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NFL Caught Abusing the DMCA
Implied Oral Consent writes "You know how the NFL puts up those notices before every game saying 'This telecast is copyrighted by the NFL for the private use of our audience, and any other use of this telecast or of any pictures, descriptions or accounts of the game without the NFL's consent is prohibited?' Well, Ars Technica is reporting that Wendy Seltzer thought that that was over-reaching and posted a video of the notice on YouTube. Predictably, the NFL filed a DMCA Take Down notice on the clip. But Ms. Seltzer knows her rights, so she filed a DMCA Counter Notice. This is when the NFL violated the DMCA, by filing another Take Down notice instead of taking the issue to court — their only legitimate option, according to the DMCA. Unfortunately for the NFL, Ms. Seltzer is a law professor, an EFF lawyer, and the founder of Chilling Effects. Oops!"
"Don't mess with football."
she shouldn't mess with football.
To paraphrase Robot Chicken: "In other news, the NFL got totally served."
The d'oh heard 'round the world.
"ehh... uhhh... I uhhmm....ehh....what?" Seriously - posting a notice to take down a notice to post a notice of a takedown notice? Who keeps track of this crap?
Zebra adjusts volume on belt controller....
"10 yards for Illegal Procedure by the offense, replay first down"
I'm an Aussie, so I've never watched an NFL game such as this, but that notice "This telecast is copyrighted by the NFL for the private use of our audience, and any other use of this telecast or of any pictures, descriptions or accounts of the game without the NFL's consent is prohibited" is just plain crazy (hence her initial video posting I suppose)... I mean trying to stop people DESCRIBING an event... dear god who the F*ck do they think they are? What are you supposed to do when you're talking to your mates about the big game?
"Hey Bob, see the big game last night?"
"Yeah Gary, I sure did... it was awesome!"
"What did you think about the touchdown in the..."
"SSSSSSHHHHH! What are you doing Gary? You can't discuss the game without prior consent... just hang on a sec."
Ring ring... ring ring...
*Welcome to the NFL DMCA Hotline, your call is important to us, you are currently number 13445 in the queue*.
"Oh F*ck that, let's talk about world political events"
If she sues, will the courts hold the NFL to the standard, and if they do, will it be more than a slap on the wrist?
This looks to be a legal milestone, for better or worse.
The government can't save you.
So the judge says "you messed up, file an action."
And then they do. And then, the overwhelming likelihood is, she will lose. That's really sticking it to... er... uh... I have no idea. This really is the equivalent of a legal prank, setting things up so you can pop up in the end and say "gotcha!" without anything really changing.
Go team.
The NFL has volunteered to be the object lesson of the moment, bless them. That NFL notice has been around for years-- since the 1980's at least-- and it always seemed out of step with reality. I'm not much of a TV watcher, so I don't really know but I can't recall any other sport or other kind of show putting up notices like the NFL's.
Here's hoping they get roasted in court, and don't get off with a wrist slapping. One more item to add to the pile of reasons why the DMCA was a bad idea. If events like this make enough of a stink, perhaps Congress will have to revisit the DMCA.
Intellectual Property is a monopolistic, selfish, and defective concept. It is "tyranny over the mind of man"
Most content providers don't want to deal with the actual letter of the law. They just want to bark out take down notices.
NFL: YouTube, Jump boy jump! Now take down all these posts.
YouTube: Arf!
It is pitiful that so much stuff can be taken down with so little thought and accountability. Without watch dogs like Wendy Seltzer these robotic asshats would trample all over our free speech rights.
The point is her original action did not violate any laws. The NFL failed to follow the letter of the law.
"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy."
Is it a violation? There's a fair use law (I think that's the one) that lets people use a small portion a copyrighted piece. Aslo she chose the one peice that should never have been an issue. I don't know why she posted it but given her background it might have had to do with a copyright discussion in which case it gets back to the Fair Use (or whatever it's called) law. She's certainly one that would be likely to know what laws make it okay to post that VERY small portion of the typical game broadcast.
I strongly suspect the NFL will continue asserting rights they don't have, putting the burden on the other guy to show their use is fair use. The only thing that would make them change their mind is if it cost them a lot of money - and I don't see how this is going to cost them a lot of money. Even if they have to pay 100,000 in legal fees and damages if this goes to court and they loose, that's chicken scratch. I'm not exactly sure how Ms. Seltzer could show sizeable monetary damages to create the basis for a large enough settlement to matter. The real problem is that attorneys view this kind of behavior in the best interests of their clients. Make the other guy fight to protect his interests, and maybe it won't be worth his while. Even if it goes to court and she wins, I would expect their behavior would not change. If I did the same thing tommorrow, I suspect I would just get into to a "filing match" until they sued me. Or they sue YouTube, which might mean I have to sign up for another account before I could post content there again. However, it is very interesting to see that the DMCA does have a provision for abuse that might come back to annoy them, if only slightly.
Leave the gun, take the cannoli -- Clemenza, The Godfather
But wasn't Seltzer acting contrary to the law to begin with?
No, she was exercising fair use rights to educate people about misuse of the DMCA.
Time is what keeps everything from happening all at once.
Steelers rock. You know whats fun to do? When someone asks what the score of the game is, tell them,"All accounts of the game are rights of the NFL. I need to get the NFL's permission to tell you that."
God spoke to me.
But wasn't Seltzer acting contrary to the law to begin with?
Not according to Seltzer.
Her contention is that she posted a brief clip for legitimate educational purposes. She is invoking her fair use rights, and therefore not contrary to any law.
(Furthermore she only posted the copyright notice, not even a clip of the football game itself, and the NFL claiming copyright infringement of the copyright notice is almost absurd.)
Low-paid professional hatchet men at the NFL who are probably going to need an Alka-Seltzer now?
Indeed!
No.
There is a larger explanation of this ensconced in the statute, but Seltzer's use of the work is easily covered by the fair use exception. She posted it for criticism and commentary purposes, not for profit; the clip was posted as the best way to report on factual information; it was a puny segment of the original football game broadcast; and there is virtually no negative effect on the NFL's market for the posted material (after all, who would buy a video clip of their copyright assertion).
The reason the DMCA counter-takedown provision is there is because the public has a right to use copyrighted materials in this fashion, and in this case, the NFL confounded Seltzer's ability to exercise that right through the second takedown request. This portion of the DMCA is actually fairly reasonable in protecting both copyright holders and the public interest, and Seltzer was exercising her rights under the law, so the NFL is solely and completely to blame here.
The NFL does have a legitimate claim on a "more than minimal" copyright notice. Their notice is longer than a simple "copyright 2007" and contains at least a modicum of creativity.
If some other sport were to use their copyright notice verbatim and substitute XYZ for NFL, the NFL might have a course of action.
However, the recipient of the takedown notice is well within "fair use" rights to use the notice as she did. The NFL showed brazen stupidity or at the very least robotic behavior when it asked her to take it down not once but twice.
The last time I checked, robots, unlike organizations, were not considered "legal persons" and could not hold copyrights to anything. If the NFL is a robot then all bets are off.
