Google to Viacom - The Law is Clear, and On Our Side

An anonymous reader writes "Google responded to the opinion piece in the Washington Post by a Viacom Lawyer with a letter to the editor titled 'An End Run on Copyright Law.' Their strong wording sends a very concrete message: 'Viacom is attempting to rewrite established copyright law through a baseless lawsuit. In February, after negotiations broke down, Viacom requested that YouTube take down more than 100,000 videos. We did so immediately, working through a weekend. Viacom later withdrew some of those requests, apparently realizing that those videos were not infringing, after all. Though Viacom seems unable to determine what constitutes infringing content, its lawyers believe that we should have the responsibility and ability to do it for them. Fortunately, the law is clear, and on our side.'"

Comments

Tag this:

[Cocoronixx]

omfgpwnt

Re:Tag this:

[theStorminMormon]

Seriously, that is ownage like I've never seen between large corporations before.

It looks like Google did in fact know exactly what they were doing when they bought YouTube. Right now Viacom looks pretty much like they just stepped on head of a rake and got whacked in the face.

If there's one thing you can say for Google, they know how to stand up for sane copyright law.

Re:Tag this:

[iminplaya]

If there's one thing you can say for Google, they know how to stand up for sane copyright law.

There will be no sanity until it is abolished.

Re:Tag this:

[Xtravar]

If there's one thing you can say for Google, they know how to stand up for sane copyright law.

That's because Google's entire business model is based around using other people's copyrighted material.

It's a symbiotic relationship where Google can use pieces of peoples content to advertise over while simultaneously causing that full content to be consumed, making the creators money.

What a strange new world...

Re:Tag this:

[theStorminMormon]

You want to *abolish* copyright law? See, now I think that that is somewhat less than sane. Picture this scenario: J. K. Rowling's Harry Potter is picked up by a small publisher and they sell a few hundred thousand copies. This gets the attention of a giant publishing house, which quickly rushes out millions of copies of the book and refuses to pay Rowling anything.

So now what? Does she write book 2 knowing that if she publishes it she'll only sell a few hundred thousand copies before stores are swamped with the (now legal) copies from the major publisher? Or does she just quit writing.

If there's no copyright, than it makes a lot more sense for media publishing companies to quit paying artists, and specialize in leeching off of small publishers. Which in turn means the small publishers will increasingly make no money for actually paying the media creators, which means the media creators eventually go back to flipping burgers.

In short: abolishing copyright entirely completely eradicates the financial incentive to pay artists to make work. I'm sure some will do it anyway, but most people have to make a living, so there will be virtually no professional, full-time artists of any kind ever again. That, to me, is insane.

Re:Tag this:

[Anonymous Coward]

I prefer to think of it another way.

Should I be able to bust into your house and have sex with your wife?

What, no, she's 'your' wife?

Can't own ideas, eh? Can't own people, either.

Should I be able to, after having my way with your wife, make off with your hi def TV?

What, no, it's 'your' tv?

Can't own ideas, eh? Can't own objects, either.

Sorry, but information doesn't want to be free. Information isn't a living thing, and it doesn't even have animal intelligence.

Information is nothing but a different 'type' of object, and there's no reason there should't be ownership laws involved. But, but, but, your wife is a person! But, but, but, your TV is a real tangible thing!

But, but but - listen, assholes (and I don't mean you, parent poster, as you have a clue!) - what, a TV takes material resources to create? Time to create?

What's the difference between a TV rolling off an assembly line, and a novel written by some guy in his basement? None. Both were produced by hard working people (and some robots in the case of TVs). That guy in his basement deserves to get paid just as much as those hard working people and robots in the TV factory.

There's obviously a point where enough is enough. Patents expire after a certain time; so should copyright. I argue not on the side of a certain irritating rodent who, if things continue, will never be released into the public domain. But crying for the complete abolishment of copyright is sheer stupidity and insanity all rolled into one.

Re:Tag this:

[Dan Slotman]

omfgpwnt I have a better idea—don't tag it that. Google's publicists didn't get in any more concrete argument here than Viacom's did.

Both Google and Viacom desperately want to set the agenda and the precedent for online distribution of media. With the increased importance of digital distribution, the future of both companies may depend on convincing the courts to see things their way. These ploys are merely the skirmishes between forces scouting for good positions; the real battle is yet to come.

Re:Tag this:

[Anonymous Coward]

With the amount of money that Google paid for YouTube, they could have just licensed or purchased Comedy Central in the first place, don't you think? The bottom line behind this lawsuit is that a lot of the popular content on YouTube is owned by Viacom, and Google is making money off of it.

Re:Tag this:

[voice_of_all_reason]

I dunno, people on the intrawebs have grown pretty strong at endeavoring to produce stuff for free to the world (fanart, remixes, mods). Sure, you'd lose the work of some (like Harry Potter), but it wouldn't disappear entirely.

Re:Tag this:

[voice_of_all_reason]

False dilemma, red herring, total logical disconnect.

Your wife owns herself. And no one's arguing that we should drop ownership of property laws. Objects can be owned by nature of them being tangible.

Information is nothing but a different 'type' of object, and there's no reason there should't be ownership laws involved

How about "the will of the people?"

Re:Tag this:

[Wilson_6500]

There is, of course, the argument that artists shouldn't necessarily expect to profit from their artistic works. Sure, artists have for ages worked on commission, but I think the concept of writing a book with the primary expectation of selling it for money is relatively new. Of course, publishing has always been expensive, meaning that there's always been money tied up in the process. Nowadays, though, we have the Internet, which is touted as a great way for artists to share their works (so long as they haven't given up the copyrights).

(Cue angry professional artists.)

Re:Tag this:

[Logic and Reason]

...so there will be virtually no professional, full-time artists of any kind ever again. That, to me, is insane.

Why? Is the concept of a "professional artist" somehow sacred? Anyway, this is not true: think of musicians who make a living doing live shows. Maybe that wouldn't work for some types of artists, but again, why should they be guaranteed a certain way of making money?

Re:Tag this:

[pnuema]

In short: abolishing copyright entirely completely eradicates the financial incentive to pay artists to make work. I'm sure some will do it anyway, but most people have to make a living, so there will be virtually no professional, full-time artists of any kind ever again. That, to me, is insane.

I'd like to point out that the greatest works of art of all time were produced in an era where there were no such things as copyright laws. It's called patronage, and it worked for thousands of years.

Maybe if every teeny bopper whore who wants to pout at a camera, sing to an over-produced track and get paid millions for it suddenly can't make money because the artificial monopoly supporting such a business model vanishes, we wouldn't be innundated with mindless crap. Maybe we would all be better off if the only people who made art were the ones that were passionate enough to make it without thought of getting paid.

Nah, you're right. That's crazy.

Re:Tag this:

[Anonymous Coward]

Your scenario doesn't show, never mind prove, that copyright is a public good. Picture the mega-publisher skimming Rowling away from the mini-publisher for the second book, just like any other star content producer. Maybe you've seen what happens to truly great software builders? The Dead did just fine giving away their concert music, because they were in the business of _producing_ music, not _protecting_ it.

Copyright was originally created to protect content from those who would change it and resell it as the original content, so when you bought a book allegedly by Rowling, it actually had Rowling's words in it and not someone else's edited version.

If there's a serious economic analysis of the public costs and benefits of copyright with such a clear result, I'm not aware of it. I've only heard bald claims and anecdotal handwaving. http://www.law.stanford.edu/publications/stanford_ lawyer/issues/73/Property.html is an interesting article, tho. Another is http://www.jstor.org/view/00472530/sp030004/03x003 8l/0?frame=noframe&userID=81531f02@mitre.org/01cc9 9331f00501bacefb&dpi=3&config=jstor
but again, no strong result.

Re:Tag this:

[sofla]

In short: abolishing copyright entirely completely eradicates the financial incentive to pay artists to make work. I'm sure some will do it anyway, but most people have to make a living, so there will be virtually no professional, full-time artists of any kind ever again. That, to me, is insane.

otoh, it would discourage those artists who are cranking out mindless drivel (*cough* *cough* Robert Jordan *cough* *cough*) just to sell a few copies so that they can make a living.

As far as what J.K. Rowling might do in your hypothetical scenario, I think these options are more likely:

1. hold out for more money upfront, as a lump sum payment
2. switch publishers

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that we should abolish copyright law entirely, but holding on to outdated business models doesn't make sense either. IMO, its only a matter of time before the book publishers lose their monopoly position just as the music and movie publishers have. Music and movies got hit first because you don't have to interact with the media itself to enjoy the content - you load it into the player and walk away. Its different with a book. At least, for now.

Re:Tag this:

[sBox]

I'd like to point out that the greatest works of art of all time were produced in an era where there were no such things as copyright laws. It's called patronage, and it worked for thousands of years.

You go ahead and try to make an exact copy of Jackson Pollock's 'One: Number 31' in 10s, 10m, 10h, 10d or 10y. Go ahead, start now. Let me know when you are finished and you can have your juice box.

Re:Tag this:

[Jtheletter]

Anyway, this is not true: think of musicians who make a living doing live shows. Maybe that wouldn't work for some types of artists, but again, why should they be guaranteed a certain way of making money?

It's not the artist's income only that copyright seeks to protect, it's also the cultural enhancement that society itself recieves and benefits from, which is more intangible but nevertheless a Good Thing. Yes, if all copyright were abolished some artists in some mediums would continue to produce, but we would not have anywhere near the amount of creative works we have now since it would be much harder to earn a living without doing some other parttime work. Copyright is supposed to strike a balance between the needs of the creator (income) and the needs of society (entertainment, culture) but lately the balance has been pushed by corporations far in favor of the creator, or rather the holder of the copyright. One way that this might also be addressed is to prohibit the wholesale transfer of copyrights to corporations, removing the incentive for a corp. to hoard works and lobby for ever stronger/longer terms. Just a quick thought, needs more fleshing out.
My main point was to defend the parent who I believe is essentially correct: removing all copyrights will in the end hurt artists by making it harder for them to make a living solely from their works and returning us to a period where works are produced mostly on commission, which means only the wealthy could afford what we take for granted today. It won't happen overnight, and it won't stop all artists from producing, but the variety, quality, and breadth of works currently available will definitely decrease.

Re:Tag this:

[shystershep]

fanart, remixes, mods

Interesting choices for examples of stuff people are willing to produce for free. Each and every one of those is a derivative work, or at least based on someone else's original work -- which is mostly likely copyrighted and created at least in part for profit.

Sure, you'd lose the work of some (like Harry Potter), but it wouldn't disappear entirely.

So we'd lose all of the original work, and be able to 'mod' and 'remix' each other's derivative dreck. Woo hoo.

Re:Tag this:

[alphamugwump]

You failed to take into account the effect that repealing copyright would have on large publishers, and the way they interact with authors. It wouldn't be small publishers that would pick up books, followed by big publishers. That is the model that is followed now.

More likely, the author would publish the book online, and rake in revenue from advertising. Sure, someone could leach the content, but the official site would always have the book out first, so everyone would go there instead of stealing it.

There would be no big publishing houses. Period. If there is enough demand, the author could simply accept preorders, and publish a small run.

This would actually lower the barrier to entry, leading to a greater diversity of stuff, rather than the current system, which is completely controlled by large publishing houses. Of course, it would probably be a good bit harder to make a living off ad revenue, making life difficult for professional creators. But then again, most of the stuff right now is crap anyway, so it's a toss-up.

Re:Tag this:

[StikyPad]

I have a better idea--don't tag it that.

Too late.. now people need to tag it !omfgpwnt just so it doesn't look ridiculous. You're right too.. I was expecting the article to be damning with a tag like that, but all the "good stuff" was in the summary.

Re:Tag this:

[HikingStick]

While not a lawyer, the precedent in this case is in the realm of flea markets. Copyright owners are responsible for identifying infringing content, not the organizers of the flea market.

Now, if it became clear that flea market organizers kept welcoming DVD pirates back (after the infringing content has been discovered previously), then the organizer may be setting him/herself up for some argument of complicity...

Re:Tag this:

[ZombieRoboNinja]

Yay, back to the good old days where the only art produced was that that explicitly glorified the extremely wealthy!

Re:Tag this:

[iminplaya]

There are other ways to make money from your work without monopolizing the distribution. In fact that's where the money is supposed to be made, in the performance of work, not the distribution of reproductions. Those should only serve to convince people to buy your next work. I don't care about publishers and distributors. They're just ripping off the creators like the railroad monopolies did to the farmers, and they can all rot. There are other alternatives now. Use them instead of clinging to businesses that no longer have a purpose. Distribution of information is now a trivial matter. We shouldn't let outdated laws get in the way of progress. The publisher's teat is running dry. They are a fifth wheel trying to put more laws on the books to maintain the artists' dependence on them. This is all that copyright is about. It has nothing to do with protecting the artists' rights. It's about protecting the distributors' profits. It is delusional to believe otherwise. This gravy is coming to the end of the track.

...full-time artists of any kind ever again.

So what? Why should I subsidize a full time artist with corrupt law that only promotes hoarding and speculation? That's like tobacco or oil subsidies. They can get paid when they perform. I'll repeat it for you, a recording of me eating a steak does not fill my stomach. There is no reason a reproduction of work already performed should fill your wallet. Make your contract, perform the work, get paid, and walk away. That's all you or anybody else is entitled to.

Re:Tag this:

[arudloff]

I'd like to point out that the greatest works of art of all time were produced in an era where there were no such things as copyright laws. It's called patronage, and it worked for thousands of years.

Thousands of years without every man, woman and child owning a high speed "printing press" in their homes

Re:Tag this:

[bberens]

As far as what J.K. Rowling might do in your hypothetical scenario, I think these options are more likely:

1. hold out for more money upfront, as a lump sum payment
2. switch publishers

Except that no publisher in their right minds would pay JK any significant sums of money because as soon as the first copy is on the bookshelf publisher b can print their own copy. If JK were to switch publishers to publisher b, then JK is faced with the same problem.

Re:Tag this:

[esme]

There would need to be a separate flow of money to the author that didn't involve the publishers.

Currently, there are government and non-profit grants. There are also day jobs (a lot of writers are also magazine editors, columnists, teachers of various sorts, etc.).

In the case of Rowling, and the small number of other stars, they could setup a foundation that accepted payments from fans (fan clubs could probably be re-purposed for this). I imagine a lot of people would be willing to buy her books for $5 and give the other $20 or so to her fan club, if it meant that she didn't have to have a day job and the books got written faster.

Better yet, the publisher could be removed from the equation entirely. Rowling could setup a website where you could download her books for a nominal fee. You could take your files to a copy shop, and they could print and bind them for you, if you wanted.

And authors are probably the worst case for the abolition of copyright. Almost every other kind of work (music, theatre, film, etc.) has an inherent performance aspect to it, and can be charged for directly. Authors would probably wind up in a more direct patronage system because of this.

-Esme

Re:Tag this:

[iminplaya]

Score:-1, Troll

You misspelled True. And telling the truth should get positive points. Or is politically correct the only way?

Re:Tag this:

[podperson]

How is the parent insightful? No-one is calling for the abolition of copyright law.

Re:Tag this:

[russotto]

Well, let's suppose we keep copyright in place. Now some technology comes along which makes infringing copyright trivial and copyright unenforcable. Now we must outlaw that technology or lose copyright. Goodbye, photocopiers and computers... oops.

OK, maybe it's not so bad. Maybe there's some other technology which can make infringing copyright hard again. But that technology can be easily defeated... so we make that illegal. But that law's unenforcable, so we make the tools for doing so illegal. But those tools are nothing but a set of instructions, and are too easily distributed, so we make even talking about where to get them illegal. There's DMCA 1201 and the 2600 ruling, led to directly by the necessity to protect copyright.

You can't have digital copying technology, copyright, and freedom of speech. They aren't compatible.

Re:Tag this:

[johnptg]

You are suggesting cause and effect in a way that I find unlikely.

theStorminMormon:
"See, now I think that that is somewhat less than sane. Picture this scenario: J. K. Rowling's Harry Potter is picked up by a small publisher and they sell a few hundred thousand copies. This gets the attention of a giant publishing house, which quickly rushes out millions of copies of the book and refuses to pay Rowling anything."

You suggest her next choice is limited to writing a book then getting ripped off by a bigger publisher or stop writing. Why wouldn't she go to the big publisher for her next book and ask for an upfront payment before she writes another book. Or, better yet, why doesn't she sell it on-line herself and tell people if they want her to write another book they need to buy from her website.

I don't think we can reliably predict what will happen if we abolish copyright. I think it is unlikely the art creator will get the short end of the deal if we do. They are still creating something people want to buy, this has value.

I agree with you to some degree. There should be legal protection for artists and their ability to profit from their work. I am just not sure the current system protects artists as much as it protects art distributors.

John

Re:Tag this:

[Anonymous Coward]

I'd like to point out that the greatest works of art of all time were produced in an era where there were no such things as copyright laws. It's called patronage, and it worked for thousands of years.

Maybe if every teeny bopper whore who wants to pout at a camera, sing to an over-produced track and get paid millions for it suddenly can't make money because the artificial monopoly supporting such a business model vanishes, we wouldn't be innundated with mindless crap. Maybe we would all be better off if the only people who made art were the ones that were passionate enough to make it without thought of getting paid.

Nah, you're right. That's crazy.

Hear fucking hear! Well said sir. But not only that, and without "patronage" as such...

The Lascaux Cave Paintings, Native American Rock Art, Inuit Art, The Epic of Gilgamesh, The Talmud, The Koran, The Bible, The Great Pyramids, The Parthenon, The Coliseum, The Pyramids of Teotihuacan...

The awe inspiring list of the ancient art of man goes on and on. Yet today we see nothing of the like of our "primitive" ancestors. Why?

It can easily be argued that copyright, capitalism and democracy are severely detrimental to the quality and caliber of human works of art.

Art is innate in man, it is its own reward.

I can think of only one modern example that lives up to the works of our ancient past, and that is the family that has over two generations now been slowly carving a colossal statue of Crazy Horse from a mountain. And as one would expect of great art, no personal profit is expected.

Re:Tag this:

[iminplaya]

...owning a high speed "printing press" in their homes

Which makes copyright even MORE abhorrent. This what copyright was intended to stop when the first printing press came out. Only the "authorized" should have access to such a dangerous tool.

Re:Tag this:

[Penguinoflight]

Well, I'd hope she would quit writing. At least then we wouldn't have to put up with all the stupid kids running around with glasses and broomsticks.

Re:Tag this:

[2short]

"I'd like to point out that the greatest works of art of all time were produced in an era where there were no such things as copyright laws."

I'd like to point out that there was no such thing as effective copying. Patronage worked great when directly hiring a creator to make something was the only way to get it, because there wasn't any technical capability to make a copy.

Does the "mindless crap" you're inundated with include the output of all programmers, architects, authors (non-fiction and fiction), engineers, etc. etc. ? Pop musicians are not very representative of the rather significant segment of our society who currently depend on copyright.

I'm a big proponent of copyright reform, but the implication that simple abolition is a no-brainer doesn't fly in my book.

Re:Tag this:

[Anonymous Coward]

I am sure of that. They must have google'd it prior to buying. If only Viacom had google'd a bit of law ...

Re:Tag this:

[Miseph]

Ok, I have mod points, but I really wanted to reply to this and the whole article's moderated to hell anyway... I don't do AC.

The problem with your first point is that the mega-publisher has no incentive at all to do that. They'd probably have to pay Rowling a shit-ton of money if they wanted to publish her next book, and all they had to do the first time is pay $20 for a retail copy. Do you really think they'll ever give up a deal that sweet for, literally, no reason? The Grateful Dead may have done a huge number of free concerts, but you're kidding yourself if you think even a majority of them were, they were just nice enough to allow paying concert goers to record and legally distribute (for free) the recordings if they so chose, though they charged extra for that privilege. They most certainly did not give away their studio recordings for free. You're crazy if you think The Dead didn't profit greatly from copyrighting their work, though it should be noted they did so without selling out or being draconian about it.

Your second point is just wrong. Copyright was never intended to keep one party from fraudulently claiming that another created something. That's what trademark is for, as well as libel. If I take a copy of the new Harry Potter book and publish a thousand copies without getting permission and paying her (and her publisher, and anyone else I'd need to pay), I'm in violation of copyright; if I cross J.K. Rowling's name out, write mine in, and publish a thousand copies without paying her (etc), i am both in violation of copyright and flagrantly plagiarizing her; if I write up a thousand pages of TimeCube style ranting and publish them so that they appear to be a copy of the new Harry Potter book, then I am in violation of trademark , and Rowling et al would probably have a very strong libel and defamation case against me... I would also, most likely, by committed to a mental health facility pending psychological evaluation.

The problem is not with copyright (or patent) itself, because we really do need that in order to protect content creators (or inventors) from predatory publishers. The problem is with our current implementation. Part of the problem is also that many content creators are completely unwilling to accept that there are other ways to profit: like providing paid support for free software (a la all the major Linux players), live performance (I think Shakespeare is the single best example of this: he wrote all of his plays so that his theater troupe could perform them for paying audience members and wrote his non-dramatic works as a way of advertising his talents to the upper classes in hopes they'd sponsor the company), or various other techniques, but they aren't always practical or applicable (a painter, sculptor, or novelist can't really touch up the work after the fact, or expect people to pay to watch them work, they really just have to sell their work, and in the case of the novelist they can't even rely on others not to be able to copy it exactly or customers to be able to recognize such copies or care if they do).

Re:Tag this:

[theStorminMormon]

nformation is nothing but a different 'type' of object, and there's no reason there should't be ownership laws involved.

This is silly. There's a very fundamental difference between tangible goods and ideas. If you take my car, I have no car anymore. If you take my song, I still have it. So you have not deprived me of the song.

