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Viacom vs. YouTube - Whose Side Are You On?
DigitalDame2 writes "Lance Ulanoff of PCMag believes that the Viacom and YouTube lawsuit is a bad idea because it has the potential to damage the burgeoning online video business; instead, it could work with the millions of people who are currently viewing Viacom content on YouTube. On the other side, Jim Louderback, an editor-in-chief of PCMag says that Lance doesn't know what he's talking about: with all the content available online for free, Viacom can kiss those investments goodbye. YouTube is actively filtering, actively allowing uploads, and making money off of the content that's been uploaded. The courts will find that Viacom has been wronged, that Google has not done enough to protect the rights of copyright holders, and that Google owes Viacom reparations. Whose side are you on?"
Success by Viacom in getting commercial stuff removed but no major fees rewarded would be perfect... less commercial stuff on YouTube.
>Whose side are you on?
Treebeard: "I am on no one's side, because nobody is on my side."
You can't talk about Wikipedia's flaws on Wikipedia
This one is simple: Viacom. They don't need to sue for 1 bilion, but YouTube needs more reviewers (or improve their copyright protection). Viacom certainly spent a few bucks on producing these TV shows. They can't simply give it away for free. It is *their* products, and *they* decide where it can or can't be redistributed.
ilex paraguariensis for all
It's very simple: we like the content, we want everything for free, therefore copyright is evil. The justifications come after the fact.
I hate the RIAA and MPAA as much as anyone, and I think the DRM schemes are a pretty cynical attempt at lock-in and control, but this is pretty clear cut: it's Viacom's stuff that Viacom's advertisers pay Viacom to distribute, and Youtube is cutting them out completely. This is the blatant stuff that makes them push for things like broadcast flags and DRM from end to end.
Done with slashdot, done with nerds, getting a life.
I'm not on the side of either Viacom or Google. I'm on the side of the law. The law, specifically the DMCA, spells out what responsibilities Google has, and what Viacom has. Viacom's argument here is that, while Google lives up to it's responsibilities, Viacom finds living up to theirs inconvenient and therefore Google should be saddled with Viacom's responsibilities too. Sorry, Viacom, but that's a matter for you to take up with Congress (who wrote the law).
>>>"it's Viacom's stuff"
If they don't want people to see it, don't broadcast it in the first place.
If they want to control it properly, have could big rooms that seat maybe 100 people, and with large screens. Oh put them in public places where you can pay an 'admission' fee. You might want to serve food in the foyer as I tend to get hungry. Perhaps Popcorn.
It really depends on the judge. A good judge will look at the DMCA, the Grokster decision, then how much user created content is on YouTube, decide YouTube doesn't actively encourage infringement or rely upon it as a business plan, and will tell Viacom to police YouTube, as is the intent of the DMCA. A bad activist judge will correct this "injustice" and find against Google. Either way, Viacom loses out long term. This is a stupid law suit.
http://bgcommonsense.blogspot.com
Took less than five minutes for justification #1. Any more takers?
Done with slashdot, done with nerds, getting a life.
One thing that many seem to be forgetting is that short excerpts are defined as fair-use. I believe that if Viacom actually does succeed with this lawsuit, it will set a very bad precedent. The majority of videos that have been taken down so far have been short clips, and thus fair-use compliant. I actually tried in vain recently to look up the clip of John Stewart's take on Senator "Series of Tubes" Stevens and Net Neutrality. It has been taken down (probably many times), and yet I am fairly certain that it would fall within the boundaries of fair-use.
I support the removal of full content, such as movies. It does not make a difference if they are chopped up into ten minute segments or not, because it is quite simple to put the full movie back together again. Regarding full television shows, though, I am still unsure. I believe that the boundary is blurred at that point. However, short clips of shows or movies should not by any means be removed. It does not matter if it is in order to placate the parent corporation or not. I hope that Google makes this one of the cornerstones of their defense, and really drives it home that fair-use is actively being usurped.
"We may face a scorched and lifeless earth, but they're accountable to their shareholders first."
I have no idea how usenet slipped under the radar so long. IRC + private ftps have been left alone too. Maybe it's just so geeky and obscure, and just doesn't do the volume to alarm the big guys - where napster and youtube do? I do know that in some cases posters have been tracked down and sued (stupid ones who let themselves be ID'd).
I also know there's a couple dudes that hang out in front of the 7-11 a block away, and I know they sell crack, I've seen them do it with my own eyes. I also know the cops must know, but they haven't done anything about it. Maybe they got bigger fish to fry? Maybe they've just given up on 'da hood'. Maybe their building a case against a higher-up and dont want to rock the boat?