Next up: Killer robot NFL attacks Supreme Court Building!
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
from what i understand of the event, dcma, and fair usage, this was intended for a discussion, intellectual debate, educational setting. also, it wasn't an entire broadcast (like the way illicit mp3s and movies are). NFL has very little to stand on. using your eyeballs is not acknowleging a click-wrap EULA.
The clip she used was short and used for educational purposes. It clearly falls under fair use. What is ironic is that she was using the clip to show how corporations are abusing the DMCA nad copyright law.
/right/now/ that's probably not true, however if more people exercised their rights, it would be. Copyright needs to be a balance between the rights of the creators of the work and the rights of the people. If the burden on the corporation becomes too high, they'll simply buy a stricter law.
The NFL demanded that Youtube remove the clip as per the DMCA. This is their right as the content-holder if they believe that their copyright is being infringed.
Seltzer sent a notice to Youtube stating that she did not infringe the NFL's copyright (as it was a fair use of the clip). This is her right as per the DMCA.
At this point, the NFL is supposed to use the courts. Instead, they sent another C&D to Youtube.
What this really illustrates is that the DMCA safe harbor provisions are fairly flawed. It's economically infeasible to monitor clips, keep track of which ones have been C&D'd already, and then file suit for every infringement that comes back to them per section 512. Actually,
No, the NFL is asserting rights to their material they don't have. If you take them at their word, you would have to get special permission from them to file a news report on the game, for example. That's clearly not the case. You don't have to have special permission to report on the superbowl. They would require, for example, you to get permission to take a 10 sec clip to show someone throwing a helmet. This falls under a paradigm known loosely as fair-use. For example, I don't have to get permission from a book author to quote a passage from their book.
What you do not have the right to do: Record the game on your Tivo and post the thing in its entirety, or substantial portions, and place your recordings on YouTube.
What they're making you do is to put yourself in legal jeopardy to protect your rights to use the material. They're not the only ones. For example, documentary film makers (read guys with no budget) often get requests to license music or images that just happen to show up in the course of filming. For example, a song playing in the background, maybe from a nearby house. Technically speaking, they do not have to license the song if it happened to be playing in the background when they were shooting. However, they often choose to pay the royalty fee rather than fight over it (a more expensive proposition), or just drop the scene.
We're heading for a world where you might have to take every photo you want to place on flickr, and photo-shop out the Coke label, the designer logo on the sweatshirt, and the images on any posters or paintings that happen to be in the shot. This is all because attorneys for the trademark or copyright holders want to make you fight for the rights you already have.
Leave the gun, take the cannoli -- Clemenza, The Godfather
You know what, in one day this woman has done more for my rights and the rights of others than you will in your life. If holding those who influence the law to actually abiding by them is pedantic, then I declare pedantry heroic.
Leben Sie jetzt die Fragen.
Here is an old article on an interview with her covered on Slashdot.
[alk]
The DMCA is also a pedantic, pathetic attempt at social engineering. The error is netiher minor nor unimportant.
If you keep throwing chairs, one day you'll break windows....
I'd love to see the DMCA go away, but violating it just to entice someone else to violate it further doesn't have any effect on the law itself. If I am missing something here, please tell me, since the NFL appears to have acted within the law initially.
Was it violated? Was it fair use? Since the game wasn't recorded and posted online, I doubt the DMCA was violated. Please don't state the infraction as a done deal fact. A copyright notice was posted online for education in copyright law. Was that a DMCA violation?
The truth shall set you free!
It's not a trick. If they're issuing take-down notices in the name of the law they should actually understand what the law says. Neither is it a spirit vs. letter of the law issue. The proper procedures for copyright holders to take in the DCMA are outlined quite explicitly, and this was intentional.
Besides, no take-down notice should have ever been sent. Her use clearly falls within fair use. If the NFL is depending on "low-paid professional hatchet men" to act in their name, and these people make mistakes, then the NFL still bears full responsibility for these mistakes. After all, these people are working as legal agents of the NFL.
Umm, no, it's not pedantry. Although I'd argue that the DMCA is deeply flawed, this provision is one of the few palatable things about it. It provides a bit of balance -- the copyright holder can demand that the service provider immediately remove infringing content and the provider can escape liability by complying. This provision allows the person responsible for posting the allegedly infringing content to vouch for and take responsibility for the content. At this point, the safe harbor has served its purpose and the service provider need not worry about liability.
The question is now between the copyright holder and the person responsible. The only sensible next step is to take the question to a court or drop it. Allowing repeated demands that the content be taken down would give WAY too much power to the copyright holder. The law has served its purpose and prevented anonymous copyright violation since someone came forward and took responsibility by filing the notice of fair use with the service provider.
The penalties for violation of process are critical. It's unreasonable to expect YouTube or other service providers to do anything other than comply with a take-down notice since that is the only way they can really be sure of satisfying the safe harbor requirements. The penalty section of the law gives a legitimate fair-user a mechanism to prevent abuse.
This was CLEARLY fair use and it was CLEARLY abuse by the NFL. This law is bad enough; don't let it be made worse by allowing the few limits it DOES have to be ignored. Take-down notices are serious legal documents and should not be issued lightly/automatically. I hope this is prosecuted vigorously.
That I shot for the SF Bay Guardian.
old photograph
She's not just a lawyer, she's a cute geeky lawyer!
You speak as if both sides were equal, which is laughable. You have multi-billion dollar industries with hordes of thousand-dollars-per-hour lawyers and very copyright-holder friendly laws on one side, and consumers on the other. Consumers that in the vast majority of cases are not lawyers nor have teams of lawyers working on their behalf. Consumers that are a very distant consideration after said multi-billion dollar industries throw millions of dollars at Congress.
You need a nice warm cup of Get Some Frikkin Perspective.
Please explain how exactly she "tricked" them. She exercised her rights under the DMCA, the NFL abused theirs. The NFL believed the clip was infringing, she believed it was fair use, so she properly filed her response with Youtube. The NFL should have raised the issue through the courts, and instead chose to abuse the DMCA by illegally filing a second take-down notice. Trickery on her part indeed! (That last sentence was sarcastic by the way).
It will probably never happen, but I'd like to see some of these people prosecuted and convicted for perjury. You know, the part of the affidavit where the author says that the above facts are accurate and true, under penalty of perjury. If you haven't personally verified the facts in the affidavit, you have no business putting your signature on the document. Any lawyer who rubber-stamps a bogus complaint should be disciplined or disbarred.
Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
The following is not meant to disagree with you (other than possibly on a small point, I can't tell from your post).
As far as I know, they're quite free to claim rights they don't actually have, so long as they don't actually take legally significant actions based on those statements. Similarly, I'm free to demand that you not take my picture while I'm standing in a public place. There's no legal requirement that I inform you that you are actually legally permitted to snap away (assuming you're not using my image for commercial purposes).