You can not deprive people of ideas by "stealing" them, and thus stealing an idea is different than stealing a tangible object.

So the reason that people can't take my TV is quite simply that then I will no longer have a TV. But if I start whistling my own invented melody and someone hears me and starts whistling it too, I haven't lost the melody. The wife example is silly. If my wife wants to have sex with some dude - much as that would suck for me - then I can't stop her. If she doesn't want to, then it's rape. Are you now trying to say that rape and theft are the same thing?

What's the difference between a TV rolling off an assembly line, and a novel written by some guy in his basement? None. Both were produced by hard working people (and some robots in the case of TVs).

Books, as in the physical objects, are not copyrighted. It is the contents of those books - which are intangible - that are copyrighted. I suggest you do some reading: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intellectual_property

But crying for the complete abolishment of copyright is sheer stupidity and insanity all rolled into one.

It saddens me that I agree with you on anything.

Re:Tag this:

[Logic and Reason]

Copyright is supposed to strike a balance between the needs of the creator (income) and the needs of society (entertainment, culture)...

Why must we "strike a balance" in copyright law? Do physical property laws "strike a balance"? No, what's mine is mine, and what's your is yours, period. So why does physical property not have a limited term, as copyright does? That's because physical property is a far more natural and just construct than is so-called "intellectual property"; most people can see how ridiculous it would be to have unlimited terms on copyright and patents. But that just shows that the idea of intellectual property itself is fundamentally flawed: trying to restrict the flow of information artificially is not only unjust, but impossible in the long run ("like trying to make water not wet," as Bruce Schneier said).

...removing all copyrights will in the end hurt artists...

Even if that were true, it's irrelevant. Not everything that harms someone is (or should be) illegal.

...the variety, quality, and breadth of works currently available will definitely decrease.

I disagree. The total quantity of works produced might decrease, but I think the variety would actually increase. Think how much of the music sold today is unimaginative dreck from pop stars backed by the big record companies, and imagine that bands started making more of their money from live shows instead. That seems likely to increase the overall variety of the market, and certainly would give creative, non-mainstream bands more room to succeed.

Re:Tag this:

[theStorminMormon]

Plus have you ever read fan art? That stuff is awful. The people writing fan art are the ones who can't actually get their works published.

It's also worth pointing out that one difference between fan art and professional art is probably the amount of time that goes into professional art. Writing a book, for most people, takes a huge investment. If you're getting paid to write the book, that's great. But if you also have to work a full time job to get by and write the book in your spare time, well, it will either suck or take you a very long, long time to complete.

Re:Tag this:

[iminplaya]

Yeah distribution costs were a bit of a bear back then. Too bad they didn't have Ticketmaster to arrange all the concerts.

Re:Tag this:

[Jherek Carnelian]

So now what? Does she write book 2 knowing that if she publishes it she'll only sell a few hundred thousand copies before stores are swamped with the (now legal) copies from the major publisher? Or does she just quit writing.

No, she sets up the industrial-strength equivalent of a paypal tip jar and when the balance reaches whatever she thinks she deserves for her 2nd book, she publishes it on the internet for anyone to read and freely share with anyone else.

Re:Tag this:

[iminplaya]

No-one is calling for the abolition of copyright law.

Yes, I am. Read the grandparent. The only suitable solution is complete abolishment outside regulations against plagiarism. I've already stated the reasons why over the last several years and have repeated some here. The law isn't what people think it is, yet they continue to ignore that fact. It must die a swift death.

Re:Tag this:

[theStorminMormon]

Why must we "strike a balance" in copyright law?

I get the impression that you don't understand what copyrights are. If you have a copyright to an idea you do not own that idea. Ideas can not be owned. Period. Copyright laws and patents do not contradict this common sense notion. A copyright law does not grant you ownership of an idea. It grants you ownership to exclusive rights to control the distribution of that idea for profit.

This isn't just a matter of pragmatics (although that comes into it to) but also of ethics. If it takes me 1,000 hours to write my novel is it fair that anyone else can come and copy it and sell it? I invested the work, but if there's no copyright law then they can reap the benefit. Most people agree that this is not fair. So artists deserve *some* rights.

On the other hand if I spend 1,000 hours writing a book does it makes sense that I can then sue someone for quoting a passage from my book? Or that I can stop people from reading my book if I don't want them to? Imagine an author wandering around a book store "I don't like the looks of you, give me that book back. Get out." So clearly giving artists *all* rights is also not fair.

Since both extremes - no rights and all rights - are not ethical than if you want to find the ethical then by definition you are looking for something in between. You are, as it were, attempting to strike a balance.

Do physical property laws "strike a balance"? No, what's mine is mine, and what's your is yours, period.

This is false. Both taxes and eminent domain demonstrate that we do, in fact, strike a balance in this case as well. If you own a house on land the country needs for a road, then you don't get to say "what's mine is mine". The gov't knocks your house down (and pays you for it).

I disagree. The total quantity of works produced might decrease, but I think the variety would actually increase.

It's called the tragedy of the commons. If everyone can profit from an copying from an invention as much as from inventing the invention, then everyone has the incentive *not* to be the one that does the hard work of inventing. This is a more fundamental law than your liking for indie music. Why should there be a larger variety of music if people are being paid less to make it? It's not as though anyone is forcing people who are willing to make music for free not to make it now. So right now everyone that is willing to make money for free makes it, and also people who need or want to get paid make it. You take away the option to get paid, and only the people willing to make music for free will make it. How are fewer artists "more variety"?

Re:Tag this:

[theStorminMormon]

Thousands of years without every man, woman and child owning a high speed "printing press" in their homes

This is actually a very historically apt example. From wikipedia:

Movable type

The printing press brought the possibility of compensation for literary labor. Very speedily, however, the unrestricted rivalry of printers brought into existence competing and unauthorized editions of various works, which diminished prospects of any payment, or even entailed loss, for the authors, editors, and printers of the original issue, and thus discouraged further undertaking. Any person with a press and some skills could use movable type to publish books and other items. Scribes and scriveners were no longer needed.

Protection for the authors and their representatives was sought through special privileges obtained for separate works as issued. According to Elizabeth Armstrong (whom the Curators of the Bodleian Library awarded the Gordon Duff Prize in 1965 for her essay on Printers' and authors' privileges in France and the Low Countries in the sixteenth century), "The republic of Venice granted its first privilege for a particular book in 1486. It was a special case, being the history of the city itself, the 'Rerum venetarum ab urbe condita opus' of Marcus Antonius Coccius Sabellicus" (page 03). [ Armstrong, Elizabeth. Before Copyright: the French book-privilege system 1498-1526. Cambridge University Press (Cambridge: 1990). ] "Venice began regularly granting privileges for particular books in 1492. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_copyright_ law#Earliest_copyright_disputations

As soon as the means for cheap reproduction existed, the need for copyright was seen. Copyright laws date back to the 15th century. I'm not sure what "greatest works of time" you were thinking of, but I'd wager at least some of them actually came into existence *after* the printing press (and therefore were probably copyrighted at the time) and in any case the point remains: before easy reproduction there was no need for copyright law, afterwards there was.

Re:Tag this:

[theStorminMormon]

In fact that's where the money is supposed to be made, in the performance of work, not the distribution of reproductions.

So... how many novels have you seen performed? Not adaptations of novels, but actual novels? There's an argument to be made that copyright is less important for the performance arts, but in that case you're not merely selling the work, but the performance of the work. So it makes sense. But a lot of art is not performed. Just tough look to them? I suppose Terry Pratchett should just start writing novels live and charging $10 an hour to watch him work?

I don't care about publishers and distributors. They're just ripping off the creators like the railroad monopolies did to the farmers, and they can all rot.

They are *now*, but that's because now any 8 year old with a CD can make perfect digital copies of most forms of art. Music, video, or text. But publishing companies were invented when the means of publication and distribution were much, much more expensive. The plunge in the cost of publication and distribution is a relatively new thing, historically.

The publisher's teat is running dry. They are a fifth wheel trying to put more laws on the books to maintain the artists' dependence on them.

This is a drastic overstatement. One of the most important things publishers do is marketing. And as Google shows, that's still an industry that is thriving today. So publishers aren't dead yet. Furthermore, not all media is digital yet, and that means there's still a reason for publishers to exist. I want a hardback copy of Harry Potter and the Deahtly Hallows, not a .pdf.

Why should I subsidize a full time artist with corrupt law that only promotes hoarding and speculation?

This is just silly. Copyright law doesn't force you to subsidize anybody. If you don't want to subsidize J. K. Rowling, don't buy her book. That's fine with me. Find an author that is willing to give their work away. But I'm happy to give J. K. Rowling her money. And if she has worked out a deal with Scholastic to print the book, then I'm happy to give them their cut. And if Borders is kind enough to take shipment of the books and provide nice displays for me to peruse, than I'll gladly fork over some cash to them as well. Conveniently enough for me, all that money is bundled into one transaction.

Copyright doesn't force you to pay money at all. It just gives authors the right to set limitations on their work. If you don't like the price they set: don't pay. You don't have some inalienable right to enjoy art you didn't create for free.

There is no reason a reproduction of work already performed should fill your wallet. Make your contract, perform the work, get paid, and walk away. That's all you or anybody else is entitled to.

Did you really write this entire thing without ever once stopping to think that not all art is performance art?

Re:Tag this:

[BryanL]

Patronage + Teeny booper whore = prostitution/child sex ring. But seriously, individuals with lots of money can have bad taste in music. Starving passionate musicians can create crap. Abolishing copyright will not mean there will be better music.

Re:Tag this:

[theStorminMormon]

Maybe if every teeny bopper whore who wants to pout at a camera, sing to an over-produced track and get paid millions for it suddenly can't make money because the artificial monopoly supporting such a business model vanishes, we wouldn't be innundated with mindless crap. Maybe we would all be better off if the only people who made art were the ones that were passionate enough to make it without thought of getting paid.

This strikes me as really funny. Like it or not, the reason that pop songs like this keep getting made is because people by them. It's actually relatively democratic. I mean, you might not like the music. I certainly don't care for it. But you can't argue with the fact that a lot of people like the music enough to pay money to get it.

But rather than the democratic ideal you'd rather go back to a system where a few mega-rich fat dudes literally decided what got made. You honestly think that would be an improvement? You know what - evenif the mega rich fat dudes were all my friends and made sure that all my favorite screamo bands and prog rock bands stuck around forever, I'd still be deeply troubled by the fact that in general people had to buy music that was decided for them by a few rich people.

Consumerism lets people vote with their wallets. The trouble is, as you've observed, they tend to make stupid decisions. Still, I'd rather take the stupid masses than a tyranny any day: even when it comes to music and not politics.

Re:Tag this:

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe if every teeny bopper whore who wants to pout at a camera, sing to an over-produced track and get paid millions for it suddenly can't make money because the artificial monopoly supporting such a business model vanishes, we wouldn't be innundated with mindless crap. Maybe we would all be better off if the only people who made art were the ones that were passionate enough to make it without thought of getting paid.

What color is the dope in your bong?

And please site anything that shows removing a financial incentive makes for better music. A lot of it is worse than the teeny bopper crap you dispise.

Re:Tag this:

[Logic and Reason]

If it takes me 1,000 hours to write my novel is it fair that anyone else can come and copy it and sell it?

Yes, if you give that person access to it without conditions on it (a contract), or if he somehow gets access to it without going through you and without violating your other rights (e.g. if there's already a copy floating around on the net, or if he happens to create a very similar work independently).

Both taxes and eminent domain demonstrate that we do, in fact, strike a balance in this case as well.

Both of those examples also happen to be unjust. Admittedly, that does make my analogy less than perfect, but it does not affect the basic argument.

It's called the tragedy of the commons. If everyone can profit from an copying from an invention as much as from inventing the invention, then everyone has the incentive *not* to be the one that does the hard work of inventing.

I think you mean the free rider problem. In any case, how do you then explain the success of open source software? The free rider problem can be overcome in more ways than one, and copyright is not a particularly good method of doing so.

You take away the option to get paid, and only the people willing to make music for free will make it.

That's a false dilemma: live shows would still charge admission, for example. Sure, people could tape the performance and spread it over the net (again assuming they didn't sign any contracts when they entered the show), but clearly there would still be a demand for live performances.

Furthermore, I think you underestimate the human drive to create. People were creating things long before there was copyright, and will continue to do so once it is gone. Being able to make a living by doing so in a certain way is not a prerequisite.

Re:Tag this:

[zotz]

"So we'd lose all of the original work, and be able to 'mod' and 'remix' each other's derivative dreck. Woo hoo."

Well, you can find the first drafts of two novels here:

http://www.ourmedia.org/blog/17145

Who knows how things will shake out? Not that I call to get rid of copyright, but it does need some serious fixing though.

all the best,

drew

http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=zotzbro

Re:Tag this:

[iminplaya]

The performance is in the writing, not the distribution. You will be paid to write a story. Make the arrangements beforehand before releasing what you have written to anybody, anywhere, because once you do, that's it. It no longer exclusively belongs to anybody. Then move on to the next one.

But publishing companies were invented when the means of publication and distribution were much, much more expensive.

And we no longer need them for that function. There's nothing wrong with using them as one stop marketing agents if they're up to the task. But there is no longer any need to sign over any rights since you're just paying a lawyer to give away something that doesn't exist. Ownership. Note, I didn't say authorship. That exists forever.

It just gives authors the right to set limitations on their work.

The only real rights are that of authorship. There are no other rights. The work was performed when he wrote the book. He can use his agent to work out the payment plan ahead of time. He has no right to dictate what I can do with my copy once it's out. He will have been paid,and that's the end of it.

Did you really write this entire thing without ever once stopping to think that not all art is performance art?

All work is a performance. I perform work on your car. That's when I get paid. You perform work on a play, screen or otherwise. That's when you get paid. Work as a studio musician. That's when you get paid. A mechanical reproduction by a machine is not a performance. The only person that should get paid there is the operator. I don't think you should get paid for selling copies(or something I can get without your help). You should get paid for writing books, or music, whatever. If I like what I see, I'll be more than happy to pay you to get another performance. But I won't give you money for work that has already been done and you are no longer performing. That's the way it works in my line of business. I don't believe anybody should receive special treatment.

Re:Tag this:

[Anonymous Coward]

uh..there are plenty of talented folks performing IN YOUR TOWN RIGHT NOW.

quit bitching that you aren't being forcefed the best, and go find some great art for yourself.

Re:Tag this:

[daigu]

A copyright law does not grant you ownership of an idea. It grants you ownership to exclusive rights to control the distribution of that idea for profit.

IANAL and neither are you. For one, you are confusing patents and copyrights. Copyright is an artifical monopoly granted by the government in respect to a particular expression of an idea. It is not possible to copyright an idea - as you would have learned if you had checked Wikipedia before posting.

Copyright law is not a matter of ethics. It is simply law and public policy. As the Constitution puts it: "To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries." You'll notice that the focus is on progress - not because it is "right" from any moral perspective.

Further, there is a problem in your premises. Specifically, you aren't using your imagination or referring to historical precedent where copyright did not exist, yet creative works were produced. The University system and patronage are historical examples. I can imagine cooperatives that could provide a basic standard of living for artists and other possible formulations that you probably haven't considered. Copyright is only one way to skin this particular cat.

It's called the tragedy of the commons.

Tragedy of the commons is actually based on scarcity. The problem you have is that you are assuming that creative works are fungible. Here's the example that shows the flaw in your reasoning. Suppose The Beatles decide to release all their music and make it all public domain. Now, since all their music is available - according to your reasoning, no one will make any music anymore. No need to create derivative works. Why bother because The Beatles is freely available right? Wrong. People like to make music. They like to make new sounds/songs, listen to new sounds/songs and so forth. The fact that The Beatles catalog is freely available means I have a treasure trove of sounds to incorporate into my own music - and great music to listen to as well. The tragedy here is that in reality the Beatles catalog is not available in the commons. If it were in the commons, no tragedy of the commons would occur due to its available. Nor would the tragedy of the commons come into play if every copyrighted piece of music were available and copyright were abolished - any more than it would be for individual artists. Also as most musicians know, your money comes from touring - which isn't about copyright. You need to work on this argument.

Why should there be a larger variety of music if people are being paid less to make it?

Because most people making music don't make music for money. Even among those that do, most don't play solely music to maximize their profit.

Re:Tag this:

[TheVelvetFlamebait]

So we'd lose all of the original work, and be able to 'mod' and 'remix' each other's derivative dreck. Woo hoo.

Anyone here listened to the radio lately?

Re:Tag this:

[TheVelvetFlamebait]

I'd like to point out that the greatest works of art of all time were produced in an era where there were no such things as copyright laws. It's called patronage, and it worked for thousands of years.

Most of them were contracted by the extremely wealthy. They made artworks that (mostly) were difficult to impossible to replicate (music being the obvious exception), and only the most wealthy had access to them. Even if the great pieces of music were produced today, they would just be recorded in concert, and distributed over P2P networks. The wealthy class wouldn't feel the buzz of owning exclusively a great piece of art, and they wouldn't finance it. In short, that was then. This is today.

Maybe if every teeny bopper whore who wants to pout at a camera, sing to an over-produced track and get paid millions for it suddenly can't make money because the artificial monopoly supporting such a business model vanishes, we wouldn't be innundated with mindless crap. Maybe we would all be better off if the only people who made art were the ones that were passionate enough to make it without thought of getting paid.

I have no idea why everyone seems to "blame" the success of pop music on copyright laws. The copyright laws help, but what really drives the market is... wait for it... demand! Yes, it is (and always has been) demand for certain products that ensures that they are created! IF you really want to get rid of these "teeny boppers", force people to share your taste in music!

Re:Tag this:

[Anonymous Coward]

Naa, everyone's missing the point. Those that are truely good, the Hendricies, the Mozarts, the Einsteins (he had a part time job as patent clerk), Dali (he was poor as shit at first) will CONTINUE to produce the best of the best regardless of some sort of copyright protection. All copyright does is allow less competent people to make money doing things they shouldn't be doing.

Re:Tag this:

[Belial6]

Uh, could you point me to an original work that is not derivative of someone else's work? I have yet to see one.

Re:Tag this:

[Anonymous Coward]

in short: abolishing copyright entirely completely eradicates the financial incentive to pay artists to make work.

The only thing abolishing copyright does is abolish the CURRENT system of financial incentives. That you believe that copyright is the only possible system of financial incentives says more about your lack of financial creativity and business savvy than it does about the sanity or insanity of repealing copyright.

Re:Tag this:

[swillden]

I get the impression that you don't understand what copyrights are.

That's funny, I get the same impression about you :)

If you have a copyright to an idea you do not own that idea. Ideas can not be owned. Period. Copyright laws and patents do not contradict this common sense notion. A copyright law does not grant you ownership of an idea. It grants you ownership to exclusive rights to control the distribution of that idea for profit.

No, you cannot copyright an idea at all, and you cannot obtain any control over an idea through copyrights. Copyrights cover *expressions*, not ideas. You and I can have the same idea but write it down with different words, and we each own the copyright in our expression of that idea. Further, you can write down your idea, I can read it, and then I can write my own expression of your idea. You have no control over my expression.

(Note that the above clear statement is a little muddied by recent changes to copyright law and court-established precedent which does grant copyright protection to structural elements, such as plots, that would seem to be ideas. However, they're carefully interpreted to be expressions of ideas, rather than ideas, because ideas cannot be copyrighted).

This isn't just a matter of pragmatics (although that comes into it to) but also of ethics. If it takes me 1,000 hours to write my novel is it fair that anyone else can come and copy it and sell it? I invested the work, but if there's no copyright law then they can reap the benefit. Most people agree that this is not fair. So artists deserve *some* rights.

No, it is not at all an issue of ethics and is purely an issue of pragmatics. That, at least, is the way the authors of the US Constitution, which is the document that gave Congress power to enact copyright laws, understood it.

From an ethical perspective, expressions and even ideas should belong to society as a whole, because that is how they provide the most benefit. This is different from material goods. Everyone in the world can't own my house, not in any useful sense anyway. And when everyone does own some scarce resource jointly, then you can get the tragedy of the commons effect.

But, with expressions and ideas, that cannot happen because there is no scarcity. As Thomas Jefferson wrote of ideas:

... no one possesses the less because everyone possesses the whole of it. He who receives an idea from me receives without lessening, as he who lights his at mine receives light without darkening me.

Since ideas and expressions are infinitely replicable, there is no possibility of scarcity.

Why, then do we have copyright?

The original rationale behind modern copyright (as opposed to original copyright as first enacted in England as a mechanism for censorship by the Crown) is that although all ideas and their expressions inherently belong to all mankind, it's not necessarily easy to get those ideas distributed to all mankind. The ideas do no good to anyone who doesn't receive them, and publishing has historically been very expensive. Therefore, "To promote the progress of science and useful arts", Congress was granted the power to "[secure] for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries."

Note that the purpose was to promote progress, not to be fair to authors and inventors, or to uphold some notional rights. That's important.

This temporary monopoly gives creators the motivation to publish their works, rather than just keeping them to themselves. Although not so much contemplated by the founders, who were mostly independently wealthy and many of whom were prolific creators, it also gives them increased opportunity to create more, since if they're successful they won't have to spend time on other employment.

The original purpose of copyright however was absolutely

Re:Tag this:

[Coraon]

Ok I'll byte, if this isn't the real battle what is? to be honest if viacom wins this one then a corp and produce groundless ciese and desist orders. If google wins then the shareholder backlash might be enough to put a big enough crack in viacom for someone to start making play for control of it...like I dont know google mabye. See I think this was googles plan all along, buy youtube, sucker in a big media company kill them in the cort, wait for the shareholder backlash, pick up the company cheep, offer a pay area on youtube where you can download content cheep, and make a enough to make Itunes pause and consider...

