting nose.
Table-ized A.I.
Has anyone else noticed that he is using that clip of copyrighted characters on his website doing line dancing. How much do you want to bet he doesn't have permission from the copyright holders to show that. Also, the music he has on line, the video he has on-line and THE VIDEO HE IS SELLING all contain the song The Electric Slide which he is NOT the copyright holder for.
One quick call to the RIAA and he is done for. Fight fire with Fire.
The only sad part is that I find myself defending line-dancing of any kind.
The ultimate irony would be if the videographer claimed copyright, the way so many wedding photographers do, and went after him for having a copy of the video. I haven't heard much about it lately, but apparently it is *really* difficult to find a wedding photographer who will simply take his fee and turn over the digital files and/or negatives. I once scanned my parent's wedding photo, and it occured to me that if I were to actually try and legally comply with copyright, I would have to locate the photographer in another state. He took the picture 50 years ago. He's probably dead. I'd have to find his heirs. Needless to say, I "pirated" my parent's wedding picture. Come and get me!
Now, I'm not war3z kiddie. I'm actually in favor of intellectual property as a concept (legal mumbo-jumbo about it not being property? feh!). Howeve, when it fails the "common sense" test in such an obvious way, you have to employ something called "judgement". Hopefully, that's what the judge will do, and pencil whip this silliness right ouf of court.
For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?
If only they did this with the Macarena.
This is awesome, it looks like the 'inventor' of the electric slide is actually serious but no matter ; we need something this ridiculous for the courts to go, "oh wait, maybe that was retarded of us to pass that ridiculous legislation in the first place". My only complaint about the whole thing is that the case itself, as the article points out - is on shaky ground solely because the videos may fall under fair-use rights.
The problem is that you can copyright a dance (any damned dance) in the first place. I'm going to go copyright 20 different punches, kicks and acrobatic moves then get paid by every single kung-fu movie producer in the world. This is totally ridiculous.
The best quote from the article, " I don't want future generations having to learn it wrong and then relearn it as I am being faced with now ". Seriously? This guy's got to be a complete idiot. Like this would ever be a scenario:
"Hi there guy that invented the electric slide. Wow, I'd love to take dance lessons from you"
"Great, let's get started - I'm going to show you the electric slide"
"Ohhh, I don't need to learn that one - I already know how to do it"
"show me"......... "you're doing it wrong"
"Oh MY GOD! WRONG? NOW I HAVE TO LEARN IT ALL OVER AGAIN!"
moron.
---
The Electric Slide Performed Correctly
Ace
If anybody is wondering, the quote unquote correct way to perform The Electric Slide is available here.
Ace
No. Copyright can be selectively enforced; no need to show due diligence. However, this copyright may be bogus for other reasons, especially considering that pre-1978 choreography copyrights are a lot more stringent, and Mr. Silver probably didn't do most of the steps needed.
Marxism is the opiate of dumbasses
There'll be no dancing around this issue.
The irony of course is that copyright, a mechanism intended to create a market for creative and intellectual works, effectively discourages participation in that market. The alternative of noncommercial fair use only underlines that failure. (Eliminating fair use wouldn't help: in that case, most of these works wouldn't be created and/or distributed.)
Not that this is new, it's just really obvious here. In spite of the ideology of copyright fundamentalists who preach "the more the better", economists know that copyright by its nature must introduce inefficiencies into the market.
"Longchamps, owners of Beefsteak Charlie's, opened a disco called Vamps on Broadway between 70th and 71st in the fall of 1975 and had an advertisement running in "BackStage" for bartenders and waiters. I needed a job at the time and applied for a position. When they say my resume and found that I was a professional dancer they asked me to give the opening night party. They hired a professional party giver, who did Neil Sedaka's Birthday, to give the Saturday Night Party and one of the girls from the Longchamps office gave the Sunday Night 'Black' Party with Leontine Price and Wilt Chamberland. My party was the only party that made money for the staff as well as the restaurant and when the clientel started dropping off a few months later they asked me to give another party only they wanted me to create a new dance and premier the dance at this party. I created "The Electric Slide" as the song had just come out and had a great beat and as I had already created "The Electric Weeble", it seemed the obvious next step. After only a few weeks of teaching the dance, I tore the cartilege in my right knee while demonstrating some of the variations of the dance and was operated on through Workmen's Compensation and was laid up for over a year. It wasn't until 6 or 8 years later that I realized how far the dance had gone and that my worst fears had come true. Every night I would tell the patrons - this dance has 3 threes, 2 twos, a One and a Hop, but I'm sure that someone is going to forget a step and try to square this dance off into 4/4 timing - It is not supposed to start on ONE every time. That is what makes this dance unique - but someone did square it off and want it to start on the downbeat and incorrectly told someone who told someone and all of a sudden - everyone is doing the dance, but they are not doing it correctly. I have spent MANY YEARS trying to correct this and until recently had given up on ever getting it right. - BUT then came the internet and now I am working to correct this wrong."