The law trumps their statement and it's up to the consumer to know his rights under the law. Their statement, perhaps sensibly, is stricter than what the law allows. They don't want you to be able to claim any rights to use their content beyond the bare minimum provided by law. Still, you are quite free to disregard any terms they've described that are stricter than the actual legal provisions. In the absence of a valid contract to the contrary, there simply is no mechanism for the NFL to add restrictions.
Of course, the DMCA take-down notices ARE legally significant. Making knowingly false statements means committing (IIRC) perjury. It's just possible that the original take-down notice may have been legitimate (although, honestly, no lawyer could possibly pass the bar and have a good faith belief that her use of the clip was in violation of the law, so even that is an EXTREMELY gracious statement). Once she filed her counter-notice, however, they can no longer claim this...
It's called a test case, and it isn't a trick or "nitpicking BS".
Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
Yeah, she tried to do the same thing to Ted Stevens
What?
It's often difficult to succinctly describe the difference between democracy as actually practiced in the USA, most of Europe, etc., and the pseudo-democracies seen in many countries that seem to have all the trappings, but don't quite work.
In a country with a functioning civil society, the weak can use the law to defend themselves against the strong (sometimes, with varying success, etc., but it is possible and does happen). In most countries without a well-developed civil society, it's unthinkable that a random civilian could win a suit against a rich, well-connected individual or company. In practice, their legal systems put power and money over the letter of the law.
In the rich democracies, businesses generally don't bother with overt criminality, because they'd just have to give up the money anyway. In countries without well-developed civil society, citizens don't bother going to the legal system in cases of crime or injustice committed by the rich and powerful.
It's cute to be cynical, and I'm not trying to argue that e.g. the U.S. legal system isn't skewed towards rich and powerful players, or that big companies are always perfect citizens. But the fact that she will probably win this case points to a deep, significant difference between "the west" and the rest.
I'd marry her too, except I think it would upset my wife and eight kids.
Do it yourself, because no one else will do it yourself. [beta blockade 10-17 Feb]
It's fair use, not copyright infringement. If they had gone to court, she would win.
According to YouTube...
This video is no longer available due to a copyright claim by National Football League
65.0% slashdot pure
Normally I'd be on your side in the case like this but this time it seems you're just wasting the court's time fighting a battle you started. I agree that their message was overreaching, but does your want to prove that entitle you to duplicating and essentially broadcasting video they produced? Even if it did your methods amount to litigious entrapment.
It's a long, twisted road from fair use to litigious entrapment, don't you think? Or do you also think I shouldn't have been able to quote your post in my reply?
Copyright your DNA, and send a DMCA notice to your wife forcing her to delete or surrender the kids as unauthorized derivative works of your exclusive intellectual property.
Then move in with Miss Seltzer.
echo -e 'global _start\n _start:\n mov eax, 2\n int 80h\n jmp _start' > a.asm; nasm a.asm -f elf; ld a.o -o a;
I take it, then, that you've never heard of something called "punitive damages?" They're intended not to reimburse the plaintiff for actual damages done but to punish the defendant for misdeeds. In this case, the lawyers who filed the second take-down notice might well be subject to sanctions for their actions. IANAL and all that, but I do know enough to know such things are possible.
Good, inexpensive web hosting
You know, you can disagree with a law, but agree with the few provisions in the law that actually make sense -- right of response, no yo-yo wars, etc. She was well within her right to file a counterclaim; the DMCA allows that in the case of legitimate ownership disputes. The NFL was in the wrong when they, in either bad faith or through a lack of due dilligence, filed a second takedown notice on the piece. Either situation, the judge is not going to look too fondly on the NFL's legal department. Furthermore, she broke no law; commentary on a portion of a work is well-protected under copyright law.
Marxism is the opiate of dumbasses
isn't this the same kind of nitpicking BS everyone is so upset about?
No, it isn't anything even resembling any such thing. I'm amazed you managed to delude yourself so badly as to think such a completely ridiculous thing.
Personally I hope the judge calls foul on both sides.
There is no legal or rational basis for such an assinine action, but given the state of the union it's still not ruled out due in large part to people like you who refuse to spend a second thinking about it before whining about some made up crap.
She did it specifically to provoke a reaction.
Whether that's true or not is entirely irrelevant. The fact is that the law is crap and pointing that out is absolutely a good thing.
I'd rather see our court system used for something more productive that a tit for tat exchange over copyright.
While I'd rather see it used to restrict criminals like the NFL from violating my rights. I guess that's a major difference between us. I support liberty. You think we should all bend over and grab our ankles whenever anybody wants to fuck us. I'm much happier being me.
I think it's time for both sides on this one to grow up and I hope a judge tells them so before he tosses the whole thing.
Whereas I hope that the judge does his fucking job and busts the only guilty party for violating the only ameliorating part of a badly broken by design law.
Perhaps you shouldn't post when you don't have a fucking clue what you're talking about. It makes you look like a fool and a lapdog.
So after this lady wins her case in court, exactly what will we be able to do differently? Post clips of NFL games to YouTube with impunity? I doubt it.
We should be able to post brief clips for educational use that do not cause economic harm to the copyright holder- exactly as the law states. That the NFL cannot grasp the laws of a free country does not mean fascism has won yet.
Changa hates change.
You'd have to have a birth certificate signed by at least three separate and unrelated dieties worshiped by over 50 million people, to get the attention of a woman like that. Probably more like 100 million now that it's the 21st century. Inflation and all that. No, I am NOT posting under my real Slashdot name for fear of being modded down to China.
Well said. Hats off.
Obviously, the parent has no clue whatsoever about how the legal system works. A lot of landmark judgments were the result of such "pedantry", as s/he chooses to call it.
I gave up my right to my text when I posted it on /.
Wendy took it straight from them I assume.
Litigious entrapment might have been an exaggeration but poking a giant and then waiting for it to make a mistake isn't the best move IMO.
For a picture of her go to http://icannwiki.org/Wendy_Seltzer.
Shes actually not bad looking and when you take into account that she is a techie and on the good guy's side that's like +10 to charisma or something.
unzip; strip; touch; finger; mount; fsck; more; yes; unmount; sleep
Here's a great idea: why don't you sit down and realise that what people are giddy about is that the corporation is going to suffer from misusing it's own strongarm tactics.
The clip wasn't a honeypot to goad a suit, it was put up for students to see the clip under fair use. When the NFL went strongarm, the professor replied with her legal rights. The NFL is overflexing it's rights, and is so far from being the victim in this story, it's not funny. Essentially, the NFL legal team are enforcing a law they don't understand.
And in regards to what other people are saying, it's complete crap that it's not trackable, especially when the same URL is used. You don't have to be much of a coder to take note of the URL and the poster's name when you're writing your bot, and stick them in a database.
You gotta be joking! You'd last about 10 minutes, whenever you left the toilet seat up you'd be so wrapped up in litigation that you'd be lucky if you ever peed again!
30% of all married women earn more than their husbands.
Maybe you should try bringing a sense of humor, some class or
aw hell, the deed to a villa or two in Tuscany, Italy, couldn't possibly hurt...