Re:Tag this:

[ajs]

I'd like to point out that the greatest works of art of all time were produced in an era where there were no such things as copyright laws. It's called patronage, and it worked for thousands of years.

Thousands of years without every man, woman and child owning a high speed "printing press" in their homes

Hrm... bad point to make. You're actually defending the idea that copyright is obsolete. Patronage had one major problem: it was elitest. Only those who could capture the attention of those with great wealth could afford to produce creative works full-time.

With the advent of the Internet, cheap printing, etc., we can now change that. I can publish my works to a MUCH larger audience, and my "patrons" can be dozens of people around the world. If copyright were gone tomorrow, you would see a patronage system for the arts that would put the Renaissance to shame.

That said, I think this is a BAD IDEA. Why? Because the arts aren't the only beneficiary of copyright. I'm closest to software, and I can say for sure that software benefits from copyright. What it does not benefit from is the foolishly long period of copyrights. IMHO copyrights on software should last about 20 years, renewable in 5 year increments for another 20 years (the reasonable life expectency of a very popular or important piece of software). After that, it should become part of the public domain. There are many reasons for this, most of which are off-topic, but I'll maintain that software copyrights (not patents) are important and beneficial, only currently broken so that most of that benefit is offset by drawbacks.

Re:Tag this:

[smellsofbikes]

>This strikes me as really funny. Like it or not, the reason that pop songs like this keep getting made is because people by them. It's actually relatively democratic. I mean, you might not like the music. I certainly don't care for it. But you can't argue with the fact that a lot of people like the music enough to pay money to get it.

But if there were no copyright, the teeny bopper whores would *still* make music, and people would *still* buy it. And, to make it even funnier, If this were the situation, in the vast majority of cases, the teeny bopper whores would make *exactly* the same amount off sales of their music that 90% of all musicians make off their music currently: nothing!

People have always made music. Drama queens have always whined about their lives. People have always been willing to listen to them whine. The presence or absence of copyright would have absolutely zero effect on that, unless the drama queen's name is Britney, and for those very few, loss of copyright would, indeed, suck. But for the vast majority of writers, musicians, and the like, it wouldn't actually make any difference. It would make a very large difference to their publishers, however, and that's why we have the system we have.

Re:Tag this:

[Gareth Williams]

I have to agree with your sentiment in general, mega rich fat dudes being the only ones who could afford to commission new art (music, etc) would suck.

But imagine if we could freely share copies of that art between ourselves. You, me, and a bunch of our friends (or say 100,000 strangers out there on the internet) could all chip in a little bit and buy the same thing the mega rich fat dudes can buy, and we could all have a copy of it at the same time. Wouldn't that be wonderful? :)

There is a lot of utility to be gained from being able to make infinite copies of something with near zero marginal cost. That utility should belong to the people, however. Handing control of it to an individual or a corporation is grossly inefficent.

Secondly, take a look at the music industry today. You think that the mega rich fat dudes don't already decide what gets made? Popular songs become popular because the Music Industry makes them so. They sit down and figure out which artist / single they are going to make popular today, then promote the hell out of it, and in two weeks everybody is dancing to it in the clubs and raving about how much they like it because it's so popular and they want to fit in with the crowd.

Whether the song in question has any real merit doesn't factor into the equation. Witness the way songs that were once mega popular are quickly disgarded as they get out of date - the songs are only "good" while they are popular. If you want to be "cool" you have to be constantly listening to the new and eschew the old. It's just like the fashion industry really - people stop wearing perfectly good clothes and run out to buy new ones just to stay "up to date". You gotta hand it to the respective industries - it's pure genius.

My point: people are easily manipulated sheep, and you know it. They don't make any votes with their wallets - they just take what is given to them. Pop songs don't get made because people buy them - people buy them because they get made (and marketted). The mega fat rich dudes are already deciding what gets made. The sooner we can take them and their corporations out of the entire loop, the better.

I know the idea has been suggested before, but I think it has real merit - imagine a website where people can make micro payments to pieces of art that they would like to see "commissioned" (including music, movies, books, digial art, whatever - anything that can be represented as easily copied 1's and 0's). When the art is delivered to the site, the artist gets paid. If it fails to be delivered, the site automatically refunds the micropayments to the individual contributers. That's about as truely democratic, "vote with your wallet", as you can get.

If one mega rich dude wants to pay a ton of money for something obscure that only he will like, well, he can - good for him. If 10,000,000 people all want a new song by Britney Spears, they can each give her 10 cents and I'm sure she'll gladly make one. Having a guaranteed profit before she even begins, she shouldn't have any trouble convincing someone to help her with recording it in return for a cut of said profit. If the song's actually any good maybe she'll get requests for more :) A true meritocracy.

Of course, with the lottery model in use today, everybody is so focussed on getting signed by an RIAA member, hitting it big, and retiring on the royalties... I imagine it'd be very difficult for such a site to recruit any of today's popular artists - which it would need to do in order to attract members of the public and get that critical mass and a foothold in the market.

All the same, I'd love to see it done one day. The real beauty of it is that it maximises total utility while still giving artists an incentive to create new works, all without requiring any copyright laws at all.

Re:Tag this:

[vic-traill]

...removing all copyrights will in the end hurt artists...

Even if that were true, it's irrelevant. Not everything that harms someone is (or should be) illegal.

I think you're trolling using absolute assertion here - call it irrelevant and just dismiss it. Some 'harms' are illegal and some harms are not (as implied by your statement) precisely because we consider the nature and extent of the harm in order to determine its relevancy to the issue at hand.

This doesn't mean that you cannot be correct here. But you have to argue it - you just don't get to dismiss it out of hand.

Re:Tag this:

[vic-traill]

You take away the option to get paid, and only the people willing to make music for free will make it.

That's a false dilemma: live shows would still charge admission, for example. Sure, people could tape the performance and spread it over the net (again assuming they didn't sign any contracts when they entered the show), but clearly there would still be a demand for live performances.

L&R, I actually agree with most of the points you're making here. My comment on the quote above is that the indie artists I know would likely say that making a living off live performances only is a pretty tough go if you're not Metallica. The money they make off product sales at shows is a substantial part of their income, and product sales at shows also drives word of mouth inspired purchases by people who didn't come to the show.

Now, I don't know that copyright helps either of these types of sales much - people who enjoy the show tend to *want* to buy product, and a lot of the people they hang out with like to support indie artists too, so maybe lack of copyright wouldn't change their income all that much.

But living off live show door/event payment is a tough proposition for these folks, so it's important that whatever we do, we minimise any damage to their product sales, because they need it.

I think you're right about the underestimation of people's will to create, BTW. The amateur pickup band I'm in exists just because we like to get together and make music and hear the band play the songs we write, which is all about having fun creating music. We all have day jobs, though, so we don't need to make any money out of it. This isn't the case for pros, though, and the reason their music is better than ours is because the spend all their time working on it and hence need to make a living from it.

Or maybe we're just lousy and nobody's told us yet. :)

Re:Tag this:

[VGPowerlord]

To start, IANAL.

Why does there need to be a precedent? The DMCA as written already exempts ISPs as long as they remove content when it is identified by the copyright holder.

See Title 17 Section 512 (c), particularly subsections (1), which outlines when an ISP can not be held liable, and (3), which outlines the steps that a content producer must take to notify the ISP for removal.

Re:Tag this:

[Lorkki]

But imagine if we could freely share copies of that art between ourselves. You, me, and a bunch of our friends (or say 100,000 strangers out there on the internet) could all chip in a little bit and buy the same thing the mega rich fat dudes can buy, and we could all have a copy of it at the same time. Wouldn't that be wonderful?

So in order to succeed, you'd probably already have to have production values as well as musical talent, which probably means investments, which means financial risk. To me this sounds like a scheme that would easily end up with only a few big "meme" bands thriving at a time.

Secondly, take a look at the music industry today. You think that the mega rich fat dudes don't already decide what gets made?

No, they don't. Mega rich fat dudes may get to decide what gets the widest commercial promotion, but there's no incentive for you to buy or even listen to the end result. There's plenty of smaller labels around to cater for different tastes if none of the more popular stuff catches your ear. There's even netlabels and hobbyist musicians (like myself) who choose to give their music away for free - but it's a choice. Nobody is trying too hard to stuff views down someone else's throat, and that's just fine.

It's quite different to a world where the only way to get by as an artist is to become a proverbial Britney Spears.

Re:Tag this:

[bentcd]

So now what? Does she write book 2 knowing that if she publishes it she'll only sell a few hundred thousand copies before stores are swamped with the (now legal) copies from the major publisher?
It's difficult to say what Rowling would do since I don't know her. However, two viable strategies are rather obvious. She could
1) Go with her old publisher and sell a couple of hundred thousand copies - which probably earns her enough to make it worth the bother, or
2) Go to the big publisher and say "I'll write book 2 for you if you'll give me $millions".
In case 2, the big publisher is presumably in the publishing business to make money and this will be an attractive offer for them knowing that they will sell millions of copies.

Re:Tag this:

[bentcd]

Yay, back to the good old days where the only art produced was that that explicitly glorified the extremely wealthy!
Luckily, we live in an age when the population at large is extremely wealthy. The only potential drawback to a modern public patronage system is that we'd generally only get the art that people want to have produced. I don't think this would be worth shedding any tears about.

Re:Tag this:

[Anonymous Coward]

You chose a bad example.

If JK Rowling wanted to, she could easily set up an escrow account into which her fans can pledge $15 each (or whatever). In return, she undertakes that once 2 million (or whatever) fans have done so, she'll release her next novel into the public domain, and send the 2 million subscribers a physical copy. So she has a guaranteed revenue of 30 million dollars (or whatever) for a year's work. It's then up to her distribution mechanism how much profit that translates into.

Stephen King has tried subscription-publishing, and IMO failed not because the idea isn't viable, because he set the prices to subscribers higher than the usual price of a novel, for a product less good than a novel. Which is crazy.

World-famous authors do not need copyright in order to make a living. They almost certainly make more money with copyright than they would with my proposed escrow system, but they could easily make a very good living without it, and making rich authors super-rich is not the ostensible purpose of copyright.

Copyright encourages artists to speculate: to work hard for little or no pay, with no guaranteed sales, in the hope of winning big after the fact. Then the royalties keep rolling in whether the artist works or not. This is necessary if you believe that it's really important for a "one hit wonder" to be able to retire, and live the rest of their life on their short period of creative genius. My proposed system would make it very difficult indeed to make a lot on your first work (so I guess you'd start with short stories, to generate interest in your forthcoming novel). It makes it much easier to judge whether it's actually worth working on your second work, third, and so on, or whether you're simply not going to make serious money in that line of work.

As things are, many artists (and especially most authors) work close to minimum-wage level, in return for a love of what they're doing and a small chance of big money. That's not working for a living, that's speculation. It's pretty harsh that artists are forced by publishers to speculate in this way, and the fact that money is made from art after the fact, through copyright, gives the publishers the perfect excuse they need to offer as little as possible to the artist.

If you want artists to make a living, then why shouldn't they do so in the same way that everyone else who works for a living does it: by putting in effort in return for expected reward? You want an "incentive for paying artists to make work" - why should it be any different from my "incentive for paying plumbers to make work"? I pay them, they do it. Plumbers don't collect royalties in perpetuity on my pipes, and I don't see them complaining that they can't make a living. They just need to agree in advance what price I'm willing to pay for them to fix my pipes.

The main problem with escrow would be that it would be in my interests to hold back my $15, hoping that 2 million other suckers pay for the work, so that I can get a cheaper copy of the book once it's public domain. So total revenues from the industry would go down. Then again, the share taken by the publisher would also go down, because they're only being paid to manufacture and advertise the books, not to take on the whole risk of authorship. So I'm not even sure that artists couldn't win on balance : currently an author makes something like 10-15% of the sale price of a hardback book, so they could afford something like a 50% drop in total revenue, provided that the publisher gets only 10% less than the 85-90% they're currently getting...

Re:Tag this:

[theStorminMormon]

For one, you are confusing patents and copyrights

No, I'm not. I'm speaking in general terms about intellectual property - both patents and copyrights (throw in service marks and trademarks if you like, but I think those are kind of a different idea). Patents and copyrights, however, are essentially the same thing. You work hard to create something intangible. I said "idea". You could substitute "invention" for patent "work" for copyright: but the principle is the same. Provide a temporary monopoly so that the creator can recoup costs and make a profit. For copyright on a song or patent on a new drug it's the same general concept.

You don't have to be a lawyer to understand the general law. In fact, I'd suggest that a philosopher is probably better at the generalities.

Copyright law is not a matter of ethics

On the contrary, all law is ultimately a matter of ethics. I encourage you to try and show me otherwise. But if you don't believe me (and I'm sure you don't) try answering the question "why should we have laws" without recourse to ethical values: implicitly or explicitly.

Tragedy of the commons is actually based on scarcity.

You are correct. I referenced the wrong economic concept. My mistake. The actual problem I referred to, however, is dead on. The example is more clear with patents, but the idea is the same. It takes a lot of money to research new drugs. It's extremely cheap to actually manufacture a lot of them. So if companies A, B, and C are pondering whether or not to design drug X, each has to weigh whether or not they can recoup their investment.

In a world with no patent law each benefits the most if someone else does the research, and loses the most if they do the research and everyone else copies. So it's more like the prisoner's dilemma than the tragedy of the commons. (Again, my mistake for citing the wrong example.) So less research would get done.

Does this work for music, novels, and other works of art that can be digitally reproduced as well? Of course it does. You incur a cost to create the work - anyone else can copy the work for free.

You see that's the flaw in your counterexample. Everyone in your hypothetical scenario is an artist or a listener. You've got the Beatles, and you've got other artists who might want to use their stuff to make more art, and you've got listeners. So you're not really talking about the possibility that someone might take every single song the Beatles published, stick it on a CD, and sell it themselves.

Of course the Beatles would probably be immune to such an attack, but any smaller musician who wants to make money by distributing their work is vulnerable to a larger company with far greater resources swooping in and making exact and entire copies of the music.

So there are only two possibilities. Either no one makes any money from music (in which case there's no motivation for such predatory copying) or the only people who make money from music are not creators of music but distributors who now have to incur no cost to copy and sell music from artists.

If you really think a world where artists can get by on donations and charity is a good idea, I can't argue against you. I just don't think putting all artists on public welfare is a good idea. Failing that, copyright law of some sort is essential to enable them to recoup costs from creating these works. And these rights must be transferable in order to have genuine worth.

Keep in mind that I'm not arguing in favor of current copyright law. It's too strict. We need to allow for more reuse in the form of sampling to create new works. And I'm *certainly* not arguing in favor of DRM. There's a distinction between saying "we should have some copyright law" and saying "we can use DRM to enforce that copyright law". How you enforce a law is not the same question as what law to have.

Also as most musicians know, your money comes from touring - which isn't about copyright

Re:Tag this:

[Logic and Reason]

Some 'harms' are illegal and some harms are not (as implied by your statement) precisely because we consider the nature and extent of the harm in order to determine its relevancy to the issue at hand.

No, I would say the reason some of them are and some of them aren't is that 'harm' is not (or again, should not be) a factor in deciding whether something is illegal in the first place. The amount of harm may, of course, factor into the amount of restitution, etc., but that is different.

For example, suppose I really, really enjoy looking at my neighbor's garden across the street. So much so that it has become my only reason for living, in fact. So if my neighbor decides to move or get rid of his garden, it would result in a very large amount of harm to me, much more than the posited harm to artists in our case. But that does not mean my neighbor wrongs me by doing so.

Re:Tag this:

[Anonymous Coward]

I'll make this easy for you: Without copyright law, GNU would not exist. Copyleft is a copyright license and protected by copyright law. Without it, anyone could take Linux, make changes and release it closed-source with absolutely no recourse.

Next time you think you have a thought, just let it go.

Re:Tag this:

[neoform]

You really think that without copyright laws, everyone would stop producing what's now considered 'intellectual property'?

Do you know what Open Source is?

Re:Tag this:

[cyborch]

"The Battle of Dorking" (1871) by George Tomkyns Chesney

The original piece upon which works such as "The War of the Worlds" (1898), by H. G. Wells was derived.

From which games like "Space Invaders" (1978) by Toshihiro Nishikado, Taito was derived.

1871 is arguably a long way back to go to find an original piece, but it took me all of 10 minutes with google and wikipedia to find the origial piece from which Space Invaders (which is itself rather original and ground breaking) was derived.

Space Invaders is (aside from being inspired by "The War of the Worlds") a very good example of semi-recent original art in that it was the forerunner for modern video gaming.

Also, "The Hobbit" by J. R. R. Tolkien can be said to be an original work, which is not derived from somebody else's.

Re:Tag this:

[jax9999]

Or let's look at it like the way it is going.

Shakespears work stay copyrighted for eternity. The rights holders lets say in the late 1700s have some sort of falling out and his manuscripts aren't allowed to be printed again. Where does that put our society?

copyright has to be measured against common good. It is not a never ending thing and has no right to be.

Re:Tag this:

[Bloke down the pub]

2) Go to the big publisher and say "I'll write book 2 for you if you'll give me $millions".
In case 2, the big publisher is presumably in the publishing business to make money and this will be an attractive offer for them knowing that they will sell millions of copies.

It's a more attractive offer for some other big publisher who goes out, buys a copy and starts printing millions of knock-offs. What's more they can even undercut the first publisher, because they don't have to amortise that big fat advance.

Re:Tag this:

[Anonymous Coward]

perhaps we would just lose all the commercially motivated crap^H^H^H^H entertainment ... and retain all the genuine art. there will always be the desire for expression

perhaps it should be the receivers choice to reward the giver

omg, sounds like the solution to me

cause so many literary/artistic greats made huge fortunes from their creations, as opposed to being obliged to manufacture pieces for their patron

mathematics requires huge amounts of genius, originality and creativity but can you tell me how many people personally benefit from their major mathematical discovery

when an artist continues for primarily financial reasons they should quit

excuse me while i fantasize about this ideal paradise

Re:Tag this:

[Bastard of Subhumani]

Copyright encourages artists to speculate: to work hard for little or no pay, with no guaranteed sales, in the hope of winning big after the fact.

Is that a bad thing? Isn't that what inventors do? Or people who found businesses? Or people who go through long programs of education or training?

This is necessary if you believe that it's really important for a "one hit wonder" to be able to retire, and live the rest of their life on their short period of creative genius.

If that one hit really is so big - like it's the best book in the whole world ever and everyone is willing to sell a kidney to buy one - then politics of envy aside, what's your motivation for begrudging the author a handsome payout? Surely if a billion people are willing to pay ten bucks for it, it's contributing more to the sum of human happiness than if a hundred think it's worh a fiver?

Plumbers don't collect royalties in perpetuity on my pipes, and I don't see them complaining that they can't make a living.

If a plumber could be in two places at once and/or pipework lasted forever, that would probably change. But really, you're comparing apples and oranges here. One is predictable and tangible, the other open ended and intangible. I can write a statement of work for a plumbing job, but I couldn't do that in any meaningful way for a novel (and I wouldn't want to read it anyway since I'd know the ending).

Re:Tag this:

[Harinezumi]

Why is that bad, exactly? I'd love to see the day when the cultural establishment starts catering exclusively to the best of us, rather than the lowest common denominator.

Re:Tag this:

[bentcd]

It's a more attractive offer for some other big publisher who goes ut, buys a copy and starts printing millions of knock-offs. What's more they can even undercut the first publisher, because they don't have to amortise that big fat advance.
Probably not. Producing a commercial-level product from an existing manuscript is a relatively costly process, especially considering that they'll likely have to transcribe the material and invest just as much into editorial quality assurance and so forth as the original publisher did. Furthermore, getting Rowling onboard would likely be more than worth her fees for the publicity benefits alone. Not least of all when considering the great many people will want to preorder the book from whoever can deliver it first, and that will be Rowling's chosen publisher.

Re:Tag this:

[T.E.D.]

But rather than the democratic ideal you'd rather go back to a system where a few mega-rich fat dudes literally decided what got made. You honestly think that would be an improvement?

No, I think that's exactly what we have now

Re:Tag this:

[kurzweilfreak]

The flip side to that is if artists shouldn't expect to profit from their work, someone else shouldn't expect to access to or to consume that work either. Artists aren't guaranteed to get paid if people refuse to buy their product, then people won't have access to that work either, just like anything else you refuse to pay for. You shouldn't get to have it both ways.

Re:Tag this:

[jamiethehutt]

So now what? Does she write book 2 knowing that if she publishes it she'll only sell a few hundred thousand copies before stores are swamped with the (now legal) copies from the major publisher? Or does she just quit writing. Or does she approach the big publisher and ask for more money...

Re:Tag this:

[daigu]

Patents and copyrights are fundamentally different. They may similar in the sense of the amount of work involved and that it is a temporary monopoly. But they are different because you can patent an idea whereas you cannot copyright one. This is also the reason why the length of the temporary monopoly of the two forms is different - with copyright being significantly longer than patent protection.

I also think your focus is strange. Suppose we could wave our wand and prove that copyright actually creates more problems in society and results in fewer inventions and creative works. If we could prove this, then I would have no problem at all revoking copyright. Why? Because at the end of the day it is about what is best for society, not what is best for the "creator". The minute the rights of a "creator" are such that it negatively impacts society and the ability of others to create - those rights that get in the way need to be abolished.

In short, individual intellectual property rights are good - only in so far as it helps the creative output and variety of society at large. How much time and effort they put into it, recouping costs and profits are immaterial, if these don't support the larger agenda of promoting creative output over alternatives.