Whatever the case, it doesnt mean it's okay to sell crack.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
I agree. It's not a simple either/or question. Does Viacom have a right to protect its copyrights? Yes! Is one billion dollars in damages sensible, sane, or in any way indicative of the damage to Viacom's earnings? Absolutely not. I mean they could protect their copyrights with a simple injunction and a token payment to cover legal fees. But no, they've got to go all SCO and look for a billion dollar settlement.
And for that sort of money, you have to suspect that they're after more than just getting their stuff removed. I don't know whether it's just greed, dislike of Google or that they want to destroy YouTube. But I have to say that I don't really care.
As far as I'm concerned, Viacom's IP isn't worth one billion dollars of anyone's money and for them to win would be a serious miscarriage of justice. IMHO, YMMV and IANAL; but if TFA wants to know who's side I'm on, then that's who, and that's why.
Now if Viacom want to drop the amount they're suing for to something that makes sense in this parallel universe, then I might change my mind. Otherwise, Go Google!
Don't let THEM immanentize the Eschaton!
that's an excellent point... whom in your opinion would the allies be?
sarcasm:
-noun
1. harsh or bitter derision or irony.
and just where else would you pull estimated damages for unauthorized sharing from?
everyone in the intellectual property business pulls damages out of thier ass... that's standard operating procedure. the IP business is about selling stuff that doesn't really exist... it's stuff you pull it out of your ass and sell to other people. clearly, if someone distributes your imaginary product without your authorization, you can sue them for all of the imaginary sales that you have lost out on. as long as we are working in the realm of the imagination, you might as well imagine big and try to jack google for a billion dollars.
sarcasm:
-noun
1. harsh or bitter derision or irony.
What's clear to me is that, if they could, Viacom and the rest of the industry would like to charge you every single time you ever watched a piece of their content. They haven't managed to yet devise a successful system to accomplish this (remember DIVX DVD's, or RCA SelectVision videodiscs that actually wore out on use), but they have never given up on this dream. And these kind of lawsuits are just more small steps along the path to the Utopia of having full control over every second of music, and every frame of film forever.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
I'm in two minds. On one hand, I can understand Viacom wanting to protect its "property". On the other hand, music video are ads for the artists and they should be happy about some free advertisments. Also, why did Viacom not sue YouTube before they were bought by Google? Because they knew there wasn't much to get? Now where Google owns YouTube, there's a lot of money make. This practice reminds me of patent trolls, who only start enforcing their "intellectual property" once a product is established and successful, in other words: As soon as there's money to be made.
Not licenced content on YouTube is nothing new. The discussions about it have been going on way before Google took over YouTube and if Viacom claims they weren't aware of it until now, they're lying.
Considering this, I hope the case gets thrown out of court, setting a signal to others to make their claims when they become aware of the violation of their rights and not when it starts getting worth claiming.
The silliest arguments I have been reading are things like "Viacom benefits from YouTube, therefore Google isn't doing anything wrong" and "the copyright holders can request to have the stuff removed, so what's the big deal?"
It's not Google's right to index/distribute/host copyrighted content without consent. They want an opt-out model for copyright holders rather than opt-in, which is pretty shady.
BTW, I don't buy for 1 second that a company with that much brainpower, cash, and tech prowess can't prevent copyrighted videos from entering their system. They should ask CNET how they prevent pirated software from entering Download.com.
Imagine if I own a parking garage. I'm an innocent small business owner with no knowledge of investigative police work. Yet I am being sued because some moron parked a stolen car in my garage (which according to good business practices has an open-door policy). Perhaps you want to arrest the well mannered Ethiopian man who parks your cars as well? No worries, he's a friend of mine, and I shall bail him out faster than you can say "Viacom Is A Senseless Money Grabbing You Know What"...
As I mentioned in another discussion, it's not only difficult for YouTube to control the copyright on uploaded material - it's impossible. I can upload some clip of a swedish TV show, but who would they contact to see who owns the copyright to that?
I could also add "(c) Viacom" to some clip that I have made, does that mean that Viacom now actually owns the right to copy that clip?
c++;
YouTube has made a fortune by blatantly ignoring the law, which clearly respects Viacom's copyright. It is not fair use. Maybe we don't agree with the law, but if we are just going to ignore it then it will lose its meaning. Which would be a bad thing, because laws are there to protect our rights. The example that YouTube and Napster have set is that if you want to be successful you should go out and do whatever you can get away with and try to become powerful enough so that by the time it comes back to you it doesn't even matter because you are effectively above the law. You might get sued for a fraction of your wealth, but the FBI is not going to raid your house and take your hard drives. A lot of people out there reading this will say, yes, that's exactly the attitude you have to have in order to be successful in business. I think it is a bad example. If I tried to do that in my personal life, I would be in prison. Of course, this is also a failure of our legislative system which has failed to give clear guidelines, but I think that YouTube was clearly overstepping its legal bounds and they knew it.