--- Grow a pair, liberals... stop letting the Republicans bully you!
Wendy Seltzer is absolutely right. Her job ( as an academic lawyer involves comment on legal issues, and a corporation tried to stop her freely commenting on just such an issue because they didn't like the implied criticism. Normally when a lawyer stands up to the rich and powerful we cheer, not sneer. Dear astroturfers, football in all its varieties around the world thrives on corruption and dodgy business. No matter on what scale, people who try to clean up sport are working in the public interest. So now go back to your sad little PR jobs and fuck off, please
Pining for the fjords
They have attempted to enter litigation with an EFF lawyer and a law professor at that. You would have thought that they would have been careful not to make any technical mistakes with that kind of opponent.
There is a reason many sports teams read Sun Tsu and all his ilk. "Know thine enemy".
If this were really happening, what would you think?
Definitely gotta put the emphasis on charisma though. And hit points.
Do it yourself, because no one else will do it yourself. [beta blockade 10-17 Feb]
Imagine how these women feel if they read slashdot. Here they are, busting their asses to do something cool/good, they finally get some recognition, and the response is a debate on how nice her hips look or don't.
If slashdot really does represent a cross section of the IT industry, I understand now why there are so few women in that industry.
weirdest thing I ever saw: scientology advertising on slashdot.
Is this really that hard of a question? Guys like girls who have some common interests as well as being physically attractive. Ever notice how average Joe's start slobbering when they hear a hot chick likes to drink beer and watch NFL? Same thing with geeks, they dream of hot geeky girls. Now of course it's true most readers will never meet these women, most guys are never going to meet any Victoria's Secret models, but that hardly stops them from talking about how hot they consider them. Furthermore, while model-type women may represent a small percentage of the population, it's no great surprise to see one while out walking. Hot geeky girls, on the other hand, are much more elusive. A geek in a small town could easily go his whole life without meeting a HGG. As a student at a large public university, I've met 0 hot, seriously-geeky girls and a few hot, sorta-geeky girls.
Just knowing such women are out there can be of major importance to a guy. If this kind of response really was the reason so few women are in the industry, it sure would seem to be a vicious-cycle. Scarcity of women -> slobbering response -> greater scarcity, and so on. However, genetic disposition and residual cultural restraints probably have a lot more to do with it.
Parent should be modded way up. /rant on Gentlemen: If either of these the ladies spoke of by the parent let their hair grow a bit and got a professional makeover including a different style of clothes it is highly likely you would be looking at them and drooling and the ladies seeing that would consider the makeover a waste of their time. Now mind you I am not saying they need the makeovers, I am saying you have preset images of what you think to be beautiful and they blind you to the beauty that both of these ladies possess and that beauty is evident from their pictures and often pictures do an injustice to the one pictured.
/rant off
If this sounds like a harsh rebuke to some of you then so be it, some of your comments here deserve it and there are plenty of others here that probably agree with me. Which brings up another item, Slashdot is not a men's locker room and you should leave the locker room comments to a minimum unless you want to run the ladies off that do come here.
So after this lady wins her case in court, exactly what will we be able to do differently? Post clips of NFL games to YouTube with impunity? I doubt it.
You'll be able to:
1) pick non-infringing fair-use clips of NFL, movies and whatnot. Post on Youtube.
2) Wait for takedown.
3) Post counter-claim
4) Wait for takedown.
5) Hire a low-grade lawyer and sue, using the precedent.
6) ???
7) Profit!!!
45 5F E1 04 22 CA 29 C4 93 3F 95 05 2B 79 2A B2
I strongly suspect the NFL will continue asserting rights they don't have, putting the burden on the other guy to show their use is fair use.
This will, however, establish precedence. Therefore, if a similar case comes up, the defense attorneys can point to this case, assuming she wins, and use it to help their future case.
I don't like Linux. This doesn't make me a troll.
She could...go...all...the....way!
The NFL got JACKED UP!
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
What is wrong with you people?
You must be new here.
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
I imagine it's because these women have already proven themselves to be desirable on an intellectual level via their accomplishments, so the next step in mate selection in physical attractiveness. Having a hot girl who's also smart is the holy grail of the male geek libido.
When one is on a message board that's [presumably] dominated by single males, what else would one expect?
Modern copyright is theft of culture from everyone and it retards the progress of the useful arts and sciences.
Hell, a worryingly high proportion of the readers here will never see *a* woman in real life...
Yeah - what he said - Geek Girl Hot Goood! Sexism Baaad! Still want more hot girl geeks - they gooooood!
Fire BAAAAD!
As far as I know, they're quite free to claim rights they don't actually have,
But isn't the threat of legal action still a threat? If the copyright holder said that they were going to come around and cause you actual, physical or financial harm that would be illegal. Seeing as a court action would cost the defendant money (and cause a lot of stress), isn't that the same thing?
At some point, somewhere, the entire internet will be found to be illegal.
Wendy Seltzer was our pro-bono, FSF-appointed attorney for a few years when we were investigating a commercial company (not intentionally linked here, they don't deserve the hits) for using our GPL code without complying with the license.
All we wanted, was for them to bring themselves into compliance... and they insisted that they were, and we were wrong, and that the GPL was "...subject to interpretation". So we contacted the FSF and they gave us Wendy. It's been a few years now, and we never really got final closure on the situation, so I'm not sure where it stands at this point. (past copyright infringement does not just vanish if you stop violating it in the present, however).
I have collaborated with Wendy over numerous dozens of emails and personally met her to sit down with the CEO of aforementioned alleged-infringing company in New York, and I can say that she really knows her field. I'm happy that she's doing good things for the EFF, they need someone of her skillset on-staff.
I have nothing but praise for her abilities and her skills. She was a brick wall between our project and the commercial company who tried to threaten us many times with their millions of dollars of investor money to try to silence us.
If Wendy is on your side, it's a good thing. It's where she shines the best.
Who keeps track of this crap?
Good Question! Are there teams of people going through the thousands upon thousands of YouTube videos looking for copyright infringements? How did the NFL find out that her clip was there in the first place? Did they stumble upon it? Was it pointed out to them? Is there some uber pattern matching software that big corporations use to sniff out violations?
When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
If slashdot really does represent a cross section of the IT industry, I understand now why there are so few women in that industry.
You have the cause and effect backwards. If there were more women in the industry, the geeks here wouldn't be so hard up and would not act like that!
(Oh and btw, Slashdot is *anything* but a cross section of the IT industry)
it looks like she's completely in the right
She is citing fair use in order to post the copyright notice, specifically that employing a clip in a teaching environment is fair use. However, posting a video to a public website is entirely different from showing a clip in a classroom. Her actions go beyond fair use.
Of course, she's a copyright lawyer, and I'm not, so perhaps I'm missing some subtle point.
When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
All Slashdotters are male.
All Slashdotters are single.
All Slashdotters are virgins.
99% have never kissed a girl.
95% have never spoken to a girl other than Mom whose basement they live in.