As such, morality doesn't come into play. All law is a not a matter of ethics. Counter-example: Restaurant inspections. It's a matter of hygiene, not ethics.

Now, I think you are making the argument that patents and copyrights provide incentives for people to create new things. I think the open question I was raising was whether there are other means of providing incentives that are better, that in some cases these incentives may actually block development (software patents come to mind, but it applies just as well to drugs), and perhaps there are cases where the public interest trumps other considerations (such as generic versions of HIV drugs to be distributed in Africa).

I don't see the flaw in my counter-example. Everyone who cares about the Beatles or music in general being available is a listener. If it is freely available, there is no incentive for anyone to "steal" it and in the context of the Internet, distribution no longer has any meaning. The problem is that you are looking at it from a framework of intellectual property that simply does not apply. It also assumes the artifical scarcity created by copyrights and patents.

I think your most telling point is regarding incentives for non-performance art. How do you support comic book writers, novelists and what have you? Even here, you still can capitalize on performance with readings, speeches and discussion groups. Fame is a currency of sorts that can be brokered into promotional contracts and so forth. I think there are ways - even under a current system. However, I think it should be an opportunity to think of better ways for society to provide incentives.

For example, instead of heaping billions on Rowling because of Harry Potter, a more equitable system would encourage works irrespective of their current popularity or ability to be marketed across different types of media. From my perspective, copyright and patents even shapes the kinds of creative works that are possible because it frames art as something that needs to make money. The focus should be on creativeity - not making money, because making money is not the point. It may be necessary to live - but there needs to be a way to meet that need without making it the focus.

Re:Tag this:

[Bovarchist]

No, I think (s)he wanted to abolish sanity.

Re:Tag this:

[theStorminMormon]

Patents and copyrights are fundamentally different. They may similar in the sense of the amount of work involved and that it is a temporary monopoly.

Right, which was all that I was talking about. We can quibble about whether the differences are significant or not, but we've established what is similar and what is different. Let's move on.

The minute the rights of a "creator" are such that it negatively impacts society and the ability of others to create - those rights that get in the way need to be abolished.

So much for individual rights. I think this is an extremely bad conception of the relationship between individual rights and society. I think the emphasis should be on individual rights, not societal welfare. It sounds like you are describing a rather tyrannical opposition to the classical western liberalism on which our nation is founded. You know - bill of rights, limited gov't and all that.

All law is a not a matter of ethics. Counter-example: Restaurant inspections. It's a matter of hygiene, not ethics.

Your counterexample fails with one simple question: why should the government have a say in hygiene? You'll reply "for the benefit of the people" or something similar. And I'll ask "but why should government be for the benefit of the people?". And so on. But the point is that ethics are normative. Whenever you invoke a "should" in this sense, you're invoking ethics. You're never going to be able to get the "should" from a purely objective beginning. At least, no philosopher in the history of moral philosophy has ever succeeded, but feel free to give it the old college try.

I don't see the flaw in my counter-example. Everyone who cares about the Beatles or music in general being available is a listener. If it is freely available, there is no incentive for anyone to "steal" it

Yeah, and there's no way to make money off of it either. Which means the Beatles all have to have day jobs. Do you really think we'll have art of the quality that we do today (not that it's *all* good quality) if there's no money in it? Who will pay for the instruments? Who will pay for publicity? How are we going to make movies without money? You just took *all* money out of art - and you don't see a problem with that?

What's the first thing an artist does when they manage to get money from their art: quit their day job to take the art more seriously. You're taking away that possibility and you see *no* negative implications?

Even here, you still can capitalize on performance with readings, speeches and discussion groups.

Right, charity. I think that's both a bad idea and morally wrong. When someone is paid for a reading, they are being paid for the reading. This means they are still uncompensated for the work itself. This is wrong, in my opinion.

Furthermore, you're not taking some money out of the system, you're taking virtually *all* money out of the system. If J. K. Rowling had not been able to secure compensation for book 1, we'd never have had book 7.

The focus should be on creativeity - not making money, because making money is not the point. It may be necessary to live - but there needs to be a way to meet that need without making it the focus.

This just smacks of utopian wishful thinking. Your ideas sound about as practical as communism.

Re:Tag this:

[DanQuixote]

And why, precisely, is it incumbent upon society to make Ms. Rowling into a billionaire?

Yes, she needs to be able to pay the bills just like the rest of us, but current copyright law goes way too far!

Re:Tag this:

[Wilson_6500]

The fundamental problem with your argument is that you make the false assumption that art is a product. Traditionally speaking, except for commissioned works "art" is _not_ fundamentally a product that one expects to sell at a profit.

Re:Tag this:

[kurzweilfreak]

It is if I (or whoever) create it and say it is. That doesn't mean anyone is forced to pay for it, nor does it mean anyone is entitled to access to it without paying for it if I so demand it, just by virtue of it being "art".

Re:Tag this:

[Anonymous Coward]

Seriously, that is ownage like I've never seen between large corporations before. It looks like Google did in fact know exactly what they were doing . . .

There are several highly moderated posts on this thread that make the assumption that Google has won. That's silly. Google has merely staked out (one of) its position(s). They are a long way from determining a winner.

Re:Tag this:

[Jherek Carnelian]

Copyright encourages artists to speculate: to work hard for little or no pay, with no guaranteed sales, in the hope of winning big after the fact.

Is that a bad thing? Isn't that what inventors do? Or people who found businesses? Or people who go through long programs of education or training?

Yes, it is a bad thing because it has enabled those who hold a monopoly on distribution channels to also monopolize the 'venture capital funding' business of new artists, essentially forcing them to give away all rights to their work if they want even a chance at distribution. Your other examples are all for markets which are not dominated by an oligopoly of five behemoths.

If that one hit really is so big - like it's the best book in the whole world ever and everyone is willing to sell a kidney to buy one - then politics of envy aside, what's your motivation for begrudging the author a handsome payout?

There is no begrudging them payout for the work they put in to the creation, but distribution is not creation. Charging for distribution was just a proxy for charging for creation that is only workable when distribution is itself costly. Now that distribution is essentially free, it is no longer feasible to use distribution as a proxy for creation. Either some other proxy must be found, or we figure out a way for an artist to get paid directly for the work of creation.

If all other possible alternative incentive systems are more egalitarian and don't create any one-hit billionaires, then that's the price society has to pay. Do not fall into the trap of believing that copyright is "free" today - society is paying a huge cost as it is now, in ways that do not support the primary goal of copyright (the progress of science and useful arts). Unless you disagree with the fundamental justification for copyright, it should be easy to understand that a new system which more effectively promotes the progress of science and the useful arts given the new environment of the internet should be adopted.

Re:Tag this:

[Javagator]

I agree with your post as far as it goes. But consider this second scenario: Before JKR writes her first book, I write a book called "Larry Potter and the Muggles of Doom". Then, when Harry Potter becomes popular, I sue her for millions, plus an injunction against writing any more Harry Potter books. If legal action of this sort became common and successful, it would inhibit artistic effort just as much as your scenario.

Unfortunately, in the software industry, lawsuits of this kind have become common and successful. Although a jury could determine that my pathetic attempt at a book had only superficial similarities to Harry Potter, judges and juries don't seem to be able to recognize a trivial algorithm that took 10 minutes to develop. Many of us in the software development business consider software patents a cancer on the industry. You can't blame us for being suspicious of anything that smacks of "intellectual property".

Re:Tag this:

[daigu]

I think the emphasis should be on individual rights, not societal welfare. It sounds like you are describing a rather tyrannical opposition to the classical western liberalism on which our nation is founded. You know - bill of rights, limited gov't and all that.

Odd that you should argue for limited government and copyright in the same breath. Copyright requires registration of the "property", law enforcement to protect the "property", and on and on. It's more government, and less individual liberty - so that a few "creators" can profit. RIAA, MPAA, DRM and so on and so forth all demonstrate that copyright is actually antithetical to the very values you claim to support. Abolishing copyright, on the other hand, means less government. It also means that you don't get control over your work and limit the liberty of others. This can be framed any way you like - and the only thing you have going for you is the fact you are arguing for the status quo.

I don't argue that the government should inspect restaurants at all. I simply say that they do, and the fact that they do is not a moral question. Incidences like Typhoid Mary makes it a practical issue, but would the government be evil if it didn't inspect restaurants? No. It can be effective at stopping the spread of disease, but it wouldn't necessarily be "wrong" for them not to do it.

Who will pay for X?

As I said before, under the patronage system, wealthy people. Under the University system, the college provides a job that enables you to do research. Governments commision works of art all the time. Public broadcasting has provided funding. Advertisers are another example when they fund concerts. None of these relies on copyrights, and if we use our imagination, we might actually come up with even better ways to fund art that doesn't rely on copyrights either.

You're taking away that possibility and you see *no* negative implications...

Of course there are negative implications. Rowling will surely think getting rid of copyrights is a bad idea. RIAA surely doesn't like it either. Many different organizations would simply go away - like companies that hold on to patents solely to sue other companies. They surely don't like the idea either. It will also mean that instead of relying on copyright to earn a living, people will have to find another way - and if we were to do it, we as a society should develop other means for supporting the arts besides copyright. You seem to think copyright is the answer - have you considered alternatives?

Let's take Rowling for example. She apparently was unemployed and on state benefits when she wrote the first novel. She got additional funding from the Scottish Arts Council. Then, due to copyright, she was paid $100,000 for the rights to publish the first novel in the U.S.A. - all of this I take from Wikipedia.

I'm basically advocating for more of the first kind of funding rather than the second kind that depends on copyrights. It is also not difficult to imagine other approaches. One that comes off the top is that she could have sold it serial style - say wrote a chapter, then stipulated a dollar amount that she would need before she would release it to the public.

It's funny how anytime someone suggests a change in the status quo - whether it be the printing press or electric cars - someone, somewhere is going to make the claim that it is utopian wishful thinking. Love the communism quote at the end - why not just go for the gold and say it sounds like economic terrorism. Isn't terrorist the new word for communists or whomever you don't agree with these days?

Re:Tag this:

[theStorminMormon]

I don't think we can reliably predict what will happen if we abolish copyright.

On the contrary, I think that basic economic principles tell us exactly what will happen. If a work can be freely copied without restriction the price you can charge for that work drops to 0. So the value of all electronic media would quickly drop to 0. This is, in fact, exactly what the advocates for dispelling all copyright want to have happen. Since all electronic media would be literally worthless, there would be no financial incentive to make any.

The suggested solutions include some type of mass patronage or charity. Ya'll just need to listen to MC Frontalot sing about that in "Charity Case" to see how that is working. Including such lines as "now I'm down on my knees begging ya'll to believe my cd isn't free". I don't know why I even have to say this, but *ANY* economic plan that relies on the good will of people is doomed to failure. I don't know how many failed utopian schemes we have to go through before people realize that.

In the example I was talking about it's a little different because there's the cost of actually printing the books. The value of the content is 0, but the books still need to be printed, bound, shipped, stored, and sold. This means that whoever can do that cheapest sells the books. If you pay an artist any significant amount of money - upfront or royalty it doesn't matter - you put yourself at a financial disadvantage against your competitors who can print the books cheaper and sell them cheaper.

This means that no large publishing company (who would focus on economies of sale) would pay an artist anything ever. They would merely wait for a book to be published, and then race to flood the market with cheap copies. So the only companies who would pay artists would be tiny boutique shops that would have to try and eek out a living on the sales of books in the tiny frame of time between when a book gets popular and when the major publishing houses get their copies on the market.

It's the basic prisoner's dilemma. The best solution is for all parties to cooperate, but form the perspective of each of the parties, it's too dangerous to cooperate, and so everyone would act defensively.

But it really comes down to what I already said: any economic plan that depends on the good will of people to work is doomed to fail.

Re:Tag this:

[theStorminMormon]

Odd that you should argue for limited government and copyright in the same breath.

Not at all. The old big gov't liberal vs. small gov't conservative dichotomy is what is odd. Why big for its own sake? Why small for its own sake? My conception of government is that it exists to secure individual liberties and ensure a free market. Powerful government is required to break up monopolies, mediate labor disputes, etc. There's a lot of work for government to do.

I consider copyright law - not as it exists today but as it was originally intended - to be both a matter of individual rights and of the free market.

It's more government, and less individual liberty - so that a few "creators" can profit.

"Rights" are not the same as "benefit". Simply because more people would benefit does not mean indvidiaul rights would be served. Those who do not create a work have no "right" to it. You do not have a right to demand that your buddy let you read his novel. That is no more a question of individual liberty than saying that anyone with a salary over $200,000 a year can no longer be the target of robbery (meaning: it's not a crime to rob them) would be an expression of individual liberty. Sure, the masses could profit at the expense of the few, but it is not theft: not a right.

RIAA, MPAA, DRM and so on and so forth all demonstrate that copyright is actually antithetical to the very values you claim to support.

No, they are all examples of how copyright has been twisted from it's original intentions. If you knew me at all, you'd know the level of hatred I have for all three of those acronyms. Browse the contents of my blog if you like, I probably dedicate more time to criticizing the **AA and DRM than any other topic on my blog.

Many different organizations would simply go away - like companies that hold on to patents solely to sue other companies.

Wait - you want to get rid of copyright *and* patents? This is worse than I thought. Without patents there would be no computers today. There might be in another couple hundred years or so, but private invention would barely eek along without patent law.

Look, I'm not going to keep going into this. I don't think we're really being productive here. This is my final position. Patents and copyrights allow creators to get a return on their investment. Without them, there is *no* financial incentive to create. In fact, there's a heavy financial penalty for creation, since you still need to make a living and every hour you spend writing your novel or perfecting your cotton gin is an hour you get paid $0 for.

You are depending on nothing but sheer goodwill to power an economy - literally. It's like communism, but even *less* realistic.

Current patent and copyright laws stifle creativity and innovation because they have gone too far. Our IP laws must be simplified and more room carved out for fair use. Old business models like MPAA and RIAA will die out - as they should. But the core principles behind copyright are even more necessary than they were when they were first invented (which was right after the printing press.)

Re:Tag this:

[daigu]

Yes, I agree further discussion isn't productive. I agree that government should secure individual liberties, but I also think that individual liberties (I'm thinking specifically about the rich and powerful here) need to be curtailed if they limit the liberty of others. I think free markets, on the scale this term is used these days, concentrate wealth into the hands of the few and destroys local communities. Free markets may have a place, but either it is a small place or there needs to be mechanisms that deal with the concentrating of wealth that is the end product of free markets and the effect they have on small communities.

Copyright law - as it was originally intended - always results in what we have today, a subversion of the commons for the enrichment of the few that have bought "rights". Buying and selling of "rights" is a guaranteed way to make sure that ideas of individuals end up collectively in the hands of the rich and powerful. It is a fundamentally flawed and broken idea and needs to be fixed - not to the original, but beyond it (if it is to exist at all).

The central problem is that government is more often the tool of the powerful and acts to limit liberty than it is a promoter of individual liberty. Unfortunately, what other options are there to put a brake on powerful individuals (or in modern times, powerful corporations)? Personally, I think the best way to address these problems is to decentralize concentrations of wealth and power. Free markets and copyrights don't do it. Government could do it, but government is typically controlled by the powerful - which is why there is so much work to do in respect to unions, etc. So what is the solution? I don't know - but making sure government acts more in the interests of people that aren't powerful is one step and failing that, limiting government in places where it does support the power of the wealthy is another.

Copyright is one way government promotes the interests of the powerful. The rationale is that giving people individual property rights enables them to sell those rights and make a living. This seems reasonable. But who do those rights get sold to? That's right, people that already have money and if art is monetized, they plan to invest and profit from them - to make yet more money. Maybe it would be better to simply make it easier for artists to make a living? Maybe it would be better to limit government on this particular issue? This is where I am coming from.

The funny thing in this is that you and I want the same thing - more individual liberty. We just differ in what we are most focused upon and what we think the problem and the solution to that problem is. It is something on which reasonable people can differ.

Re:Tag this:

[theStorminMormon]

Free markets may have a place, but either it is a small place or there needs to be mechanisms that deal with the concentrating of wealth that is the end product of free markets and the effect they have on small communities.

Nothing could be farther from the truth. I suggest you do some research into the economic theories of Hernando de Soto and "(poor) people's capitalism".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hernando_de_Soto_(eco nomist)

http://members.forbes.com/global/2002/1223/070.htm l

http://www.peoplescapitalism.org/PeoplesCapitalism paper_new.htm

Capitalism empowers the poor, and the fundamental reason for poverty is that there's not enough capitalism. The poor of the world have an estimated 9.3 billion in assets that they can do *nothing* with because of a lack of legal infrastructure. Ensuring that people can transfer, sell, lease, and borrow against their property is the fundamental problem of world poverty.

The funny thing in this is that you and I want the same thing - more individual liberty.

Yes, but you consider the works of artists to be "commons", and I do not. One a person writes a novel it is inherently a private creation. They don't have to share it. You believe that if they publicize it at all they must immediately, completely and forever abdicate *all* rights despite the fact that they are the ones who spend untold hours creating this work. The morality of this position seems patently flawed. You believe that artists and creators deserve no rights no whatsoever despite their hard work - their own creations must be secret or no longer belong to them.

I'm confident that not only is this not morally defensible, but that you will never convince the majority of artists that they can have *no* power over their own creations.

Re:Tag this:

[daigu]

Ensuring that people can transfer, sell, lease, and borrow against their property is the fundamental problem of world poverty.

Without some kind of infrastructure to prevent it, monetizing assets is a guarantee that those assets will be taken by someone with more wealth. Take a look at this history of Africa when assets are open to "transfer, sell, lease, and borrow" and how they are stolen. That is the fundamental problem - a problem that capitalism does not and cannot answer.

The problem is that you have "property" so ingrained into your thinking that you cannot imagine a world not based on it. It is people with mind-sets like yours that will one day charge people for their survival - water, air, patented seeds and on and on. I'll pass on the free market fundamentalism thanks. One God is enough for me - Matthew 6:24.

Re:Tag this:

[theStorminMormon]

You should at least try to understand the viewpoint before you dismiss it. I mean - have you ever even taken an econ course in college?

Re:Tag this:

[daigu]

Yes, many of them. The concept I particularly liked of all the courses I took was the fact that "free markets" include many externalities and unintended effects that they don't account for - clean air, strong local communities, etc. Basically, free markets are a great example of the original issue you brought up - the tragedy of the commons. If you can't put a price tag on it, it doesn't have value.

You also don't need to be a genius to see that the assumptions that underlying free market ideology are fundamentally flawed - people are rational actors for instance. Try looking into what is being done in behaviorial economics, such as Daniel Kahneman's Nobel Prize speech that shows how fundamentally flawed this premise is. It also has a good discussion of framing effects that you can apply to your next issue of Forbes magazine - should you choose to do so.

Re:Tag this:

[daigu]

Also, I wanted to touch on your particular links. Your major source seems to be Hernando De Soto. I'll grant that the criticism of his ideas is poorly presented on Wikipedia. But you can find plenty of people that can give you some ideas: Slate linked from Wikipedia, Fair Housing and Foreign Policy.

The Foreign Policy article is not freely available, but I think it makes some interesting points: no evidence his ideas work even though the Peruvian government established a Commision to institute his ideas in 1996 (and is not the only country where his ideas have demonstratedly failed); the ideas are not different from his ideas published in 1986 in _The Other Path_ and can be traced backed to the ideas of people such as David Collier and Jagdish Bhagwati in the 1970s; doesn't allow for cultural variation like the fact that traditional Muslims are opposed to borrowing money; and the fact that other factors such as famine, disease, war and so forth impact economic opportunities.

Best part is this quote:

His solution is vague enough to appeal to people of all political stripes.

Although judging from the coverage in the business press, IMF and places like the Cato Institute, he clearly appeals to a particular flavor of politics more than others.

What bothers me about people like de Soto is that they are experts that don't have to live with the problems their policies create. They have ideas that are not backed up by any empirical evidence, and when they are tested, these policies fail because they are simplistic. In the meantime, the do more harm to the poor and in some cases find ways to funnel cash to the wealthy (someone is flying him around the world to attend conferences and give advice for a reason).

Speaking of simplistic, did you read the sub-title for People's Capitalism? It's Peoples' Capitalism: The Economics of the Robot Revolution. Originally published in 1976, it is an example what is called Binary Economics (you can see that it is finally mentioned at the bottom of the page). I loved this quote from the article - Binary Economics: Paradigm Shift or Cluster of Errors by Timothy D. Terrell in Quarterly Journal of Austrian Economics, Spring 2005, v. 8, iss. 1, pp. 31-50:

Binary economists stress the uniqueness of their "new paradigm." Yet the theory is riddled with severe problems. Milton Friedman, who once debated Kelso, called Kelso's "two-factor economics" a "crackpot theory," and with considerable justification, it seems. It is not clear from reading binary economists that they understand the "conventional" economics that they are criticizing. Many binary economists are not formally trained in economics...Binary economics is, in sum, a cluster of significant theoretical errors masquerading as a market-friendly solution to our worst economic problems. Kelso's employee stock option plan is a legitimate method of simultaneously compensating employees and solving a pervasive principal-agent problem. Binary economics takes the ESOP and turns it into a fantastic Wolkenkuckucksheim, heedless of the massive inflation that would necessarily accompany its policy proposals.

I don't claim to be an expert in economics. I personally think a lot of it is based on false premises, and it is of limited use. However, there is enough in the article you linked to that did not sound right - particularly how all of our problems could be solved if we just followed this two part plan.

You should do a better job of looking into the background of people selling these crackpot theories and what kind of criticism they are recieving. I realize that conversations like these are how we discover our mistakes - but I can't help but wonder whether you put the effort into checking into and th

Re:Tag this:

[Bastard of Subhumani]

Your other examples are all for markets which are not dominated by an oligopoly of five behemoths.