Ric Silver was injured that night, and was put on NY Workers Comp WC Case 0763-6911 6/17/76, and in the documentation listed on his website it clearly says he was an employee of VAMPS, meaning that he created it because he was asked by his boss. Therefore he doesn't own the dance moves http://ric06379.tripod.com/sitebuildercontent/site builderpictures/ll.jpg
Also, his webpage (and personal homepage each play a sound recording of a song I believe is called (warning: iTunes link)"Electric Boogie" by Marcia Griffiths. I can't help but wonder if Mr. Silver has a license from ASCAP, BMI, or whichever entity may be responsible for enforcing the copyright for this sound recording.
As long as I am pointing out these types of things, on Mr. Silver's homepage is a graphical representation of a copyright symbol (the "circle-c" symbol) that looks remarkably similar to the one on the webpage of the U.S. Copyright Office.
In a line in the song "Electric Boogie" the singer says, "Oooooh .. shocking!" Are these facts shocking? Not to me. But very interesting. At least in my humble opinion.
Laws affecting technology will always be bad until enough techies become lawyers.
The Electric Slide is made up of 1 unit of choreagraphy known as a phrase. Mostly these "phrases" are meant to match a specific phrase structure of a particular set of music. In general a phrase is 32 beats of music. The electric slide is a 32 beat phrase with an extra 4 beat rhythm break. Through the process of doing the dance the dancer starts facing one wall. At the end of the phrase the choreagrapher incorporated a 90 degree turn. So that by the time you have completed the phrase 4 times you will end up facing the same wall that you started in. Rinse and Repeat till the song ends. It is the dancing equivalent of a for loop.
Whoever choreagraphed this little peace of nostalgic heaven did a brilliant job. The dance is so easy that any grandma can do it in only a few minutes. She feels as if she is dancing just as well as the rest of the cool and hip people on the dance floor. She is getting exorcise. The younger set gets a lot of chances to be creative within the dances structure, yet still be part of a group.
In the late 70's and mid 80's a concurrence of events in American pop-culture created an environement that made this dance popular. The late 70's marked the end of the "hustle-era" and the mid 80's marked the "urban-cowboy" era. Line dancing was not extremely popular with the hustle dancing set but was just catching on when "Disco" was collectively pronounced dead by the American zeitgest. About the same time John Travolta again made a splash with his movie Urban Cowboy and a new dancing fad was born. Two-stepping and Line-dancing at the local "honky-tonk" was all the rage. The easiest of all the dances to learn was the Electric Slide. Soon after this confluence of events every budding dance teacher across the country rushed to put out content on the new hot medium of the day... Video Tape. I still see the dance prominently displayed on DVD's in the dollar bin at Half Priced Books all the time. The Electric Slide was in the right place at the right time to become the most popular line dance in history.
In my mind there is no question that the choreagraphy is indeed something worthy of being copyrighted. On the other hand it is quite debatable whether or not it has any real value. I don't know copyright law. But I can say that if I was faced with the decision of paying a liscence fee to the choreagrapher, I will just make up my own 32 beat phrase with a 1 quarter turn at the end and call it The Erotic Bump instead. It isn't that hard to do. For an overview of where line dancing is today view this link.... http://www.ucwdc.org/competition/linedances.shtm where you will find that not one of the choreagraphers is paid for their efforts. In the meantime Im going to go out to the salsa club and do the Macarena
"The problem is that you can copyright a dance (any damned dance) in the first place. I'm going to go copyright 20 different punches, kicks and acrobatic moves then get paid by every single kung-fu movie producer in the world."
No. You can't copyright something, magically, that you didn't come up with. You can't copyright a punch or kick that someone else has already used. You could perhaps copyright a sequence of 20 different punches, kicks and acrobatic moves as you seem to suggest, but unless your sequence takes on another layer of signification in the popular consciousness, no kung-fu movie producer will use it. This is perfectly reasonable. The Electric Slide is desirable to people because of the value it as a whole has gained historically, not because it's a fundamentally basic mode of movement.
Yes, you can copyright a dance, as with any other mode of expression.
Seriously: there are problems with this guy's strategy, including uncertainties of the copyright, whether it's applicable at all, whether fair use comes into it, and of course the onerous requirements of the DMCA. But people's ability to claim a copyright on their own creative work is not the problem here. His being a bully is.
What's he's doing isn't *clearly* right or wrong.
Wrong: He's getting litigious for no good reason.
Right: He's trying to stop people from doing The Electric Slide.
Non impediti ratione cogitationus.
That's why Futurama sang a different variant in the episode with Nibbler's Birthday.
Probably because through a series of Mickey Mouse protection acts, it's *still* copyrighted in year 3000.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
OTOH, the damages he might conceivably collect will be less than if he had been actively asserting his rights all this time. "Innocent" infringement incurs only actual damages, while "willful" infringement opens one up to serious punitive damages.
I'd be curious to see where the lines are drawn for derivative works WRT choreography. Typically dance IP issues only arise with more "serious" forms like ballet, musicals, dance companies, and the like (to the point where some instructors insist on controlling taping of student recitals so that students & family can get copies, but rivals cannot). I don't know how derivation would apply in a "popular" or "modern-folk" dance idiom which, almost by definition, will gradually change over time.
Any choreographers (or their lawyers) want to chime in on this one?