Avoid Missing Ball for High Score
"Copyright needs to be a balance between the rights of the creators of the work and the rights of the people. If the burden on the corporation becomes too high, they'll simply buy a stricter law."
I have never heard anyone mention anything in the U.S. constitution that says there needs to be a balance between the rights of the creators of the work and the rights of the people. There needs to be benefits to the people perhaps. (Science and the useful arts?)
Now you may be right on the second sentence though.
"What this really illustrates is that the DMCA safe harbor provisions are fairly flawed. It's economically infeasible to monitor clips, keep track of which ones have been C&D'd already, and then file suit for every infringement that comes back to them per section 512."
Why file suit for every infringement? Why not only the ones that look like they will cause you economic harm?
What I think is really flawed or outdated is the concept that ignorance of the law is no excuse though it should still hold for common sense issues. It is economically infeasible to keep abreast of all the laws so that you can try not to violate them. Hey, and as an added bonus, in my country, the law is protected by copyright!
all the best,
drew
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vcaf2ThG7q4
UFO seen in skies over Winton!
FreeMusicPush If you want to see more Free Music made, listen to Free
It's economically infeasible to monitor clips, keep track of which ones have been C&D'd already, and then file suit for every infringement that comes back to them per section 512.
What's so hard about it? All it would take is a five column spreadsheet:
Content Name, Infringing URL, Date of DMCA Notice, Date of 512, Suit filed?(y/n).
Perhaps they could get fancy and add a column for the "infringer's" name. Having created this, to finding info is only a CTRL-F away. This is exactly the sort of thing that computers make very, very EASY to keep track of.
After all NFL sent their lawyers after a church (russian translation) for violation of copyright on broadcast rights and it did not cause waves of protests from fans. And all of those stories of building property for games using local tax money? Prohibitions to translate games when they are in town (want to see it, go buy a ticket, instead of your paid cable subscription).
Football IMHO is getting up there in *AA league these days.
Hyperom.com
Exec: "Hey found this on Utube, man, kill it!!"
Lawyer: "Sir, yes, Sir" {emails DMCA takedown}
Lawyer: "WTF... !! Sir, they issued a counter takedown!"
Exec: "What the hell is that?"
Lawyer: "I'm not sure it has never happened before, it must be a mistake, I'll just email the takedown notice again... Maybe I should look up this DMCA in one of those big books I have in my office"
How about we constantly bash a law for being unfair, unnecessary, and convoluted, and then turn around and expect a corporation to follow it to the letter!
Well, yes, that's what they pay their legal team the big bucks for.
Speaking of which, how much are they paying you? They're not getting their money's worth: being subject to a DMCA takedown notice doesn't mean you're violating the DMCA.
They exist, but are rare. At my university (~21k students 15 years ago) I dated the two hot chicks in the engineering dept. Generally not a lot of competition there so even a middling looks guy can do well. I was working construction to pay for my CS degree so was in really good shape at the time and could help them with their Fortran homework.
One of them was a HGG. I married her.
Unfortunately for Wendy Seltzer, YouTube is a completely incompetent and bad actor when it comes to censorship ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=By6aqz_79Uc ). She will have to go after YouTube, NFL *AND* the DMCA. She might be right, but the odds are stacked against her.
Manlaw! No more chicks allowed to enforce the DMCA!
boycott slashdot February 10th - 17th check out: altSlashdot.org
Exactly. Hence... Ms. Seltzer is surely correct about them overreaching.
This reminds me of the Olympics(R) shutting down athletes' blogs on the grounds of copyright infringement a few years ago. I never did hear what happened with all that. Did they back down? Did anyone fight it?
*sigh* as if we needed more reason to go out and play sports instead of watching rich assholes on TV playing them.
Sticking feathers up your butt does not make you a chicken - Tyler Durden
Many people who read Slashdot tend to be focused on technology to the exclusion of other things, including real world relationships. So, looking at pictures, porn, or even a fantasy of meeting an attractive and intelligent woman tends to be the closest they will be to a relationship for years at a time(or in some cases, ever).
On the lighter side, the 85 percent rule states that 85 percent of the human species is genetically stupid, and nothing any of us do will give these people a clue. There is an additional 10 percent that have been corrupted by exposure to the 85 percent, so they too become stupid. This leaves us with only 5 percent of the species even worth knowing.
With that rule in mind, many people would prefer a fantasy that they will find someone of the opposite sex that are both intelligent and beautiful, so go figure that on Slashdot we find people who post about the appearance of a woman. They simply NEED a real social life, but can't figure out how to meet a woman(or man) in real life and get into a relationship.
The "oops" on the NFL's part was, apparently, the NFL crossing a law professional, rather than the violation of the law in the first place?
That's very sad: we've gotten to the point where we're happy to settle with having a case where we have a reasonable chance of the crime _just being brought into public light._
Because our biological imperative is mixed up with our geeky brain, duh. Btw the ultimate geek girl has to be Miss Ohio USA 2007, she's a Biology/premed dual major with good grades and is a pageant queen. Now there may be few of these women around, but to a geek they are better than any supermodel. You could have a great conversation with her and all of your non-geek friends would still be jealous of you for her physical attraction.
There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.
The cesspool just got a check and balance.
The NFL demanded that Youtube remove the clip as per the DMCA. This is their right as the content-holder if they believe that their copyright is being infringed.
Seltzer sent a notice to Youtube stating that she did not infringe the NFL's copyright (as it was a fair use of the clip). This is her right as per the DMCA.
At which point YouTube is obliged to reinstate the content in question.
What this really illustrates is that the DMCA safe harbor provisions are fairly flawed. It's economically infeasible to monitor clips, keep track of which ones have been C&D'd already, and then file suit for every infringement that comes back to them per section 512.
Whilst it might be "impossible" to monitor uploads the situation here is that someone has complained that a specific piece of content is infringing followed by a counter notice being submitted and acted on. This would apply to a tiny faction of the content being hosted. All that is needed is to apply a tiny piece of meta data to each item.
It's just possible that the original take-down notice may have been legitimate (although, honestly, no lawyer could possibly pass the bar and have a good faith belief that her use of the clip was in violation of the law, so even that is an EXTREMELY gracious statement). Once she filed her counter-notice, however, they can no longer claim this...
AFAIK the bar is very low for both kinds of notices. The point is that these are ment to be "one shot" deals. Once someone has sent a counter notice the hoster should be "out of the loop" at least in respect of the work in question (or any parts of it). Not only should the hoster hot nonour a duplicate "take down" they probably arn't even obliged to say why. If things work as they should the plaintiff (in this case the NFL) must follow a normal procedure, including correctly identifying and serving legal notices to the defendent.
So you're saying they gave the judges too much credit? Yeah, I agree :D
Sticking feathers up your butt does not make you a chicken - Tyler Durden
I agree. It's really disheartening. You'd think the intelligent 'beta males' of geekdom would sympathize a little more with women but it just ain't so. Apparently being bullied or otherwise looked down on doesn't make one more sympathetic - it makes one more likely to bully, objectify or otherwise put down someone else that is perceived as being lower on the social totem pole (i.e., female).