Since similar things have happened in markets that had little or nothing to do with copyright (cement and oil spring to mind) I'd say the problem is more likely due to lack of competition.

There is no begrudging them payout for the work they put in to the creation

What's that mean? They should be paid by the hour at predetermined rate? Sounds suspiciously Marxist to me.

distribution is not creation.

Never said it was.

If all other possible alternative incentive systems are more egalitarian and don't create any one-hit billionaires, then that's the price society has to pay.

Ah. So it is Politics of envy, then.

Re:Tag this:

[Jherek Carnelian]

What's that mean? They should be paid by the hour at predetermined rate? Sounds suspiciously Marxist to me.

Don't be fooled, copyright as a state-granted monopoly is not even close to a free market system.

People should be paid what other people are willing to pay them without government interference, that's the definition of a free market. Perhaps you think that is the "politics of envy" - any economist would laugh you out of the room.

Analysis from the Future

[CheeseburgerBrown]

Optimistic: one day our grandchildren won't believe us when we tell them how ridiculous the state of intellectual property law was back in the early 21st century.

Pessimistic: we won't be allowed to tell them, for copyright reasons.

Re:Analysis from the Future

[Doc Lazarus]

No kidding. Just revert it to the original lifetime (or something REASONABLE) of the creator and leave the legacy factor out of it. I just can't wait to see when Disney loses rights to their very early stuff, that will be a laugh and a half.

Re:Analysis from the Future

[Bastard of Subhumani]

Nice one! At the very least, they should bill Viacom for the wasted time. At overtime-plus rates.

Re:Analysis from the Future

[iminplaya]

I just can't wait to see when Disney loses rights to their very early stuff, that will be a laugh and a half.

That won't happen. They will ask for and receive extension after extension.

Re:Analysis from the Future

[ShieldW0lf]

Yeah... cause girls don't want to go out with a geek who is making a good living, they'd rather go out with that football jock who sells used cars.

As long as you're a skinny geek and not a fat bearded geek, you're all set. If you can get out the front door, that is...

Re:Analysis from the Future

[rhombic]

If you can get out the front door, that is...

First you have to make it up your Mom's basement stairs.

Re:Analysis from the Future

[NeoManyon]

For an interesting and somewhat chilling read on what the future might be like if we follow the pessimistic path then read "The Right to Read" by RMS. http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html

Here's the beginning:

For Dan Halbert, the road to Tycho began in college--when Lissa Lenz asked to borrow his computer. Hers had broken down, and unless she could borrow another, she would fail her midterm project. There was no one she dared ask, except Dan.

This put Dan in a dilemma. He had to help her--but if he lent her his computer, she might read his books. Aside from the fact that you could go to prison for many years for letting someone else read your books, the very idea shocked him at first. Like everyone, he had been taught since elementary school that sharing books was nasty and wrong--something that only pirates would do.

Re:Analysis from the Future

[Headcase88]

Corporations' lifetimes could be more than the current 50+ year rule. Pinning copyright on a single individual not always possible.

Personally, my magic number is 20 years. More than enough time to reap lots of money, IMO.

But copyright law will never change for the better in a two-party system until most people care about it.

Re:Analysis from the Future

[voice_of_all_reason]

sharing books was nasty and wrong--something that only pirates would do

Somehow I doubt there was ever a pirate sitting on the deck of his vessel in the early evening, sipping his tea and perusing The Lay of Leithian in his off-hours from pillaging the nearby towns.

Re:Analysis from the Future

[26199]

Realistic: more of the same, because stupidity never goes out of fashion.

Re:Analysis from the Future

[Lord Balto]

As I suggested elsewhere on this thread, why should any corporation be allowed to own the creative work of real people for decades into the future? Why can't they simply be limited to first use rights or first year rights or some such limiting factor and the rights then automatically reverting to the creators of the work? This would allow the corporations to make money and at the same time preserve the rights of the *real* creative artists the law is *supposed* to be protecting.

Re:Analysis from the Future

[compro01]

As long as you're a skinny geek and not a fat bearded geek, you're all set.

i dunno about the fat part, but beards seem to be rather popular with the women around here for some reason.

Re:Analysis from the Future

[Dirtside]

s/ask for/buy

Re:Analysis from the Future

[Captain Splendid]

i dunno about the fat part, but beards seem to be rather popular with the women around here for some reason.

Why, is there a bearded lady Training College in the area or something?

Re:Analysis from the Future

[ShieldW0lf]

I dropped out of university at 17 to go hitchhike across North America... I don't get this "basement" crap... but then, I have a girlfriend.

Re:Analysis from the Future

[ozbird]

Somehow I doubt there was ever a pirate sitting on the deck of his vessel in the early evening, sipping his tea and perusing The Lay of Leithian in his off-hours from pillaging the nearby towns.

They be called "privateers".

Re:Analysis from the Future

[fyoder]

Somehow I doubt there was ever a pirate sitting on the deck of his vessel in the early evening, sipping his tea and perusing The Lay of Leithian in his off-hours from pillaging the nearby towns.

True. They preferred The Rime of the Ancient Mariner. Their choral presentations were said to be quite spirited.

• About, about, in reel and rout
  The death-fires danced at night;
  The water, like a witch's oils,
  Burnt green, and blue, and white.

  (Arrr, that it did, that it did, me hearties)

Re:Analysis from the Future

[moogs]

Screw you, I'm literally a fat bearded geek... And I'm single. sigh... Ah well, I have my toys around me... Besides, being a rocket scientist is something to be happy about, at least for the "impressive" values :P

Re:Analysis from the Future

[VGPowerlord]

That won't happen. They will ask for and receive extension after extension.

I'm willing to bet we see a repeat of Eldred vs Ashcroft every time they do.

It's inevitable that the Eldreds of the world win eventually.

Volley...

[R2.0]

This is a legal tennis match that will go on for years - interminable, boring, but at the end there will be a winner. I'm just rooting for Google - on this one, I believe they have it right.

Re:Volley...

[Anonymous Coward]

Everyone knows the only winners in a legal battle are the lawyers.

Re:Volley...

[zcsteele]

Funny, the only way to win is not to play at all.

This requires some translation:

[8127972]

"Fortunately, the law is clear, and on our side."

This translates to "Drop your lawsuit or you're guaranteed to lose. Besides, our market cap is much bigger than yours so we can simply buy you to make this go away. Na na na na na na!"

Re:This requires some translation:

[User 956]

"Drop your lawsuit or you're guaranteed to lose. Besides, our market cap is much bigger than yours so we can simply buy you to make this go away. "

It would be absolutely brilliant if Google bought Viacom; they could continue the Viacom lawsuit (against themselves) but lose on purpose, thereby establishing favorable legal precedent.

Re:This requires some translation:

[Atlantis-Rising]

It doesn't work that way. If it did, that loophole would already have been exploited dozens, hundreds of times.

Re:This requires some translation:

[Jaqenn]

That is incredible! Would that really stick? Seems like someone would have tried it already if it would...

Re:This requires some translation:

[Orange Crush]

This translates to "Drop your lawsuit or you're guaranteed to lose. Besides, our market cap is much bigger than yours so we can simply buy you to make this go away. Na na na na na na!"

Nah, Google doesn't want Viacom to drop the suit. Google was gunning for this fight and they want Viacom to come at them swinging hard. It's a fight Google is likely to win, but it has to be a fight otherwise it won't resolve anything and the rampant DMCA abuse will continue.

Re:This requires some translation:

[Anonymous Coward]

"Fortunately, the law is clear, and on our side."

As my professors taught me in law school, if you have to say the issue is "clear", it isn't.

Re:This requires some translation:

[J053]

It would be absolutely brilliant if Google bought Viacom; they could continue the Viacom lawsuit (against themselves) but lose on purpose, thereby establishing favorable legal precedent.

Sorry, but Sumner Redstone owns a majority share of Viacom, and I don't think he'd be willing to sell to Google for any amount of money.

pwnd

[allforcarrie]

i hope google pwns them.

Hi From Google!

[ack154]

I think Google just drew a big middle finger over the Viacom HQ on Google Maps...

Groklaw

[SnowZero]

Well, it looks like Groklaw will now have something to cover after the IBM-SCO lawsuit is done. Hopefully this one won't take 4+ years to be decided.

Re:Groklaw

[pilgrim23]

One could say the glove is off now...or not

I was on the Mad TV site...

[iPaul]

And clicked on the "you tube" link from the Mad TV site only to find the content had been pulled from You Tube and Mad TV's account was suspended. (I don't know if this is still the case, as this happened a few days ago). I assume Mad TV had originally posted the material, since the link to You Tube was from the Mad TV official site. Anyway, that's not the only one I've come across where legitimate content, posted by the right hand of one company, was ordered to be pulled by the left hand of the same company. I think that You Tube represents a significant opportunity to get Viacom's content out there for people to watch. It's a shame they can't come to some sort of agreement. (And it's a shame Viacom doesn't like the law they helped pay for).

Re:I was on the Mad TV site...

[beckerist]

Considering the first season of The Colbert Report was essentially DRIVEN by YouTube hits (think: Green Screen Challenge!), I think Viacom should be THANKING the GooTube!

Re:I was on the Mad TV site...

[Peyna]

People on the Internet often overstate their own importance.

I wouldn't be surprised if a large majority of Colbert Report viewers the first season have never watched a single Colbert Report episode on Youtube.

Re:I was on the Mad TV site...

[Rakshasa Taisab]

And the other day I was reading one of the major Norwegian newspaper's online edition where they had a link to a Danish TV commercial. It got pulled, but it was from a traffic safety campaign made by a government institute, so I doubt they sent a C&D letter to youtube.

It might, however, have had something to do with the content of the commercial: A topless girl waving a speed limit sign over her head.

I think we need an European youtube...

Re:I was on the Mad TV site...

[winnabago]

I think we need an European youtube...

Yes, we do.
It would look just like Daily Motion, but BETTER.

Re:I was on the Mad TV site...

[cyber-vandal]

The prudish fools in the UK (my country before you flame) would hate that :D

Re:I was on the Mad TV site...

[maxume]

No need to qualify that first statement.

Re:I was on the Mad TV site...

[beckerist]

Hells yes, thank you.

That's it..?

[mrbcs]

I was hoping for another smack down letter like the one from the other day. You know, the one where the RIAA was suing a dead guy and the defense lawyer chewed em up.

Text precedent?

[darjen]

If there's anybody who can challenge the current state of copyright madness it's Google. They've already made copyrighted text material so readily available. Weren't there legal challenges to that to (I'm too lazy to look it up right now)? In this case they aren't simply doing the same thing to video as they did with text searches to begin with?

in the press

[Anonymous Coward]

These press statements appear to be aimed as something bigger than simply trying the case in the press. They seem designed to sway public opinion in preparation for lobbying to change/retain the DMCA.

Hee hee, go Google.

[Stumbles]

I think Google's response is spot on and equally important highlight's some of the ineptness that exists in the media industry. How is it that Viacom cannot adequately identify their own material? That's just astounding. And just how do they expect someone to know if it is their material? What bunch of buffons. If I were a stockholder of that company, I would be grilling the CEO and boardmembers about just exactly why they are not doing their jobs and keeping track of property the company owns.

Re:Hee hee, go Google.

[Anonymous Coward]

highlight's some of the ineptness... What bunch of buffons.

Re:Hee hee, go Google.

[Stumbles]

Piss off grammar Nazi.

Re:Hee hee, go Google.

[Trailer Trash]

How is it that Viacom cannot adequately identify their own material? That's just astounding.

Last I looked, a DMCA take-down notice was made under penalty of perjury. Maybe if *someone*, like, say, maybe a judge, would actually hold the slimey lawyer who sent it to that penalty of perjury, viacom would do a better job figuring out what they own. Lawyers would be *far* more likely to think before sending if mistakes meant jail time or monetary loss.

After reading both letters...

[twitchingbug]

I'm acatully slightly on viacom's side here...

Yes, I actually read both letters, *GASP*. I think both sides have good points. Basically whose responsibility is it to identify and remove infringing copyright material? It's obviously hard for Viacom to keep track of all possible places that copyrighted material could end up, and on the flip side, it's hard for YouTube to keep track of all copyrighted material to see if any of that is infringing. Basically whoever loses has to pay for the time and effort needed to keep copyrighted stuff off the web...

I'm not a lawyer or anything, but it seems easier (from a tech perspective) for YouTube to control what's going on it's site than Viacom policing all sites. Even if they had a little button there that said, "flag this video for copyright infringement", that might be enough? again, I'm not a lawyer...

Re:After reading both letters...

[DrEldarion]

Basically whose responsibility is it to identify and remove infringing copyright material? According to law (DMCA), it's the content owners' responsibility.

Even if they had a little button there that said, "flag this video for copyright infringement" They do have that button. "Mark as inappropriate".

Re:After reading both letters...

[Atzanteol]

Sure, it may be easier for Google. But it's not their responsibility to enforce the copyright of others. Viacom is trying to enlist the world in their search for copyright infringement.

I sincerely hope nobody from the MPAA, RIAA, or Viacom sees your post. "Well your honor, it's easier for everybody surfing the web to find our content and notify us if the find something infringing. So if you *see* copyright infringement and don't report it then it's a crime!"

Re:After reading both letters...

[Mishra2002]

It is far easier for Youtube to control what's on their site but how can they tell if something is copyrighted? You tube is now supposed to be intimately knowledgeable about the copyrighted material of every corporation on earth? With the recent fad of fan made commercials how can yYutube distinguish between a legitimate fan made commercial and a parody? A copyright holder can identify infringement report it and have it removed. To expect youtube to have some magical AI script that detects copyrighted files is lunacy.

Re:After reading both letters...

[BadMrMojo]

I'm not a lawyer or anything, but it seems easier (from a tech perspective) for YouTube to control what's going on it's site than Viacom policing all sites. Even if they had a little button there that said, "flag this video for copyright infringement", that might be enough? again, I'm not a lawyer...

. . . Neither are the vast majority of people watching clips on YouTube. With copyright law being so labyrinthine and thoroughly beyond the understanding of the average person, how is a reporting system supposed to work accurately? "Flag this video as inappropriate" is easy by comparison. Viewers can see "nekkid_folks_getting_it_on.mpg" and identify it as porn. The same does not hold true for copyrighted material - even when being monitored by the copyright owners themselves, as proven by Viacom's false positives.

Google's response accurately states that, under the DMCA, it is the responsibility of the copyright holder to identify infringing material and report it to the hosting site.

As far as which is easier, it's a complete wash, I think. Viacom has an essentially infinite number of sites to monitor and YouTube has an infinite number of copyrights to filter. Neither solution is going to result in thorough, timely, accurate filtering.

Re:After reading both letters...

[2short]

"Basically whose responsibility is it to identify... "
Viacoms.
"...and remove..."
YouTubes.
" infringing copyright material?"

This isn't up in the air, debateable stuff; it's spelled out perfectly clearly in the law.

"I'm not a lawyer"
Clearly.

Re:After reading both letters...

[Anonymous Coward]

It's obviously hard for Viacom to keep track of all possible places that copyrighted material could end up, ....

Well, isn't that just too fucking bad! Business is so much easier when you can turn all your profit-making problems into externalities.

Try sending a letter to the IRS saying you'll no longer pay taxes and make them find out what you owe.

Re:After reading both letters...

[bkr1_2k]

Easier, sure. How the law is written? Not so sure. According to the law (or at least according to Google's interpretation of the law) it is Viacom's responsibility to police every site.

From Google's perspective, they acted according to the wishes of the copyright owner and removed the materials. Then Viacom said, "oh wait, those aren't ours." but filed a lawsuit anyway for material that was removed saying it wasn't done "fast enough" or something like that.

I'm going to have to disagree with you on this one.

Re:After reading both letters...

[tinkerghost]

Basically whose responsibility is it to identify and remove infringing copyright material?

The DMCA safe harbor provision declares it to explictly be the owner of the copyright who must object & request the takedown of the material. In fact, it has always been the responsibility of the copyright owner to initiate any form of copyright complaint. There is no way that YouTube or any other content aggregate can determine if the material is:

1. copyright by a specific individual (Stephen Colbert posting a home video) vs copyright by a company (A clip from the Colbert report).
2. Permitted by the company (Any number of adds posted on YouTube by the add company)
3. Permitted under fair use (Yes it still applies)
4. Used under license from the copyright owner by the poster.

Given those factors, it is strictly the copyright owners responsibility to identify & request the removal of infringing material. YouTube in fact goes farther & uses a hash system to block the re-upload of videos it removes - in effect performing the pro-active filtering that Viacom wants.

Re:After reading both letters...

[CoderJoe]

It is far easier for Youtube to control what's on their site but how can they tell if something is copyrighted? [...] To expect youtube to have some magical AI script that detects copyrighted files is lunacy.

Technically, everything is copyrighted when it is created, as per the Berne Convention (with the default license of "All rights reserved"). The question you're looking for is "how can youtube tell if something is uploaded with permission of the copyright owner?" The upload form essentially asks the uploader if they have the right to upload the file. Most people uploading content from Viacom or other companies don't have that right, but check that box anyway. The DMCA protects youtube in this case, provided that they take the video down upon notification from the copyright owner.

Re:After reading both letters...

[Anonymous Coward]

I wouldn't mind. I would be reporting everything on MPAA affiliated sites, RIAA affiliated sites. I'm sure they havent asked members of their own organization if they're allowed to use clips. And even if they have, let them track it down and provide the paperwork.

Re:After reading both letters...

[HikingStick]

I'm glad to see a balanced thought here. I do think a "report this" button could work if there was a popup or some guidance (e.g. Report this only if you know it to contain content from another source--movies, TV, radio, etc.--in excess of 15 seconds [or other fair use limit]. All reported clips will be placed in a library for review by copyright holders). Otherwise, it becomes a Salem witch hunt.

I still believe that the content owner bears responsibility for identifying infringing content. Perhaps the content owners can create links on their sites (if they have them), asking their fanbase to report cases of infringement, no matter where they are on the web.

Re:After reading both letters...

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm not a lawyer or anything, but it seems easier (from a tech perspective) for YouTube to control what's going on it's site than Viacom policing all sites. Even if they had a little button there that said, "flag this video for copyright infringement", that might be enough? again, I'm not a lawyer...

uh, no, mr. viacom lawyer. you gave yourself away when brought in the idea viacom had to monitor many sites without bringing in the idea google had to monitor every single upload - not just those from viacom.

your bias is clearly self evident.

btw, i think the law is clear on this matter - viacom better get to work.

Re:After reading both letters...

[Todd Knarr]

My immediate counter would be "Well then, why isn't Viacom doing exactly that themselves?". There's been recent documentation of infringing material on Viacom's own YouTube-like site. If having the hosting company scan for infringing material is, in Viacom's eyes, entirely reasonable, why doesn't Viacom take this entirely reasonable step themselves? Doesn't seem really fair to me for Viacom to demand that someone else do what Viacom's unable or unwilling to do as well in exactly the same circumstance.

Re:After reading both letters...

[Anonymous Coward]

You hit the nail on the head!
Why should a company have to spend a large amount of money to catch someone else who is making money off their material? They admit they took down 100,000 videos that seems like alot but on the other side they have an attitude that they can steal until they get caught, they do nothing to stop copyright infringement, what happened to "Don't be evil"?

Now if they both truly wanted to stop this they could just encode some type of macrovision allowing them to id who the copyright holder is and if it's okay to display it. They of course would want to stop the videos and work together. Clearly this is less about copyrights and more of a pissing contest over a failed negotiation.

I agree the copyright laws need to be moved into the information age and without big brother, big biz, or steal everything attitudes. It should be fair to catch a small funny clip of something that's funny, like many point out it could actually help sell product for the copyright holder.

Re:After reading both letters...

[Dunbal]

Even if they had a little button there that said, "flag this video for copyright infringement", that might be enough?

      You do realize that hundreds of people are going to press that little button just for kicks, right? So effectively, all videos will have to be reviewed. Or do you mean just have the button and do nothing, like the "click this link to unsubscribe" links in spam?

Re:After reading both letters...

[ClosedSource]

They could put a system in place that requires an ID and a signature before posting. This might destroy the value of YouTube but it's certainly possible.

Re:After reading both letters...

[Anonymous Coward]

Remember, according to the Berne Convention, ALL videos on YouTube are copyrighted -- unless the copyright has expired, they have been assigned to the public domain, or were created by entities that cannot assert copyright (like a government).

In other words, approximately 99.999% of YouTube's content is copyrighted. The only difference between the video of my baby's first words and the clip of The Daily Show is the license; I have no problem licensing the video for distribution on the Internet and Viacom thus far has not licensed it.

So the problem isn't of how to identify copyrighted content (almost all of it is), but of how to know which videos are not licensed for distribution.

In the case of porn or hate speech, it's easy to tell by looking at it if it falls into either category. In the case of copyright, there's no way to tell by looking what license a video has. Since there is no way to tell what the license on a video is without asking the owner, and there is no way to know who the owner is without them coming forward, there is nothing YouTube can do.

dom

Re:After reading both letters...

[tieTYT]

IANAL but I think a better way to look at it is what will happen in the context of precedent if Viacom wins. It's a slippery slope. My GF has a forum she set up with Joomla. If a random user decides to upload a copyrighted image can she now be sued for it? I don't think this lawsuit should have anything to do with google. It should be between Viacom and the users that uploaded the content.

Re:After reading both letters...