The argument that Viacom would like us to pay every time we watch a piece of their content is irrelevant. I don't want to see that happen and so I will fight any legislation that supports it and I will support legislation that makes it more difficult. If Viacom ignores that legislation, than I expect our legal system to enforce its laws and penalize Viacom accordingly.
There are plenty of reasons to oppose restricting free speech in order to make information a scarce good that have nothing to do with "wanting everything for free", and in fact many of us would be happy to pay content producers directly for their work, if they'd just mind their own business instead of telling us how we can or can't use our own hardware and internet connections.
Visual IRC: Fast. Powerful. Free.
everyone in the intellectual property business pulls damages out of thier ass... that's standard operating procedure. the IP business is about selling stuff that doesn't really exist... it's stuff you pull it out of your ass and sell to other people.
Perhaps your tune would change some if you'd spent a full year of your life, working 8-12 hour days pulling a full novel "out of your ass".
clearly, if someone distributes your imaginary product without your authorization, you can sue them for all of the imaginary sales that you have lost out on.
Except that, if you spent a year planning, writing, and editing the book, you'd hardly call it "imaginary". And if it really was imaginary, why would anybody else care to copy it?
Oh wait a minute, it's not imaginary?
as long as we are working in the realm of the imagination, you might as well imagine big and try to jack google for a billion dollars.
Viacom invests many millions of dollars to produce these shows "out of their ass". Clearly, their shit really doesn't stink since so many people want a piece of it. What Viacom should be focusing on, though, is how they can grab the YouTube phenomenon and run with it, rather than try to stop it.
I have no problem with your religion until you decide it's reason to deprive others of the truth.
"A great democracy must be progressive or it will soon cease to be a great democracy." --Theodore Roosevelt
i don't have to worry about that. i have a grownup job. i work 8-12 hours a day for assholes and no one will ever ask me for an autograph. if you are so worried about people taking your imaginary product, perhaps you should get a grownup job too, or maybe you should diversify your offerings with stuff that can't be easily duplicated. or better yet, thank your lucky stars that you are able to make a living as a writer and that you don't have to get a grownup job like the rest of us.
let's say that i "steal" your book... as in i tried to pass it off as mine and make money from it. is that really what youtube does? can you really watch a YouTube Productions Ltd. of "Desperate Housewives" in HD quality?
no, you can't. you have to watch shitty clips that are in no particular order. i can see that the TV networks are in real danger.
now, let's say i took your book, and said to everyone i know "mcrbids wrote a cool book and i want you to read it... here take this shitty copy of part of it." if it was a hardcopy book that would be fine, but if it was a PDF the shit would hit the fan.
how can you say, with confidence, that the 10, 100, or 1000 people i gave the PDF to would actually have bought the book before i gave them a digital copy? how many of them would say "thanks! i was just about to pay money for that." you can't, therefore the damages you claim are imaginary.
on the other hand, i can say with relative certainty that if i emailed your book to a thousand people, at least one of them would go out and buy it. especially if it was good enough for me to bother copying and distributing it in the first place.
people treat intellectual property the same way that they treat real property. that's just how it is. you can waste your writing time fighting that battle or you can find a way to capitalize on it. the choice is yours. the only difference between you and viacom is that viacom can afford to sue for billions and all you as an aspiring writer can do is cry about it.
have their ratings suffered? don't they get paid by the networks before the shows go on the air? has some network threatened to drop the show as a result of youtube? won't the shows end up on DVD and in syndication eventually where there are profits from those sales just like every other studio? if anything, viacom can justify raining the price of it's show to the networks thanks to all the buzz on the net over their fabulous shows.
how much money does viacom need to keep producing shows? how much do you need to write a book? is a billion dollars really justified?
is there value in putting your life on hold to create something of value forthe world to enjoy? of course there is. are the people at viacom doing the same thing that the aspiring writer is doing? hell no. they are a huge corporation with billions and they are only interested in making more billions. i'm a little light on sympathy for giant media companies at the moment.
artists need to make livings in order to keep producing, but at some point in the pursuit of a living it stops being about the art and starts being about enriching the lifestyle. it happens to artists and it happens to people with grown up jobs.
i think suing google for a billion dollars is a clear message that it's stopped being about the art for viacom.
sarcasm:
-noun
1. harsh or bitter derision or irony.
What makes you think Google/YouTube is actively policing their site for porn clips, rather than responding to the clips being flagged by users who stumble across them?
Visual IRC: Fast. Powerful. Free.