Of course this isn't true of all men or all geek men. Perhaps it's just the jerks that post the most, who knows? I do personally know some men (geek and otherwise) that are awesome.
filter: +3. Hey, look! all the trolls went away!
In case I'm not the only one unable to reach the article.
Please don't state the infraction as a done deal fact. A copyright notice was posted online for education in copyright law.
Quotation is generally considered "fair use" so long as it is not excessive. Where the original work is itself very small even quoting the entire thing is unlikely to be excessive. An analogy would be quoting a tradmark or advertising slogan (some of which are single words or collections of words which do not even form a sentence.)
In such situation the proportion of original to quoted text might well be a better metric than what proportion of the original is quoted.
Also quoting something to discuss it, comment on it or critique it generally indicates "fair use" even if there question of "excessive quotation".
And the answer is....NO. Geek average, maybe, but definitely not hot.
IIRC you can't pick and choose like that. If you know about a violation of your own copyright and decide not to persue it, other violators you DO persue can use that against you.
If you choose not to defend your copyright, you lose your ability to defend your copyright.
I am not a NFL apologist, but did anybody ever think that the NFL might have employed a team of mouth breathing drones to simply scour the internet to find material and sending out take-down notices? I imagine they may not even log any details of the content nor do they cross check to see if a previous notice was already sent. The whole process is merely a scare tactic only. Again, I clearly this is the NFL's fault for not researching the matter thoroughly. The only resolution I see out of this is better screening procedures for content violations by the NFL and possibly (a thin chance) that the DMCA is modified to allow repeat take-down notices. Fair use does not come out ahead unfortunately...
Hum, no. You can't ever "lose" a copyright, unless it expires. What you're thinking about is trademarks, which is completely different.
Religion is the best example of mass psychosis
You think any other industry is different? Certainly not the fashion industry. Well maybe, but only because most of the men in that industry tend to be gay. Not any blue collar industry as that one has been turned into a stereotype with the wolf whistles as a pretty woman walks by. It isn't right, but I know that tends to be a quite common response.
Forgive me for being an NFL apologist (heck, I watched all of two games last season), but this hardly qualifies as front-page Slashdot news with a title of "NFL Caught Abusing the DMCA". I thought this was going to be about the NFL sending out thousands of inaccurate DMCA take down notices or something comparable.
Actually they would be completely within their rights to send out any number of DMCA notices, because they could argue they had a good faith belief that the material is infringing. The present situation is legally worse for the NFL since the existence of a counterclaim proves that there was no good faith.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
She posted a clip of the NFL's copyright notice for educational purposes. (She is a legal professor) This is obviously fair use, so there is no 'original infringement'
I didn't even RTFA and I know this. People like you need to learn what your rights are, or else you'll continue to ignorantly give them up.
Imagine how these women feel if they read slashdot. Here they are, busting their asses to do something cool/good, they finally get some recognition, and the response is a debate on how nice her hips look or don't.
I'm a boob man, myself
Naw, go with dexterity and get a long bow.
I drank what? -- Socrates
How do you manage to breathe?
Sticking feathers up your butt does not make you a chicken - Tyler Durden
"IIRC you can't pick and choose like that."
Well, I think you can. Perhaps a lawyer would like to chime in.
You have to be much more careful with trademarks though from what I understand.
all the best,
drew
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ls1QealrmLk
Paper Plane 002 Take 001
FreeMusicPush If you want to see more Free Music made, listen to Free
On the other hand, the cynic in me believe it's more likely that the NFL's legal department will find some other way to get you.
Question 2: do you think they really care, given how successful they are, about what a bunch of troglodytes on Slashdot think about them? A bunch of repressed, flourescent-tan male nerds? I wouldn't give a damn if I was them.
And on the Eighth Day, God created baseball.
Baseball, the game for people who DON'T have ADD!
P.S. -- Go Angels!!!!
General Relativity: Space-time tells matter where to go; Matter tells space-time what shape to be.
And waste the court's time with irrelevant and silly cases. I mean come on, what's the point?
While we may be heading in to a world where protecting free speech may become irrelevant and silly I still hold hope that the effort is not yet a waste of time.
Time is what keeps everything from happening all at once.
This is all because attorneys for the trademark or copyright holders want to make you pay for the rights you already have.
There, fixed that for you. :)
Chuck Norris: Socialism == a thousand years of darkness.
*shrugs*
;-)
I'd fuck her, even if she wasn't a techy/goodguy lawyer.
But since she IS, I'd perform at least a half hour of cunnilingus for her too.
I know, I'm a dirty bastard, but I'm honest about it, especially anonymously.
Yes yes, because we all know 'Oops' is all any corporation need say after breaking the law. It's not THEIR fault, it's just too complicated for them to bother trying to comply.
I wonder if I could get away with this line of reasoning while doing my taxes. "Why yes Mr/Ms IRS agent, I suppose I -DID- deduct this list of items multiple times, but if you take into account the sheer volume of my deductions, you can clearly see that actually making sure I don't repeat any is far too complicated."
I don't think it would fly, and I'm just one guy sifting through the data, as you correctly point out, they have whole TEAMS.
And just how hard do you think it would be to check outgoing takedown notices against a list of clips with takedown disputes active?
Probably alot simpler than setting up teams of people (or even better, bots) to search for infringement.
If you copyright your DNA you will have the greatest euphemism for masturbation so far: "exercising my intellectual property rights."
This is not my sandwich.
Unlike with trademark, under copyright they can allow infringement in some cases, while seeking takedown in others.
Not true. It depends on the intended usage of the passage/clip, along with the size of the sample, not just on the fact that it's just a small part of the work. De minimis usage is only acceptable under fair use if the portion reproduced would be considered fair use for other reasons.
Better check with your lawyer, first. See Harper & Row, Publishers, Inc. v. Nation Enters, where a 400-word excerpt was deemed not to be fair use, since it comprised "the heart of the book".
I fully agree with the point you make in your post. However, things have gotten worse recently, and it's important to note that what was considered fair use in 1990 is no longer necessarily still considered fair use.
"Trolls they were, but filled with the evil will of their master: a fell race..." -- J.R.R. Tolkien on Olog-hai
All you've got to do is style her hair a bit and give her the right clothes and suddenly things are a whole lot different...
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
That is obviously no longer the case, as copyright extensions always show up once some major work is about to fall into the public domain. What I think is really flawed or outdated is the concept that ignorance of the law is no excuse though it should still hold for common sense issues. It is economically infeasible to keep abreast of all the laws so that you can try not to violate them. I agree. Most laws follow common sense, so it's not a problem to obey them. But it only takes getting hit with one really obscure traffic law out of the blue to realize that the system sucks. Got a better proposal? Hey, and as an added bonus, in my country, the law is protected by copyright! I'm not sure which country that is, but in America, we have a few laws protected by copyright: building codes. So you can't legally build a house that doesn't conform to the code, and you can't get a copy of the code without paying absurd fees. You can review the code at a library or town hall, of course, but that's probably pretty infeasible if you're trying to actually build a house yourself.