[Theaetetus]

Yes, I actually read both letters, *GASP*. I think both sides have good points. Basically whose responsibility is it to identify and remove infringing copyright material? It's obviously hard for Viacom to keep track of all possible places that copyrighted material could end up, and on the flip side, it's hard for YouTube to keep track of all copyrighted material to see if any of that is infringing. Basically whoever loses has to pay for the time and effort needed to keep copyrighted stuff off the web...

Thing is, while Viacom might have a legitimate point there, that's not what the DMCA says. It says that the copyright owner has to find the infringing material and notify the distributor, not that the distributor is responsible for such. At least there, the law appears to be on Google's side.

Re:After reading both letters...

[RalphTheWonderLlama]

Google's response accurately states that, under the DMCA, it is the responsibility of the copyright holder to identify infringing material and report it to the hosting site.

The problem with that is does that make it ok to put up copyrighted stuff then? Can you just put up anything and wait around until the copyright holder says something? There's probably a good amount of time in there to profit off of their work. I should start a website and put up TV episodes or movies for download for free and make money from the advertising. Some copyright holders may catch on early so I'll have to take down their particular stuff, but I could probably make a nice chunk of change before they all found me out. BUT you say YouTube/Google isn't the one putting up the videos. Come on, they damn well know what's going on. They willingly let it happen from what it seems like to me, and yes they make money from it.

I have to agree with the parent and side with Viacom (strange for me). I don't get the first few posts saying Viacom was pwnt by Google. I didn't see that at all from reading both letters.

Re:After reading both letters...

[tinkerghost]

Mandating a term of use like that would be struck down in court faster than Viacom can post takedown notices. It hinders freespeech & destroys the right of anonymous speech.

Could YouTube do it, yes, but it still doesn't prevent the infringing material from appearing online, it just gives a name & signature to go with it. So, what is the gain for YouTube or Viacom? Viacom can still get the name from an ISP after supeona-ing the IP address from Viacom.

Re:After reading both letters...

[BadMrMojo]

The problem with that is does that make it ok to put up copyrighted stuff then? . . .

No, not at all. Whether the people who posted the copyrighted material did the wrong thing was never in question. They're not the ones getting sued, however, because they don't have the money to make it worthwhile.

The DMCA does, however, exempt YouTube from contributory or vicarious infringement charges when someone else did the actual infringement, as I understand it.

Remember who the suit is against. The users who are posting copyrighted works are not part of the suit. Viacom is claiming that YouTube is the one who is infringing against copyright. It seems pretty clear that the users are flagrantly violating copyright law, but they're not the ones in question.

It's a law enforcement issue

[MikeRT]

If the feds busted 5,000 people under the No Electronic Theft Act, it would send shockwaves through the file sharing userbase in the United States, far more powerfully than 50,000 lawsuits by the RIAA and MPAA. Giving the people who trade in any forum from Limewire to Youtube a choice: pay restitution or go to prison (possibly an upgrade to the NETA) would change many people's tune about this casual infringement really quickly.

The advantage of having law enforcement take over and bring prosecutions is that it would actually help the little artist, writer or movie producer. It'd be far easier for them to refer a case of mass infringement to the FBI for investigation, and then prosecution, than to make them have to sue the hell out of someone.

Re:It's a law enforcement issue

[guruevi]

So you want the feds to break down YOUR door, arrest YOU and possibly get a FALSE statement out of you so you could get some sleep or so they would stop waterboarding you just because somebody (your kid, or the kid next door that uses your internet, or just because of some mistake by your provider because you just switched IP's and their clocks were 10 seconds of) uploaded a funny piece of The Tonight Show to their YouTube account?

There is a reason MPAA/RIAA tries to do it in court. It's because they don't have a case and they know it, if they did, the feds would already have been all over it (that's why the legal note when the movie starts: FBI/NSA/Interpol warning not to copy this file) and they have been over cases which are actually clear.

Re:It's a law enforcement issue

[Clever7Devil]

Yeah, but why would the small independent entertainer ever want to do this? YouTube, P2P File Sharing, hey even MySpace Music and Pandora (Though the last two haven't been sued yet AFAIK) all are great ways for these lesser-knowns and amateurs to get their material in front of people. I think the argument that anyone, besides the RIAA and Metallica, actually sees this as a problem is long stale. I was at a Stephen Lynch http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Lynch_(musici an)/ concert last month when he made a revealing (to me at least) statement about a song he was not going to perform, "Buy the album, go to iTunes, download it off LimeWire, I don't give a fuck." His albums were noted by Apple as two of the 100 best-selling Independent albums on iTunes in 2005. These artists don't want to send the cops after people who like their music, they want those people to continue liking it so that they will pick up albums and go to shows. Artists make more money touring than they do with album sales by a hefty margin. You can't download the front row.

Re:It's a law enforcement issue

[cdrguru]

So your contention is that there is no illegal copyright infringement going on? I don't think that matches up with the reality that I see where nobody pays for music, people download ripped copies of DVDs and software is available for free from Eastern European web sites.

No, I think the RIAA is trying to follow civil procedures. Unfortunately, what we have is a clueless Mom with an Internet account while the teenager downloads music to fill that 30Gb iPod. Mom gets a letter and cluelessly says "I don't download music, prove it!" and the comedy begins.

Evidently there isn't much of a precedent for the "owner" of an Internet account being liable for activity on it. So, if your name isn't on the account you are pretty much untraceable. Maybe you knuckle under to lawyers, maybe not. Clearly they have no idea whose fingers are on the keyboard so that means everyone gets off scot free, right?

I think there will be a rude awakening with this somewhere along the line. I think the only choice is the account holder is responsible for all activity. Period. If your wireless access point isn't secured, you would then be liable for whatever transferred over your equipment and your account.

Re:It's a law enforcement issue

[HikingStick]

If infringement is going on, I don't oppose legal action. The case here is that (under current law) the copyright owner MUST identify the infringing content and ask for its removal. This lawsuit contends that Google is providing a safe harbor for illegal content. Google is just telling the copyright owners to (do their duty under law and) name the infringing content so they can remove it.

Each party has a role to play. Google says it is willing to do its part. Suing Google just to get around a legal requirement for dealing with infringement is no way to skirt the law.

Re:It's a law enforcement issue

[Dunbal]

The advantage of having law enforcement take over and bring prosecutions

      Hang on, umm, have we moved out of civil issues and we're now into criminal law? IANAL but there's a whole lot of things that have to be checked off a list before criminal charges can be brought to bear.

      It's like if I had you arrested for building your fence 1 inch on my side of our shared property boundary. Not likely... and who would want to live in a world like THAT?

Re:It's a law enforcement issue

[Dunbal]

Mods, this isn't a troll. Sheesh ok yeah the author uses strong, abusive language, but if you actually READ the point he's trying to get across, it makes a lot of sense. Flamebait may be more appropriate than troll, but considering the content of the message I would just have left it alone. We're all grownups here.

      Hello? modding something troll because you don't agree or don't like the language should get you banned from modding forever...

Re:It's a law enforcement issue

[Dunbal]

Mom gets a letter and cluelessly says "I don't download music, prove it!" and the comedy begins.

      Yeah, a letter asking for a mere $3500 settlement. She should just pay up, right? After all, she's getting of easy.

How is this any different from Napster?

[Anonymous Coward]

Napster was found guilty and they weren't even storing the illegal content on their own servers. How is YouTube somehow in the clear?

Re:How is this any different from Napster?

[Tanktalus]

IANAL (I didn't even follow the case), but it would appear to me that Napster was largely about trading copyrighted files in their entirety that weren't owned by whoever was seeding it (music, video, whatever), while YouTube is largely about trading copyrighted files that are owned by whoever put them online (or otherwise fall under fair-use laws). It may be as much about intent and purpose as activity. YouTube also made an effort to take down files that copyright owners claim were posted illegally - further proving intent to be above board with everything, not to mention actually following the DMCA law.

Re:How is this any different from Napster?

[HikingStick]

YouTube has made it clear that posters are responsible for the content they post which is stored on Google's/YouTube's servers [I know, Napster disclaimed responsibility for the content, but I know not enough about that case to address it here]. In addition, Google has fully cooperated with the law in pulling materials that were deemed to be infringing. I don't need to be a lawyer to know that current law requires copyright owners to identify infringing content and request its removal. They, for example, would need to find bootleg DVDs at a flea market in order to make a claim of infringement--they cannot simply order all flea markets to screen all their sellers, or prevent all DVD sales. Google's argument is that the same rules apply on YouTube. If someone claims infringement, let them identify the infringing content and Google will pull it down. It is a reasonable scenario. Otherwise, EVERY company that hosts ANY potentially infringing content (read: any webpage, web host, ISP, service, etc.) would need to screen ALL content for ANY potential violation against EVERY CONTENT OWNER IN THE WORLD!

That would be untenable and an undue burden. The history of law in the United States (and, if memory serves correctly, from much of the British Common Law tradition that led to current intellectual property law) holds that the intellectual property owners are responsible for safeguarding their property. While it would be illegal (without express permission) for someone to print and bind their own copies of the Harry Potter books, for example, it falls to Rowling and/or her publishing house to identify such infringing copies, demand that the pirate cease operations, and then to sue for damages (if desired).

Re:How is this any different from Napster?

[Anonymous Coward]

There are vague similarities, but some pretty key differences.

Napster was sued by the RIAA for facilitating the illegal distribution of copyrighted materials. The central issue with Napster was that Napster ran a centralized database of each user's music collection, while the actual sharing was done by the user.

YouTube, by contrast, is being accused by Viacom of actually hosting copyrighted material.

This may make YouTube seem like it has a bigger problem, but under the DMCA it doesn't. The DMCA provides for electronic services - just as you can't charge the postal service with copyright infringement because they transport infringing material, you can't charge an online service with infringement.

Napster wasn't a host. It was a search service. While copyright was a central issue in both cases, the cases really are quite different.

Re:How is this any different from Napster?

[Stonehand]

*sigh*

It's an ongoing situation, not a one-time one.

Let's say that Viacom sends Google a list of their popular shows that have been infringed upon, with URLs leading to specific examples. Note that, for the infringement to have any impact, it must be findable by users -- it must be identifiable via tag, title, description, author, channel, or advertisement elsewhere (blog post for instance). If people are uploading infringing material in ways that are all but impossible to find, than Viacom has little reason to care.

Are you suggesting that once Viacom provides some *specific* examples, Google should be permitted to plead complete ignorance when the very same uploaders re-upload the material using titles and descriptions that clearly match the previous descriptions they've been given as infringing uploads? We're not talking about a generic duty to identify what's being uploaded without authorization; we're talking about matching content metadata against a list of identifiers specifically noted as associated with infringement.

True or false:
* Google is incapable of building a system that would parse tags, titles and descriptions against a list supplied to them suggesting infringement, and of flagging possible items that are almost probably infringing (like " ExSy> part N").
* All content owners have a duty to continually scan every single upload of Google's content because Google cannot assume it's unauthorized even if it precisely matches a previous item that was marked unauthorized.

Yes, patterns exist. There are people who systematically upload entire television series with very specific title patterns, appropriate tags, and accurate descriptions. Do you really think that Google -- whose whole business depends on information management -- bears no responsibility at all for making even a slight effort at detecting these?

Re:How is this any different from Napster?

[russotto]

True or false: The DMCA imposes a duty for Google to build a system to detect infringement as a condition for taking advantage of its safe harbors.

It doesn't matter whether Google _could_ do it -- of course they could, though they would of course err in both directions. It matters whether or not they are required to do it. And they aren't.

Re:How is this any different from Napster?

[HikingStick]

Could Google build a system? Possibly, yes [the first things pirates would do would be to change the clip/track names and numbering to avoid the filters], but that's not the point. The law does not place the burden on Google. The law places the burden on the content owner to identify infringement and demand action. Must the media companies scan for every potential new infringing clip? As the law now stands, yes.

I would strongly advise media companies to revisit fair use provisions, develop something fair to all parties. I would never accept as (or suggest that it be) allowed for whole episodes of a program to be posted, even if they were chunked into "fair use" sized portions. Now, would it be possible for someone, finding dozens or hundreds of "fair use" portions, to stitch together again the whole program or track? Yes, but it would again be the content owner's responsibility to protect their content.

When Google was notified of infringing content, the take-down notice inlcuded items that were not even infringing! If the content owner doesn't know the difference, how can you expect Google, no matter how technically proficient, to know what is or is not infringing content?

Re:How is this any different from Napster?

[burris]

In Napster's case, internal e-mails from officers of the company said stuff like "our users need to stay anonymous because they are pirating music." Once it was established that the officers of the company knew their users were infringing and that the very purpose of the service was to allow infringement then it was all over for Napster.

one corp's opinion

[Anonymous Coward]

Unusual that the WP doing put these pieces on its editorial pages, isn't it? This kind of self-serving propaganda usually appears as a press release masquerading as a news article. While it certainly deserves to be labeled as opinion, in article format the WP could at least have feigned skepticism.

Translation

[indros13]

Viacom to Google: *snarl*

Google to Viacom: *smack*

Viacom: *whimper*

Re:Translation

[drpimp]

Animated version Google vs. Viacom

Re:Translation

[PMuse]

Some steps not complete yet.

1. Viacom: profit!
2. Google: profit!
3. Viacom to Google: *snarl*
4. Google to Viacom: *smack*
---------------
5. Google: ??
6. Viacom: *whimper*
7. The people: profit!

Oh, for God's sake, you two.

[91degrees]

Keep it to the court. Stop airing your dirty laudry in public. We don't decide whether you're breaking the law. That's why we have a legal system.

Re:Oh, for God's sake, you two.

[HikingStick]

You're wrong here. It was absolutely necessary for Google to make a public stand on this issue. Google's reputation was sullied in the public eye by the news coverage of the pending litigation. By writing the open editorial piece, Google is taking a firm and purposed position in defense of its reputation. You can't believe that the average citizen is going to be following this via Slashdot, much less by looking at the public record of the legal precedings.

Besides, such editorial comments have been a part of journalistic history in the United States. They are often one of the few things that keep traditional media outlets mildly interesting.

As a citizen, it is important for me to know when a corporation is trying to hose me through its actions against other companies. IANAL, but I do have experience as an educator, and copyright has a tremendous impact in that arena. Google's arguments are spot-on when it comes to who is responsible for identifying infringing material. Perhaps Google's letter will inspire some citizens (those targeted by the RIAA, for example), to challenge the settlement offers and legal threats that they currently swallow without a second thought. The fact is this: unless you stand up to a bully (preferably in front of witnesses and the bully's lackeys), the bully will continue to steal your lunch money.

If Viacom can't do it, they shouldn't expect ...

[Augusto]

... others to do it.

It has already been shown that ifilm contains material which they don't own the copyright. Viacom, can't police that material, why should anybody expect google to do what the originator of the lawsuit is crying about?

And google does have a way to report questionable material, you hit the "flag as innapropiate" and choose "Other terms of use violation". In addition the same button has a link for copyright owners to object to the material. That really seems fair enough to me.

The only technical solution would be to filter words, which is a stupid alternative. As I may want to upload parodies of "Steve Colbert" instead of actual video from his show.

automated copyright detection/removal - impossible

[moochfish]

It's impossible to detect copyrighted content on any large scale. Expecting YouTube* be the enforcer** of their content is naive at best. Machines can't tell if something was uploaded by its owner or a stranger. If they employ people to investigate this, each person would need to be able to instantly recognize copyrighted stuff*** from any producer in the world (impossible). That means somebody would have to see a video or song and know if it's owned by ABC****, NBC*****, Viacom******, Sony*******, the Discovery Channel********, etc. This doesn't even touch upon fair use, which not even the terminator********* could recognize with confidence**********. Then there's the issue of a false alarm***********

[POST TERMINATED DUE EXCESSIVE COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT]

Google flicks off Viacom and says...

[TimeForGuinness]

Did you hear what I said Viacom? Or shall I turn it up for you?

Because everyone is wondering...

[Anonymous Coward]

...The same video was mentioned on The Register yesterday, including a link to the video.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/03/28/bikini_ban dits/

Posted anonymously because, well... I just posted a link to topless women on Slashdot. If that's not karma whoring, I don't know what is.

The Real Problem

[Lord Balto]

The real problem with copyright law is that large corporations are allowed to possess them. This is just another example of the much larger problem of large corporations being allowed to do anything an individual can do. Even in your example, the author doesn't necessarily own the copyright. Often, it is the publisher that does so, which is good if a lawsuit is required, but it limits the author's future right to do what they wish with their work. In short, why is a company that has not produced anything creative allowed to take advantage of a legal right that was supposedly enacted to protect creativity? Perhaps these corporations should only be allowed to possess limited copyrights that only extend to the first production of the work in question, with all rights thereafter reverting to the artists who created the works. I have no absolute solutions, but I really think this needs to be looked at from the point of view of what would actually increase creativity in the real world and not just in the corporate bizarro world.

Re:The Real Problem

[gcallow]

Perhaps these corporations should only be allowed to possess limited copyrights that only extend to the first production of the work in question, with all rights thereafter reverting to the artists who created the works

Already can be done - licensing. Artists aren't obliged to sign their copyrights away - they can instead let somebody license the work from them with whatever restrictions they feel fit to place upon it.

The problem is, historically, the cost is distribution. To make any money from your copyrighted work you need to distribute it, distributing it means going to the big media companies and they'll only distribute if you hand over the copyright, not license it from you.

The internet, computers, podcasts, YouTube and the like are moving the distribution cost lower and lower. Hopefully we'll get to a point soon where artists realise they aren't beholden to some of the current companies to get their works out and make a reasonable sum of money from it.

Re:The Real Problem

[2short]

"Often, it is the publisher that does so, which is good if a lawsuit is required, but it limits the author's future right to do what they wish with their work."

You right to do what you wish with something is generally limited when you sell that thing.

"why is a company that has not produced anything creative allowed to take advantage of a legal right that was supposedly enacted to protect creativity?"

Because they paid the creator for the creation. It's supposed to encourage creativity by helping the creator get paid; which it did. Sometimes creators make bad deals; sometimes because big corporations abuse their monopoly on the ability to distribute the product of particular types of creators. This is a problem, but it is not specific to copyright; in the realm of physical goods, workers in sweatshops have essentially the same difficulty.

Copyright makes it possible to own certain things one creates that are informational in nature. While the focus is on "artists", a heck of a lot of people create all sorts of things which are information in nature, and I for one think it mostly makes things a lot easier if it is possible for creators of such things to in some sense own their creations.

I can't see how you can let someone own something, and not let them sell it to a corporation. Corporations can do anything an individual can do. If they can't, can a group of people do it by just not calling themselves a corp?

I think the length of copyright terms has gotten crazily out of hand, there's a pretty obvious case to be made there. But I can't see aboloshing it entirely; it just awfully useful to society if people can own the things they make, at least initially, even when those things are made of bits.

Re:The Real Problem

[iminplaya]

The real solution is to limit all IP law to the subject of plagiarism. Seems pretty simple. Attribution is forever and non transferable. Of course the publishing houses want more, so, ever since the writers guild started crying about the printing press, we get law that purports to "promote the sciences and the arts", but actually does exactly the opposite. And it turns out the law was merely meant to control what can be printed. Can't have any subversives spewing their bile, you know. Once you understand the true nature and intent of these laws, you too, will know that nothing less than a complete repeal will change anything for the better. You would especially understand if you were sick and can't afford any medicine. Natural, safe medicine that would be available if not for the law. A perfect example of how scarcity is created artificially. Of course information in general is another perfect example of how the law creates a group of "have-nots". But hey, it's all good. This is how this economic system functions. No money can flow if everybody can get what they need without going to BIGCO. Scarcity is the pump that creates and maintains that flow. To make money from our abundance of information, we must make it scarce. Just as if one wishes to make huge profits from marijuana, they make it illegal. No real difference. Both are a prohibition against unauthorized distribution, and they are both serving their intended purpose very well.

Re:The Real Problem

[Attila Dimedici]

Walt Disney is a large corporation. It is a large corporation because it holds the copyrights to the works of.....Walt Disney (among others). Walt Disney (the guy) was able to realize many of his dreams because he created Walt Disney (the company) and gave them the rights to his works. Yes, he probably took advantage of some other creative people. However, the problem isn't that he gave the rights to his creative works to a corporation. The problem is that he's been dead for some time now and the corporation still has exclusive rights to his works. The problem with copyright law (as several others have posted here earlier) is that it lasts too long. IMO copyright should last for the lifetime of the creator or 75 years from the date of creation, whichever is longer. That last may be too long, or not long enough. A case can be made for anywhere from 50 to 100 years. However, the two important things about copyright duration should be lifetime of the creator and time from date of creation...I believe that current law is length of time from death of creator.

Re:The Real Problem

[theStorminMormon]

The real problem with copyright law is that large corporations are allowed to possess them.

In short, why is a company that has not produced anything creative allowed to take advantage of a legal right that was supposedly enacted to protect creativity?

A couple things to note. First of all it's interesting that you qualify corporations with "large". I take it you understand why corporations are so important to modern business. What they do is limit the risk of any investor to only their investment. In other words if you put $1,000 into a corporation and the corporation gets sued and loses all it's assets and still owes money, the creditors can't come to you for more cash. Without this guarantee of safety, investing in corporations would be even more risky, and only the rich could do it (only they could run the risk). So it's actually a powerful democratization effect to have corporations exist as legal entities because it protects their investors.

However you're right that when corporations get really big it's hard to make sure that the people running the corporation have the interests of the stakeholders at heart. In fact, it's hard to even define who the stake holders are. In America the stakeholders are the shareholders. In Europe the stakeholders are also the company employees (even if they don't own stock). In Japan it's company employees and also other businesses (because in Japan companies own each other's stocks at a much higher rate). In none of these cases is the stakeholder the general public. So trying to figure out how the general public can none the less impose some penalties on corporation decision makers for bad decisions is an extremely, extremely tricky problem.