Except that it isn't Youtube's job to monitor which works have been reinstated. They get a C&D from the copyright holder, and part of that C&D states (under penalty of perjury) that the work infringes, that the C&D comes from the copyright holder, and that the takedown notice is legal per the DMCA. Youtube MUST comply with such a notice to maintain their safe harbor status. The problem is that the second C&D was not legal per the DMCA, as once the item is reinstated, the copyright holder is supposed to get a court order to escalate the incident.
This def is Charisma +10, except she also codes in Perl...that makes it +50. A lawyer who codes in Perl. Next, I'll meet a EE/ME/Scientist who also is a porn actress... bwahahahahah..err wait.
Through gills, if the GP is anything like the sharks he/she is defending.
IANAL as well, but punative damages are not available under all circumstances. In addition it is the responsibility of the individual to mitigate any damages. Often, punative damages are capped at some level of actual damages. For example, I might get 3x damages as a punative award inaddition to regular damages. however, I still have show an economic basis for the harm. (IANAL but I used to be an accountant and did cover business law and some contract law). If the damages are considered excessive, the NFL could appeal the damage claim. I can't stand what the NFL is doing, but I don't see how she's going to get to the millions of dollars of damages it would take to get the NFL to change their behavior.
Leave the gun, take the cannoli -- Clemenza, The Godfather
'Why is it that whenever a woman does anything noteworthy the first response here on slashdot is whether or not she is hot/doable/marryable, etc.'
Because Slashdot is primarily populated by males. The ladies can beat up the men for it all day long but you will never change the FACT that men are hardwired to view women as sex objects. The first and most powerful drive in the interaction between male and female is the drive to mate. There are no exceptions, even if it is not conscious (and it is usually very conscious) the first thing a man considers when he looks at a female is whether or not he wants to mate with her (and yes, he makes the initial decision when he SEES her, not when hears about her accomplishments).
A man can pretend to only be considering your accomplishments but he can not actually only consider them. That doesn't mean a man can't be impressed with your accomplishments if you are not attractive or that he can't be impressed with them if you are attractive.
There are some men who show enough restraint to consider whether or not he wants to mate (or commence some act that is derivative of mating) with you silently rather than with crude remarks. But there will always be some who are comfortable making those comments on an internet forum where they wouldn't be comfortable making them publicly.
Yeah, but I bet they'll still make you go to court to enforce your rights.
Leave the gun, take the cannoli -- Clemenza, The Godfather
In the movies, all you would have to do is take off her glasses.
Live forever, or die trying.
Thanks. I think we are in agreement. I was tired when I wrote it last night, but you pointed out the major thrust of what they're doing " claim[ing] rights they don't actually have." My point is that they are putting the burden on consumers to enforce their rights. Otherwise, by tacit acceptance, we will loose those rights.
Leave the gun, take the cannoli -- Clemenza, The Godfather
You just know that half (hell, 80%) of these guys deciding "NOT HOT" are tubby comic book store guys. You know, the ones who wear the too-tight t-shirt that says "NO FAT CHICKS" when they themselves are clocking in at 250lb+. So, xeno314, let's see some reciprocity. Post a picture. You know. People in glass houses and all that.
IANAL.
While I dislike the DMCA, and I'm thrilled that Ms. Seltzer is taking on the NFL, and I dearly hope she trounces them in court... I have to wonder what useful result can be accomplished? My wild guess: some NFL lawyer will apologize to the Judge and Ms. Seltzer, promising that it will never happen again. I don't see how Ms. Seltzer can claim any monetary damages, and that's the only penalty that might change NFLs behavior.
gawbl
Thanks, My point about reporting is that you don't need special permission to state that the superbowl occured, where it occured, or who played in it. Imagine if that were the case, and we had to refer to the superbowl as "A really well attended game." Your right, I did make a gross over-simplification of fair use. However, when people use pieces of someone else's content as part of another piece in a conforming way, they tend to be short.
Leave the gun, take the cannoli -- Clemenza, The Godfather
Suck it - how's your Italian, asshole. English is not my first language.
Leave the gun, take the cannoli -- Clemenza, The Godfather
An underlying premise of this discussion seems to be that individual or corporate "rights" are at issue. These "rights", often described as "civil rights", are only those privileges proscribed by enacted legislation and are not FUNDAMENTAL or INALIENABLE rights spoken of by the great thinkers of Western civilization. These "rights", as proven by the DMCA and related changes, are fully subject to revision based upon the political whims of the times (read: follow the money trail, here). These civilly enacted privileges are similar to those enacted to make corporations "people", thus indemnifying shareholders against liability at the cost of society. The issue of Free Speech vs corporate intellectual properties is simple as true, Natual Rights must always be held as higher virtues than the privileges of artificial entities. If the shareholders really wanted to assert their indvidual rights to such properties, they would not hide behind corporate liability shields, but would take personal responsibility for their actions by engaging in their business through partnerships where they can be held individually responsible. The fact that our society grants artificial corporate entities (LP's, LLC's, Corps, LLP's) the same civil liberties as natural individuals is part of the underlying problem that creates situations like this. Will sports shareholders step up and personally sign those affidavits under penalty of perjury and be held personally and directly to account for the actions of their firms? Don't hold your breath waiting for that to happen.
Ah, I believe you are right. I take back my comments then. I wonder if by not persuing all violators, does it set a precident that can bite you later on? I think the key is if you are aware of the violation and do nothing. Obviously you can't be expected to deal with situations you don't know about...
This law, when properly used, can be a "good thing" for the parties it protects. The problem comes in when these 800-lb gorillas want to make up their own rules and expect everyone to follow their beliefs, ignoring other laws (fair use) that those pesky comsumers want to follow. In this case, the NFL is doing it's best to make sure that they are the only ones think/say/see anything relating to footbal. I'm sure if they could get away with it, they would sue anyone who says "Monday Night" without paying them a $1 license fee...
Thank you Wendy for showing the world (and your law class) how absurd these big companies are...
--- "To ignore race and sex is racist and sexist!" -- Jesse Jackson
[100% ISO 646 Compliant]
SVM, ERGO MONSTRO.
No, you're wrong. The NFL and / or other sports leagues have sued/threatened to sue people for exactly that. They either *do* believe it's within their rights, or they are trying to make other people believe so, and threatening/filing lawsuits on that premise.
Sticking feathers up your butt does not make you a chicken - Tyler Durden
"It's implied."
Actually, I am not sure it is. I think the word balance is the problem. There does not need to be a balance (equality) of any sort. There just needs to be enough of a tradeoff to get the producers to produce and publish enough works to serve the publics needs.
"Got a better proposal?"
Well, perhaps a crazy one to kick off the discussion. In any case involving the "state" and a jury, quiz the jury on the law, if they all know it, the case proceeds, if they don't, case dismissed. if the government wants to enforce laws, they better see to it that they educate the public as to what they are. Pros? Cons?
I am in the Bahamas. Funny thing is, from what I understand, the U.S. wil not honour the copyrights on our laws in the U.S.
all the best,
drew
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vcaf2ThG7q4
UFO seen in skies over Winton!
FreeMusicPush If you want to see more Free Music made, listen to Free
How dare these women discuss the looks of firefighters? What's wrong with them? Imagine all the training to fight fires and women discussing your muscles? They should put a stop to it RIGHT NOW.
You can't take the sky from me...
cmon: well volunteering bait!
I do not believe in karma. "Funny"=-6. Do good and forbid evil. Yours, Oft-Offtopic Flamebaiting Troll.
Exactly.
Other than threats of physical violence or other illegal acts, I don't know that there's a problem. They're not in a position to advise you of your rights, you are responsible for your knowing those.
The way I see it, they basically say "We forbid you any rights to this material." They're not actually able to limit you any further than the law, but it's up to you to interpret the law correctly. If they disagree with your interpretation, they may well sue you. They're in a better position to get a conservative reading of your right to fair use because their statement advised you that they willingly grant you no rights. You therefore have the bare minimum allowed by law and can't claim , e.g., that they gave you implicit oral permission that you can't show a record of, or that your use was inadvertent under the mistaken good faith belief that the material was public domain.
Yeah, going to court over this would cost you money. That's a fact of life. In truth, though, their statement is meaningless if you obey copyright laws. You should be taking care to respect it with any material you use and run the risk of litigation any time you attempt fair use, or you'll get yourself into trouble.
this space left intentionally blank
Most likely none of the readers here will ever see a woman in real life
There. Fixed that for you.
It is a bit of a stretch, kinda like a Kevin Bacon thing, only different. Believe me, the linkage is there. But just to be sure, it's not meant to be taken seriously, so while I appreciate the props, I'm a bit confused by the "informative" mod myself.
What?
She posted (afaik) 1 small piece of video that contained the NFL notice we've all been talkign about. Fair Use mentions educational use, and she's a law professor. WTF about that isn't fair use?
And, umm, those "technicalities" proved you technically wrong. The fact that you're also literally wrong is just gravy.
Now stop being a troll, I'm not gonna feed you no more.
I understand your point, completely, but don't overlook the fact that women, in general, and these women who find the spotlight in a place like Slashdot, in particular, can see through juvenile bullshit, with little to no effort.
snig
Going for the +5 Funny moderation, eh? ;-)
Modern copyright is theft of culture from everyone and it retards the progress of the useful arts and sciences.
Sounds to me that a moderator thought "oh, she posted stuff from Ted Stevens in an attempt to bait him into filing takedown notices as well? That's informative!" without actually checking the link to see if the claim was true or not.
Why is it that whenever a woman does anything noteworthy the first response here on slashdot is whether or not she is hot/doable/marryable, etc. What is wrong with you people? There is a post further down the page that says she looks like a man... and got modded funny! WTF? A couple days ago, a 17 year old girl won a 100,000 dollar science fair prize, and at least 1/3 of the comments were about whether she was hot or not. Most likely none of the readers here will ever see the woman in real life, so just what value do these comments have in the discussion?
I blame society :D. In our culture, for some reason men feel inclined to behave like asses when they congregate, especially with respect to the way they talk about women. I'm sure women talk differently in a roomful of women, too, and there is that "locker room atmosphere" to take into account. Part of it is the same process that happens in any group wherein there is some aspect that is noticably absent. In this case it's (ostensibly, since there are women on slashdot) a bunch of guys talking with no girls around. It's kind of like a bunch of white guys hanging around and someone cracks a black joke that they probably would not tell if their black friends were around. It is wrong, but people do it, and we aren't yet at that place in our society where enough people see the two as being equally and unequivocably wrong.
Men tend to objectify women and have a natural tendency to see them in terms of their sexual attractiveness. Part of that is a natural process, but part of that is a sickness in society that prevents men from treating women as truly equal. Even when they get to the evolutionary stage where they are able to treat women more or less equally in day to day life, under the right conditions these kinds of things can resurface if those thought processes have not been addressed. It does not help that this is the internet, where people are more or less anonymous or feel that they are. We all know what effect that can have.
In any case, just as it is quite possible, given a little self-control, to talk to an attractive woman without staring at her chest, and equally possible to sublimate sexual feelings in order to deal with someone in a professional context as another human being rather than some fantasy, I think it should be possible for a slashdotter to read a story about an attractive woman without spooging on their keyboard about how hard they'd toss her salad, or whatever. It just seems that people choose not to.
It was definitely more than a little weird in the case of the underage girls, like the high school student you mentioned. I do think (or rather hope) that in many cases, and especially that one, there was some humour involved, making fun of this very tendency. It might not have been funny for her, but who knows. Maybe she blew it off like the rest of us did.
Imagine how these women feel if they read slashdot. Here they are, busting their asses to do something cool/good, they finally get some recognition, and the response is a debate on how nice her hips look or don't.
I hate to break it to you, but they do read slashdot, and if they cared, some of them could probably find out who you were. Definitely Wendy Seltzer could. Not that she will, you panting dogs. You are right, though. It is probably something they have dealt with their whole lives because that is how women are treated in our society. To a certain extent there is flattery because, after all, it is not like it is bad to be smart and attractive as well as accomplished. I know my girlfriend is. But that does not mean that they like being publically drooled over like that by a horde of oversexed, underwashed virgins who they just *know* are doing unspeakable things at their computers (hopefully not involving their picture). :P It's gross, and it is a poor way to treat someone who is contrib
Hot geeky girls, on the other hand, are much more elusive. A geek in a small town could easily go his whole life without meeting a HGG. As a student at a large public university, I've met 0 hot, seriously-geeky girls and a few hot, sorta-geeky girls.
That's because they are hiding from you. Quite apart from the fact that they are geeks in the first place which tends to lead to a reclusive lifestyle, especially in college (they're studying!), anyone who knows they will basically cease to exist as a person and become an instant target for horndoggery the minute you find out something about them is likely to hide these things to a certain extent. The fact geeks tend to be shy does not help. Rinse and repeat this a few times and it's a wonder that someone hasn't created a secret bunker only accessable through obscure mathematical codes where women can evade such depredations. Then again maybe they did.
I was looking for, and have once again found, the HOWTO that talks about the problems women have with the men who hound them from the fields they might have trod, and how to prevent yourself from being one of those guys. If you really want to "score" a "geek chick," the first step, I would think, is to stop treating them the way men usually do (especially maladjusted ones). Some people also enjoy ESR's Sex Tips for Geeks, but you aren't old enough to read that until you've finished the other and done penance to linuxchix.org for your many failings :D.
1) All Slashdotters are male.
2) All Slashdotters are single.
3) All Slashdotters are virgins.
4) 99% have never kissed a girl.
5) 95% have never spoken to a girl other than Mom whose basement they live in.
You forgot:
6) CowboyNeal
7) ???
8) Profit!