I agree with you in principle that it's a problem, but I think the real fundamental problem isn't about copyright, it's about how to design corporate governance structure so that the individual decision makers in corporations are responsible for the decisions the corporations make. This is harder to do than it sounds.

Re:The Real Problem

[Anonymous Coward]

In short, why is a company that has not produced anything creative allowed to take advantage of a legal right that was supposedly enacted to protect creativity?

Errr, because the company has paid the artist in return for (a subset of) the artist's rights on that work?

Re:The Real Problem

[Anonymous Coward]

I think that you, unfortunately, misunderstand the difference between stakeholders and stockholders.

stakeholder |?st?k?h?ld?r| noun 1 (in gambling) an independent party with whom each of those who make a wager deposits the money or counters wagered. 2 a person with an interest or concern in something, esp. a business. [as adj. ] denoting a type of organization or system in which all the members or participants are seen as having an interest in its success : a stakeholder economy.

straight out of my Oxford American dictionaries app. Everyone down to the community surrounding a busniess is a stakeholder. If I live down the street from a papermill I have an interest in how they dispose of any chemicals they use (eg: I don't want them dumping them in the river). The society at large has an interest in the proper behaviour in all major (and minor) coproations, so I don't believe that balancing those interests is quite that difficult; however, I DO think that balancing the interests of stakeholders vs stockholders does present the issues you describe and my answer to that is that the society at large (stakeholders) win.

Just my $0.02

Re:The Real Problem

[skubeedooo]

In all of this, you have to remember that it is the artists that decide to license their works to the label. They trade the license to their creative work in exchange for advertising, production and cash. Decreeing that large companies aren't allowed to hold copyright is effectively saying that bands aren't allowed to sell their main asset. I can't see how government disqualifying the highest bidder is going to help them.

When the government starts dictating who can sell to who, it usually ends up worse for everyone concerned. In this particular case, if a label can't get access to a significant future revenue stream, then they are not going to stump up the cash for production, advertising and so on. Every limit you place on what the corporation can do with the rights gets instantly and automatically translated into a limitation on how much the artist can get paid. In your example, if a company is willing to pay £100,000 for the rights to all productions, then it might only be willing to pay £20,000 for the rights to the first production. Is this a better deal for the musician? Well, it might be, or it might not be. I'll let him figure that one out - he doesn't need me, or government, to decide for him.

To answer your question about why, it is simply about distribution of labour. Labels are good at marketing etc, artists are good at creating music. Artists pay for the labels to promote them by giving them the copyrights. At the moment it is claimed that artists get a bad deal - if it is true, then it is time for the artists to start wising up, not for the government to introduce new populist laws.

Re:The Real Problem

[illumin8]

The real problem with copyright law is that large corporations are allowed to possess them. This is just another example of the much larger problem of large corporations being allowed to do anything an individual can do.

You're an idiot. What's wrong with a corporation owning a copyright? The author of the book specifically agreed to transfer the copyright in exchange for: publication, promotion, advertising, distribution (having your book in thousands of bookstores worldwide doesn't just happen), royalties, pre-payment of royalties, etc.

If a corporation wants to take on the risk of publishing a book that might or might not make any money, who are you to refuse them the right to do that? Corporation or real person (individual), it makes no difference. You're trying to take rights away from people (corporations).

Re:The Real Problem

[theStorminMormon]

I think that you, unfortunately, misunderstand the difference between stakeholders and stockholders.

Actually I'm painfully clear on it. As a systems engineer "determine the stakeholders" is one of the foundational elements of our general methodology. My point was to distinguish between stakeholders and stockholders. In American business theory, the stockholders are considered the stakeholders. That's just the way business works in America. Not that it has always been this way or will always be this way, but the current mantra, for at least the last 2 decades, is that the point of a business is to "maximize stockholder value". So clearly stockholders = stakeholders.

As I pointed out, this is not the case in Europe or Japan, where employees, management, and other companies are also considered stakeholders. In the case of Japan the other companies are considered stakeholders based on the fact that they are stockholders. That's due to American influence. But Japanesee companies are also extremely paternalistic and treat employees as stakeholders even when they own no stock. German companies work the same way: employees are considered stakeholders. This is based more on liberal philosophy than on paternalism.

In any case, I really do understand the difference between stakeholders and stockholders.

Re:The Real Problem

[Anonymous Coward]

The real problem is that corporations enjoy all the privileges of a person without some of the important liabilities:

• mortality
• morality
• fear of imprisonment for crimes

To be sure, corporations do bad things when they own copyrights. However, those things are not all that much worse than what corporations do when they own property.

Why not? Because it's overkill

[paladinwannabe2]

Like most people, I sometimes go over the speed limit while driving to work (sometimes by as much as 10 miles per hour!) I'm sure that if the Federal Government started arresting people for speeding, most people (myself included) would speed a lot less.

Of course, any elected official trying to 'crack down on speeding' by tossing speeders in jail wouldn't last long in office. When you give ridiculous punishments for minor offenses, you just breed contempt for the law (not to mention annoy everyone but special interest groups).

Google for President!

[Grinin]

Though people always try to critique big success stories like Google. I think Google is a very powerful company with very good intentions. Copyright reform being one of those good intentions.

I so wish I had mod points right now

[Atario]

...because you would get a shiny +1.

You're overreaching

[paladinwannabe2]

Life isn't like 24- cops don't torture random people until they get confessions out of them. Furthermore, they usually don't engage in SWAT-style raids of criminals unless they are suspected of something serious- rape, murder, drug dealing, etc. You are right that the GP is stupid, but your explanation is poor and sensationalist (i.e. stupid in a different way).

What the GP doesn't seem to get is that raiding someone's home because they stole some mp3s is like raiding someone's home because they swiped some candybars from the drug store. It's worse than a waste of everyone's time, it's also a net loss to everyone- the candy is worth far less than the door they just broke getting into the house, and violent entry is always risky to the police officers and the poor sap they are busting. The penalties for downloading mp3's should be even lower than the penalties for stealing candy, since I'm doing less harm. A minor fine (such as paying off the RIAA) is reasonable, being tossed in jail is not.

Or perhaps the GP does realize this, and is using sarcasm to make a point, or is trolling for idiots. If so, we both fell for it.

Re:You're overreaching

[russotto]

Life isn't like 24- cops don't torture random people until they get confessions out of them.

They do in Philadelphia and New York (remember the plunger incident?)

Furthermore, they usually don't engage in SWAT-style raids of criminals unless they are suspected of something serious- rape, murder, drug dealing, etc.

Or copyright infringement. Why do you think the RIAA has those SWAT-style jackets with RIAA on the back. Or "hacking". Or nothing at all... remember the Steve Jackson Games case?

IANAL but...

[SwashbucklingCowboy]

I think Google is quite right. DCMA seems to protect GooTube.

As I posted in a previous thread on the this general subject, Viacom's fight is not with GooTube - it's with Congress.

Real issue here

[cdrguru]

There are a bunch of side issues here, like what is fair use when considering a video clip of some duration. But there is one big issue:

Entity A has a service by which lots of stuff gets picked up and made available to others. Some of this is owned by other people and Entity A has no rights to it at all. Is it Entity A's responsibility to ensure they do not collect such material, or is it the owner's? DMCA pretty clearly says it is the owner's and this works on a small scale pretty well.

But when Entity A is the size of Waste Management and they "accidently" pick up every car in your neighborhood to sell them at auction, is it necessarily a good move to say that every car owner has to sue them individually?

YouTube is a vacuum cleaner of mammoth proportions and is certainly capable of sucking up whatever content there is to acquire through the dillgent efforts of anonymous contributors. There are vast similarites with Napster here - sure there is a lot of non-infringing content but also lots of infringing content as well. Grokster pretty much said the service can be held liable for copyright abuses of its users.

I don't think this is at all clear cut. Yes, Viacom probably could do a better job at identifying infringing material and a compromise might be to enable Viacom (and others) to have easy access to recently-uploaded materials for such identification purposes. But in no way does YouTube (or anyone else) get to say they have no responsibility in the matter at all.

Re:Real issue here

[Todd Knarr]

The distinction is that YouTube isn't vacuuming up the content. Individuals are posting it there. YouTube simply provides the hosting. Not everyone can afford to run their own co-located servers to host their own videos, and the safe-harbor provision of the DMCA recognizes that the companies simply running the servers should have a way of putting the responsibility for what users do on the shoulders of the users.

This is much akin to the way UPS, FedEx and the USPS work. They move packages from point A to point B. If they were directly liable for everything that might be in those packages, they'd be forced to open and inspect every single one. They couldn't operate like that. Moreover, people who use them couldn't work like that. Companies and individuals need to send confidential documents around with some confidence they won't be opened and read by random people at the shipping company. So the law says that it's the shipper who's liable, not the shipping company, unless the shipping company has some reasonable grounds to believe, just by looking at the outside of the package, that there's something wrong. This lets UPS/etc. provide service to everybody without you having to let them see every bit of everything you'd like to ship through them and without having to worry about being sued into oblivion just because Joe Moron decided to use them to send death threats to his boss and didn't mention it to them.

The DMCA safe-harbor provision is modeled after that. A hosting company is responsible for providing hosting. They aren't responsible for standing over every user's shoulder every second watching and approving/vetoing every single thing the user does with the service. Responsibility for what the user does falls first on the user, as long as the hosting company takes a hands-off approach.

Re:Real issue here

[Dunbal]

There are vast similarites with Napster

      First, IANAL, obviously.

      Only Napster didn't take down copyrighted material when they were told to do so by the copyright holders. It was all about piracy. YouTube did take it down and continues to do so. There's a big difference.

      It's unreasonable to assume, however, that youtube must police every single item uploaded and check for copyright infringement. Starting with the fact that EVERY upload is copyrighted by the creator, whether it be a fart lighting contest or an episode of Battlestar Galactica.

      A copyright is automatic, and the owner in theory should not have to go after the infringer. However this law was designed before a service like YouTube was conceived, and perhaps there are some aspects that need to be rethought. Merely silencing the voice of the people is not enough. There's an obvious demand for this kind of service and the VAST majority of videos are NOT blatant piracy. Change the law before trying to go against what the people want (again).

Yeah, that is pretty much the issue

[Anonymous Coward]

Back in the early days of America, the founders struggled with the concept of patents and copyrights. It was noted that more side innovations would occur if we had neither. But of course, patents and copyrights encourage the ability to come up with ideas and to get them into "production" (be it a book or an item). The ultimate solution was to give limited time on both. Never in their wildest dream did they imagine that some virtual entity would have damn near as many rights and far fewer responsibilities than do individuals. It seems that it is time to start changing the laws to limit what Incs can do, since it is obvious that they can operate really on the edge. As it is, all of the Texas-style accounting that occurred at Qwest, WorldCom, etc, or even MS's actions over the last few decades, shows that Incs need a different set of laws.

Bear in mind, that I set an INC different from llc or partnerships as ppl are held responsible for their actions.

Lack of jurisdiction CANNOT be waived.

[Anonymous Coward]

Disclaimer: IANAL. I took a college class that covered how this works under US law, however. If you need legal advice, talk to someone licensed to practice law in your state--that someone is definitely not me.

Under the US Constitution, our courts only have jurisdiction over "cases and controversies" so they can't just run out and decide what some law means without someone bringing them a case--the issue has to be "ripe" (you can, in certain circumstances, get ca declaratory judgments if someone threatens to sue you, but it has to be quite clear that a lawsuit was threatened and they were only delaying it for reasons of FUD).

Also, matters of jurisdiction cannot be waived by either party. So the court, sua sponte, can just throw out your case if you try to pull something stupid like suing yourself (or colluding with someone) to set up a bogus lawsuit to set precedent. In those cases, the judge would just find that the parties are insufficiently adverse and toss you both out on your ass (possibly with Rule 11 sanctions if it was so blatant a scheme).

The constitution says

[Burrfoot]

Article I; Section 8: The Congress shall have power to ... To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries;" The purpose of the law is *NOT* to protect the author. The purpose is to benefit the public by providing a reasonable way to compensate the author for work which in a "limited time" will enter the public domain where everyone can use it. Alas, there's no definition of "limited times" Ay, there's the rub. [(c) 1602, Wm. Shakespeare, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED]

Sure thing...

[CasperIV]

I need a gallon bucket, 50 packages of spaghetti, white and black paint, and an assistant that doesn't mind getting a little dirty... Seriously, what happened to all the artists? We use to have musicians, now we have pop stars. We use to have actors, now we have Tom Cruises. It defiantly does not look like we are headed in the right direction when the average movie costs around 34 million to produce, and several million of that is just amenities for the stars (hotels, gifts, trailers, misc demands).

Talk about undue burden...

[DeadCatX2]

So, before Google will allow any video to be posted to YouTube, they're going to check with every copyright holder in existence to make sure that the video is okay?

I do believe this would fit the definition of "undue burden".

Viacom needs to quit bitching about YouTube and realize that they aren't footing the bandwidth bill for this promotional material.

Re:Talk about undue burden...

[RalphTheWonderLlama]

Well there is a burden for Viacom to find every single video that infringes their copyright on someone else's site as well. As they see it, it's not their fault that someone else is hosting all their copyrighted stuff and making money off of it so why do they have to police the internets looking for every instance of that when it's clearly illegal. Rather than having them searching every website all the time for things like this, maybe they should have some sort of way to notify everyone ahead of time what content they own that they don't allow everyone to show without permission. Oh yeah, isn't that a copyright?

Re:If Viacom can't do it, they shouldn't expect ..

[TubeSteak]

It has already been shown that ifilm contains material which they don't own the copyright. Viacom, can't police that material, why should anybody expect google to do what the originator of the lawsuit is crying about?
...
The only technical solution would be to filter words, which is a stupid alternative. As I may want to upload parodies of "Steve Colbert" instead of actual video from his show.

YouTube currently has a filtering system in place.

They licensed technology from AudibleMagic.
(MySpace has also licensed the technology for filtering.)

YouTube only pre-filters content for media companies who have entered into a licensing agreement with YouTube. The company gives YouTube hashes of their copywritten works & YouTube plugs those into their database. Viacom briefly mentions all this in their editorial & in the legal complaint (paragraph #7 & again further on).

Anyways, maybe the Judge will tell Viacom to license AudibleMagic's technology and use it on their own site... Who knows? But the main thrust of your argument is based on the claim that GooTube can't filter and you're wildly wrong. Don't worry though, lots of other people have been making that same argument, wrongly of course.

Ban key search terms

[Jeff1946]

I am not taking sides on this, but how could you find a submission on Youtube without key search terms. For example Jon Stewart, daily show, etc. If Youtube would not display items found by these search terms, wouldn't this stop most uploads?

Re:Ban key search terms

[Dunbal]

I am not taking sides on this, but how could you find a submission on Youtube without key search terms. For example Jon Stewart, daily show, etc. If Youtube would not display items found by these search terms, wouldn't this stop most uploads?


IANAL, but I think the idea is if they do any routine "policing" at all, then they are liable if they don't get all the infringers. As it is, they are not responsible for the content people upload. There's a warning to not upload copyrighted material, and if you do that, YOU are liable, not them. They make a reasonable effort to take down material known to infringe once they are informed of it. And that's that.

      If you include blanket filters - then what about parody, for example? You are allowed to use the words "A "Star Wars" Parody" without being sued by Lucasfilms. But if this is filtered automatically - you are disallowing part of what copyright law permits. Not only that, but automatic filters are easy to get around. How about $tar Worz, st4r w4rs, wtar sars, etc. It's impossible to filter keywords 100% effectively.

Re:Ban key search terms

[azenpunk]

and if it's private footage of jon stewart signing autographs on a corner in NYC?

Re:Ban key search terms

[Stonehand]

If it's hard to find for Google and Viacom, it's going to be hard to find for users, and therefore it matters less.

Law for ever

[hhawk]

There is nothing wrong with the scenario which you described, although I would write a different one for music. Let's focus on the area you covered, "books."

The problem isn't that copyright protects the Authors, which was the intent, but that a 2nd intent was that after some reasonable period of time, those works enter into the public domain. Without that, for example, a modern writer say of a TV series like Star Trek TNG, couldn't include a "character" like Sherlock Holmes. In fact when they tried, the Estate of ACD asked them to stop...

The copyright law was designed to allow an author to fairly profit from their work and then get it into the public domain where others' could extend it and alter it, and publish it. It was even reasonable to extend the period of protection for some years. However, the current extension (The Sonny Bono Act) is far too long. Copyright should allow an author reasonable profit, not allow his Estate and Heirs to support themselves "forever."

Re:Law for ever

[iminplaya]

The problem isn't that copyright protects the Authors, which was the intent...

That was NOT the intent! This is where everybody is so confused. That was its stated intent, far from what it really is. Its intent was to protect established publishers of the time when the printing press was making their work obsolete. Its intent was to restrict access to a press, much like the Russians' attempt to restrict access to a photocopy machine during the "communist" days to try to silence the critics. You all really need to get this "promote the arts and sciences" thing out of your heads. Nothing could be farther from the truth.

Re:Law for ever

[theStorminMormon]

The copyright law was designed to allow an author to fairly profit from their work and then get it into the public domain where others' could extend it and alter it, and publish it.

I agree 100%. I've been arguing in favor of copyright law at all, not copyright law as we have it in America now.

DMCA safe harbor does not apply to Google

[Pausanias]

Right. Why don't people here on mention the fact that the DMCA safe harbor clause specifically says that the infringing entity must not gain financially to qualify for safe harbor? Check it out for yourselves on this DMCA faq right here:

The service provider must not gain any financial benefit that is attributable to the infringing material. [512(c)(1)(B)], [512(d)(2)].

I hate the DMCA. I hate the copyright cartel. However, the DMCA is on the cartel's side here. Google is in trouble, because they are in fact gaining financially through the copyright violation. Their only hope is to somehow argue that "financial gain" in the DMCA means only "selling the copyrighted material," which is far-fetched.

Re:DMCA safe harbor does not apply to Google

[russotto]

The DMCA FAQ is not quite precise enough here.

The actual words used in DMCA 512(c)(1)(B) are

"does not receive a financial benefit directly attributable to the infringing activity, in a case in which the service provider has the right and ability to control such activity; and"

Google does not lose the safe harbor by making money off of YouTube; if they did, the DMCA safe harbor would be vitiated. The benefit has to be _directly_ attributable to the infringing activity; an indirect benefit like "more people come to the site, and thus see the ads, thus raising revenue" does not qualify.

Re:DMCA safe harbor does not apply to Google

[Xtravar]

This entire lawsuit's outcome will be determined by the interpretation of that one word? That's incredible.

Re:DMCA safe harbor does not apply to Google

[Digital_Mercenary]

Does Google profit from a site that allows the end user to post videos? Or does it profit from a site the allows the end user to post copyrighted material?

Does Verizon profit from a phone call I make. Or does Verizon profit from a phone call I make to fence stolen goods?

Re:DMCA safe harbor does not apply to Google

[russotto]

Not so incredible. Typically, every word in a law is assumed to have meaning. In this case, there's a rich history of "vicarious infringement" case law which Viacom could try to bring to bear to show that Google did in fact financially benefit from the presence of Viacom's copyrighted material. That's all precluded by that word "directly", as "vicarious" and "direct" are essentially opposites in that sense.

Re:DMCA safe harbor does not apply to Google

[Score Whore]

Google's primary line of business is selling ad space. You will have a brutal time convincing a court that increased revenue from increased ad views is an indirect benefit.

Additionally, Viacom can attack Google's search reputation by pointing out that their take down list came as the results of a search of the content on Youtube. The misidentified files, Viacom will blame on poor quality search results.

Re:DMCA safe harbor does not apply to Google

[Not The Real Me]

"...Google does not lose the safe harbor by making money off of YouTube; if they did, the DMCA safe harbor would be vitiated. The benefit has to be _directly_ attributable to the infringing activity; an indirect benefit like "more people come to the site, and thus see the ads, thus raising revenue" does not qualify..."

Based upon your logic, I can copy a bunch of DVDs I rent from Netflix or get from a television broadcast. Put them on my website. Insert a bunch of advertising. Since I am not selling the material that I copied, I am not in violation of the DMCA because I am making money off of advertising and not the pirated material itself. Using your same logic, radio stations should stop paying royalties to musicians because radio stations make money by selling advertising on their station. The same rule would apply to television, cable and satellite stations as well.

The bottom line is Youtube is acting as a broadcaster and distributor of material.

Re:DMCA safe harbor does not apply to Google

[russotto]

If you copy a bunch of DVDs from Netflix and put them on your website, you don't qualify for the safe harbor at all; you're a direct infringer.

Mod +1, Insightful or Informative!

[don_bear_wilkinson]

The Founding Fathers were, by and large, clear and purposeful in their language. Let's at least pretend to read what they wrote, eh? :)

the flip side

[Gary W. Longsine]

It's not entirely clear that YouTube has a viable business model without violation of reasonable copyright law, setting aside for the moment the DMCA. Of all the YouTube links sent to me by friends, probably 8 of 10 are links to copyrighted material. Frank Zappa on Crossfire, Talking Heads performing on some television show or another, clips from The Daily Show, these are the things that draw viewers to YouTube. If you take a few moments and gape in open-mouthed shock for a moment at some unfortunate soul who has probably ruined any chance they will ever have for a normal life by posting some remarkably embarrassing thing to YouTube, well, that tends to be incidental, and it doesn't really draw people back for more.

The owners of these massive archives need to get with Google and compromise on a revenue sharing model. People want to find and use this stuff. It's rotting in a vault otherwise. Bring it out into the light. Let people find and share it. Make a fraction of a penny everytime somebody clicks on an ad because of it.

People want it. It would make the world a more fun place. There isn't any other way to make money off the stuff. Just do it.

Re:the flip side

[unapersson]

"It's not entirely clear that YouTube has a viable business model without violation of reasonable copyright law, setting aside for the moment the DMCA. Of all the YouTube links sent to me by friends, probably 8 of 10 are links to copyrighted material."

That's not correct, close to 100% of the links sent to you are copyrighted material. The fact someone has made a video with a camcorder and uploaded it to YouTube makes it no less copyrighted material than if some big corporation creates it. I've also seen examples of big corps using YouTube to submit their videos. So only the copyright holder knows if a piece of work is infringing or not, by uploading something you are in effect claiming that you have rights to the material you are uploading.

Re:automated copyright detection/removal - impossi

[Stonehand]

No.

A machine, however, might be able to detect a pattern under which the metadata for an upload reflects a probable instance of infringement based on previous specifications.

If Viacom informed Google of a particular television series, and supplied --

- the name of the series
- the descriptions for each episode
- the cast list
- the uploaders caught uploading episodes so far, and what channels and tags have been used

You think Google couldn't build a pretty decent classifier that would have a pretty good chance of flagging subsequent uploads as possible further violations?

Corporate flame wars

[Vaibhav_Locke]

The flame war has begun. Soon there'll be WTFNOOB and DIAF letters sent to the Washington Post

Re:Corporate flame wars

[Bastard of Subhumani]

im in ur t00bz watch1ng ur v1dz

You are not correct about copyright origins...

[slew]

Copyright was _not_ originally created to protect contect from those who would _change_ it and resell it as original.

Copyright was originally created to protect book publisher from being undercut by _verbatim_ duplicates created by rival book publishers. There used to be a booming business for rogue publisher to create cheap copies that undercut the original publishers. That was the reason for copyright, not people co-opting the work of others as their own or changing it in some way or producing edited versions to be confused by purchasers.

Prior to the modern version of copyright, essentially publishers purchase the rights to copy from authors for a one-time-fee and then were granted a virtual monopoly to restrict other publishers from printing copies. This took a different form in different countries, but many times these restriction were mostly agreements between guild members rather than some elaborate law like is the case in England until later the rights were transfered to the author of the work in the modern version of copyright (for an example also in england, the Statute of Anne).

Whether you believe the author or the publisher deserve more money is of course open to debate (esp if you are an author or a publisher), but I think there are three schools of thought on the rationale of copyright. One school of thought is that copyright is inherently a "moral" right of the author which is independent of public costs (the so called "right-to-withhold" publication). Another school of thought is that copyrights are a support/welfare mechanism for artists (this is sort of the populist view). Finally, a smaller school of thought is that copyright is the backstop that slows things down enough to prevent the system from collapse when technological discontinuities threaten established business models until new business models can be worked out. Although many may dispute these ways of looking at things, I think it's fair to say most opinion falls into one of these camps.

I think no-one can really ever compute a cost-benefit analysis of copyright, no more than you can compute a cost-benefit of allowing say, non-property owners the right to vote. It depends so much on your definition of cost and benefit that two reasonable people can come up with a different answer. In face, I actually think it's completely unreasonable for all governmental policy to be required to show societal cost-benefit (as an extreme example show me the cost benefit analysis that says the government shouldn't allow for companies to profit from the extermination of people with genetic defects). This is why I generally prefer a the check-and-balance of representative government of people, not an authoritarian or libertarian government that is "scientific-study-based".

I don't dispute that copyright laws as is currently stands is basically generally unenforcable statute sort of like speeding is basically generally unenforcable unless we submit to egrgious restrictions, but that doesn't make it unreasonable to actually have a speed limit.

Re:You are not correct about copyright origins...

[Anonymous Coward]

First, thank you for correcting my misconception about the origins of copyright. The basis, however, was apparently also not as benign as we might think today. Suppression of seditious material was also a goal. The Stationers Company had other goals....

I disagree that nobody could ever analyze the costs & benefits of various copyrights, although I agree that it's not a simple process. How else can we rationally decide the appropriate term, especially for patents? The welfare argument is certainly open to economic analysis, and if anything I think it's the one called out in the Constitution. The "moral" reasons seem too much in the eye of the beholder, although again I think the Constitution calls out the right (populist) goal.

Sorry for posting as an AC. I changed jobs and didn't attend to details, so now I can't access my old account (in the 20k region). But no worries; I'm not looking for karma.

It seems intuitive that copyright promotes creativity, but if it was that simple there should be some straightforward way to measure it. Again, what term best promotes the broadest availability (use) of content? This is more of an issue in patents, but it applies here too.

On the previous post -- somebody has to give rowling her incentive, and she can auction the work off to the highest bidder. I don't think the Dead gave away their concerts, people still had to buy tickets. I expect they did okay off their published albums, but they certainly put a lot more effort into their roadshow than the studio. I'd be interested in the ROI.

-dca

Re:automated copyright detection/removal - impossi

[moochfish]

How do you distinguish parody, commentary, and other forms of fair use?

Also, what happens when people catch on and start getting around the TEXT BASED filters by using more cryptic titles:

"c0lber rep. interving ____"
"fami1ygu_1y"

Or what about non-descriptive titles that humans can easily distinguish but robots can't:

"peter goes to vegas"
"marge arguing with bart"

If you use text based filters to filter video content, you will fail as soon as the community catches on. And worse yet, you will inadvertently hit people that are uploading fair game:

"funny situation that happened in my office" -- FLAGGED BECAUSE IT USES THE TERM "OFFICE"
"my encounter with Steven Colbert in real life!" -- FLAGGED BECAUSE THIS IS LIKELY COLBERT REPORT
"parody of SNL" -- FLAGGED FOR "SNL"

It would become a monumental pile of "pending review" videos. And a pending status would be necessary since not using such a status would essentially keep things exactly where they are now: bad content goes live immediately for sharing and further distribution. But if legit videos are getting stuck in pending, people would have a strong (and very real) incentive to get around the filters, even if they aren't uploading copyrighted content.

The entire system would collapse in days.

Err...

[Anonymous Coward]

> it must be findable by users -- it must be identifiable via tag, title, description, author, channel, or advertisement elsewhere

I guess you don't know about those people who did crazy things like ROT13 the keywords so that people could find (but not screen) the files on other sharing services. Given that there are infinitely many possible ways to encode things, I don't think they can do much without causing too many false positives to be worth it.

After all, they could encode the titles as strings of common words with some arbitrary substitution rule. Yes, YouTube would be able to go after them one by one, but it would quickly degenerate into the ridiculous burden of having to screen each submission manually. Worse, even though Viacom *does* that, people are still finding infringing works on their site. After all, the ONLY difference between an infringing work and a non-infringing work is whether the copy is authorized. There are NO other material differences to go by. If you think otherwise, feel free to publish a program capable of such discrimination so that we can test it. I'd love to see it.

So Viacom and ONLY Viacom should have to screen the videos. Moreover, that's what the law says (even bad laws have their bright spots). Furthermore, Viacom is unable or unwilling to do exactly what it expects YouTube to do.

Thus, in absolutely no event can I see what they're doing as fair. It's nothing but sour grapes over a deal gone sour and they want people to use their own (crappy) service instead of YouTube.

In other words, don't expect me to feel even the tiniest bit of sympathy for the hypocritical, unjust and unreasonable position of a company when it complains that a competitor is doing something illegal, even though what they're doing is expressly allowed by law.

Google CEO, Google has bigger challenges

[Anonymous Coward]

The Google CEO and other executives need to focus on meeting very clear laws of the land related to use of commercial videos, and not instant translations yet. Reduction and adjustment of scope of business is what the shareholders of Google really want to create a stable company. It is inexcusable to see quotes and any time spent by a company on new stuff when they keep burning a handful of United States Government entities. Google Executives need to instead come full stop and prove to its board of directors that it is going to remove and address the widespread, chronic and gross use of essentially Pirated Movies to gain business advantages (REF: see www.peekvid.com and see now the hundreds of feature movies that remain stored on Google and YouTube servers in parts). Those videos were brought to the attentions of Google over 6 months ago by concerned business competitors who didn't see that as fair. They should make friends and build relationships with content owners and seek permission before keeping the feeds out there. Why is Eric, Larry and Sergey so lazy in that regard to normal thinking and business processes.... traditional thinking and laws and normal ways of behavior and laws......, yet messing with new fields into instant translations,..... when someone should be arrested, indicted & possibility going to prison. Does the FBI warnings on those videos just a bunch of chumps only trying to scare you? If the executives like Eric or Larry are confused or concerned, maybe someone should read them.

If the world is a world is laws, then the law demands infringement and evidence of those videos as of 3/28/2007 eventually be looked into.

I think this is a problem that revolves around the illusion one can become an icon, famous or popular on the Internet with millions of fans, and just about get away with murder and stomp over laws, legal protections and principles that make the world under those principles a much safer, happier, wealthier place...... I think these business approaches Google uses are very bad influence to anyone considering copy cat approaches. Not to mention it is wrong, illegal and criminal inspiring. Young business people growing up and the citizens which use Google stuff out there will remember, will see, and will be negatively influenced. Even if no further actions are taken, the negative influence is the cancer out there. That cancer can grow or be removed based on the actions CEO's like Eric and decision makers like Larry take. I think if the Government was telling me to stop today, or change my behavior on something related to business activities I would listen instead of 'pushing back'.

Hopefully the Viacom suit will make them understand. I am sure it will not be long before someone in the government notices those videos out there and sets the example of what happens when you do that. I am sure Viacom would much rather be able to choose when, how and if they will distribute movies like those they own on peekvid.com stored on Google Inc. property.

Re:Google CEO, Google has bigger challenges

[LittleRedStar]

> I think this is a problem that revolves around the illusion one can become an icon,
> famous or popular on the Internet with millions of fans, and just about get away with
> murder and stomp over laws, legal protections and principles that make the world under
> those principles a much safer, happier, wealthier place......

Why not? Microsoft has.

Re:Google CEO, Google has bigger challenges

[Anonymous Coward]

How dare you link to peekvid! Don't you realize that you're helping the pirates? Maybe a stay in jail will teach you to obey the rule of law.

Re:Google CEO, Google has bigger challenges

[alexgieg]

Copyright is dying, and whatever hastens its demise is welcome. I applaud Google for doing whatever is in their hands, up to and into any and all legal gray areas, for this to happens as fast as possible.

Now, of course there will be strong reactions making the efforts to destroy copyright to sometimes stops, sometimes even go back one or two steps. And some people who are on the cutting edge of these changes (call them "pirates" if you wish, for me this is an honorable word) will be arrested and put into jail. But in the end it's all in vain.

And no, this isn't bad. Copyright is a novelty, create some few centuries ago. Before that we had 5,000 to 10,000 years without copyright, and people managed fine. The post-copyright world will still work, and won't be all that different.

Enjoy the ride. ;)

One day of Fuck Viacom

[9mm Censor]

Google should remove, any Viacom and its subsidiary companies or their products and assets, from Google Search. And publish the traffic to Viacom's sites that day, and the average day.

Re:automated copyright detection/removal - impossi

[Dunbal]

It's impossible to detect copyrighted content on any large scale.

      ALL the content is copyrighted. If you film the contents of your left nostril, it's copyrighted by you (not that I imagine many people would care about it, but there's always a few...).

      You mean infringing content - ie content uploaded without the author's permission.

Re:Why not? Because it's overkill

[Dunbal]

When you give ridiculous punishments for minor offenses, you just breed contempt for the law

      Not to mention putting extra strain on an already overburdened prison and judicial system... When is lobbying going to be made a crime?

Hey Viacom,

[Anonymous Coward]

Hey Viacom, would you mind publishing a list of that content you don't want me to watch just in case someone else accidentally manages to give it some free promotion? I'll be happy to go out of my way to avoid it. By the way, what business are you in?

Re:automated copyright detection/removal - impossi

[Anonymous Coward]

Why can't copyright holders submit their work to Google, and have Google compare uploads. Obviously it couldn't work bit for bit, but I'm sure you can notice patterns statistically to some extent. Processing power might be prohibitive.

adolescent

[MePhuq]

lawyers, they have a chance to do good and never do, copyright is the most interesting field in law, uploaders, recontextualizers, are doing promotion for that which they upload, in fact, they should get paid. Viacom knows Youtube can't control what is uploaded, and its not up to youtube to know what is and isn't copywritten. what a dumb approach when something innovative can happen you can rest assuredly it won't, suffice to say, it's entities like viacom that won't to consciously or unconsciouly keep humanity at its current adolescent level.

Demand

[Anonymous Coward]

But the big media corporations would also need creative works to live. They could take works of smaller publishers in the beginning, but when those are dead, the big corps would have to invest money in creation of new work for them to maintain or increase their income.

As long as there is demand for content there will be people paying for it.

Or am I wrong?

Re:Demand

[Anonymous Coward]

And even if not.

Creative work happens even if no one pays for it. It could happen in smaller amounts, but money isn't the only thing that drives artists. Artists would still get paid for some of their work, for instance performances.

I'd like to try the other extreme for awhile...

[Anonymous Coward]

Or maybe... just maybe people have gotten so fed up with the abuse of copyright the pendulum begins to swing all the way to this opposite extreme? If so it's the direct fault of the media corporations and their refusal to accept *reasonable* copyright limits. And copyrights *must* have a limit or else media never makes its way to the commons and the well of culture and ideas goes dry. And the creative works are only able to imitate what has already been done--exactly as it has been done before. Tell me, how many remakes have you seen lately? How many sequels? Sequels to stories already told and not needed to be continued after the "Happily Ever After" bit?

That's the result of the extreme we're currently living. Can you blame us if we'd like to try it the other way for awhile?

artists need no copyright

[vakibs]

It is the recording companies that need copyright. Throughout history, making money has never been difficult for artists. They were always patronized by friends and fans. How did Homer survive ? How did Leanardo da Vinci survive ? How did Wagner survive ? How did all these people make money ? Did anybody buy their music or literature ? No Even today, every great artist has been carefully patronized by his immediate circle of friends before he/she finds his fame. Hollywood/recording industry has nevery done a decent job of discovering and patronizing artists. They are indeed responsible for the suicides and desperation of many talented people.

Patronizing artists is a basic trait of human nature. We have been doing it ever since we existed. Sometimes, it is individuals who do it. And sometimes, it is associations (feudal lords, church, kings) who do it. In the age of the internet, the power to patronize artists is within the reach of every single person - not only the rich and the famous.

The recording/publishing industry has outsurvived its time. It needs to die. The battle between Google and Viacom is only a part of the bigger war.

Can patronizing of an art earn enough money to undertake large projects ? Can anybody make "the lord of the rings" out of donations ? If you are not convinced, please visit my blog The answer is YES . The very symbol of freedom is a sign of the promise in the democracy of art. I am talking about the statue of liberty . If it could have been built out of donations of people, nothing else is impossible.

YouTube doesn't need Viacom anyway?

[tajmahall]

Viacom's content apparently isn't what continues to drive YouTube. YouTube's traffic doesn't seem to have been affected much by Viacom pulling its content, though it may take a while to tell. Offhand I'd say whatever profit YouTube may have gotten from of copyrighted content is done with. The site is now the established video vault, and it seems to be getting along fine (so far) without Jon Stewart.

Re:YouTube doesn't need Viacom anyway?

[mdm-adph]

...especially since you can still find tons of videos of The Daily Show on there.

Thought Provoking

[Anonymous Coward]

I find your ideas interesting, and wish to subscribe to your newsletter.

I think your analysis is way off

[Dan Slotman]

The entire point of Viacom's case is that they don't want to grind out cease and desist orders. They want YouTube to self-regulate uploaded content, and they want to be able to sue YouTube for copyright infringement for uploaded material without going through the cease-and-desist cycle. I doubt that Viacom gives a rat's ass about material that isn't theirs—I have trouble believing that baseless cease-and-desist orders are malicious rather than accidental. So that's Viacom. If they win, they maintain the status quo and offload the expense of protecting their intellectual property. If they lose, nothing change. They keep patrolling YouTube and similar services and keep cranking out takedown letters. There will be no shareholder backlash, because shareholders realize that Viacom's value is in their intellectual property. This IP will not be damaged by losing a court battle with Google.

Google has more invested that Viacom. Since multiple facets of their business rely in distributing copyrighted material (search, scholastic papers search, book search, YouTube, etc) while selling advertising, one of their long-term goal as a company must be to maintain current copyright law at worst and relax it at best. I think this point is critical. Google's revenue entirely relies on material that they are not creating. (Whereas Viacom employs content creators via child companies and subsidiaries, and uses this content for revenue.)

In conclusion, if Viacom loses this fight, they merely maintain the status quo. They will have to adjust their business strategy in the long term to deal with digital distribution, but they have breathing space. If Google loses this fight, their entire business strategy is endangered. While their search and its advertising revenue will not immediately dry up, they can anticipate that copyright law will increasingly be used against them.

She would be paid in advance for writing the book.

[jotaeleemeese]

Since the risk would be too high for a single publisher maybe several publishers would band together, each publishing different versions of the book (illustrated, paperback, "adult" edition, etc).

Good writers would get paid, your dilemma is not such.

So?

[jotaeleemeese]

If governments of corporations would be the only ones able to comission works, I would not care, art is art, who is the patron is the least important thing (as history has shown).

We, the small people, could form arts syndicates to comission artistic work (books, music, sculptures, even films), unlike the times when the church or nobility ruled, in democratic societies citizens can organize themselves in any way thes see fit to provide for their needs.

Copyright is an artificial construct, many people thing is an inalienable right, but in reality is a device that some people thought could be good, and that now people that have benefitted from it are trying to preserve and extend by all means possible, but it is by no means the natural order of things and we could get away with it if it ceases to serve its purposes (which IMHO it has).

Re:If Viacom can't do it, they shouldn't expect ..

[RalphTheWonderLlama]

Well for me at least it's pretty easy to tell if a video on YouTube is from a TV show. I don't know if it is Viacom's TV show but that shouldn't matter to YouTube if they are all copyright infringing anyway.

Splitting hairs.

[jotaeleemeese]

You know he was talking about older times.

His point stands, no matter your trickery pockery.

Copyright

[DeadCatX2]

Actually, the way copyright law works, the copyright owner is responsible for enforcing their copyright.

Since when .....

[jotaeleemeese]

.... it is a plausible excuse to not comply with a law saying it is difficult to do so?

Your are sidelining with Viacom because don't understand what the law says.

When one is objective (which I suppose you are) but misinformed one qill reach the wrong conclussions.

Lets be honest about Youtube

[mcguyver]

Do you really think youtube would be as popular if it were capable of filtering out all copyrighted material? I like Google but Youtube is just a way to make a dime off the backs of the people who create copyrighted material.

Re:Lets be honest about Youtube

[freedom_india]

isnt't it ironic? On one hand all the copyright owners want everyone to buy their content, but on the other hand, they would not allow even promotion of their copyrighted material by readers posting snippets of their copyrighted material for all to read.
Why can't these short sighted guys think beyond the next quarter? Why do they always assume if i watch a snippet of their precious copyrighted material, iam pirating? Have they ever read a book in a bookshop before buying? Have they ever sampled a cookie before buying?

They woudl follow up....

[jotaeleemeese]

.... and if you are behaving like an ass they could ban you and even initiate legal proceedings against you.

Do you want Google's legal team after you? Nope.

And in less than 10 minutes...

[Belial6]

And in less than 10 minutes with google, I could find that "The Battle of Dorking" (1871) by George Tomkyns Chesney is in fact a derivative work. Wikipedia has a section on it on the Invasion Literature page. So, you give one example of a derivative, that you try to pass off as being completely original, and then after explaining that Space Invaders is a derivative work, you claim that it is original. Not even taking into account your very good example of where it derived from, it is also just a simple carnival shooting gallary that has replaced the ducks with space ships. That is far from original and non-derivative. Or, are you in the camp that believes adding "on a computer" makes every day things something new, original, and innovative?

The Hobbit?!?!?! You must be kidding? Quest for a treasure story? You think that was invented in 1920? From Wikipedia:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hobbit Tolkien introduced or mentioned characters and places that figured prominently in his legendarium, specifically Elrond and Gondolin, along with elements from Germanic legend. But the decision that the events of The Hobbit could belong to the same universe as The Silmarillion was made only after publication, when the publisher asked for a sequel and Tolkien began work on what would become The Lord of the Rings. The novel draws on Tolkien's knowledge of historical languages and early European texts -- many names and words derived from Norse mythology, it makes use of Anglo-Saxon runes, and is filled with information on calendars and moon phases, detailed geographical descriptions that fit well with the accompanying maps -- attention to detail that would also be seen in Tolkien's later work.

The dude was ripping stuff off left and right. So, here we sit with still no example of a single non-derivative work.

Filtering content

[jjersin]

This problem is one of filtering content, and can be explained by using a network firewall as an example. There are two types of filtering various firewalls can do, blacklist filtering and whitelist filtering.

Whitelist filtering is allowing only content that you know is ok. Blacklist is disallowing only what you know is bad.

The issue at had boils down to the fact that until now, only video distributors which use whitelist filtering have been around. TV broadcast companies (and I guess I am assuming here) don't air content unless they know the owner. Google on the other hand will distribute anything in the world unless someone tells them for sure that they shouldn't.

Napster used blacklist filtering too, if they hadn't they wouldn't have been busted for anything (not to mention unpopular).

As for my opinion...I work for a firewall company, and whitelist filtering is our competitive edge. That's what our customers trust more, so is it so wrong for Viacom to want content distributors to use the same cautious paradigm?

You're confused

[ClosedSource]

"Mandating a term of use like that would be struck down in court faster than Viacom can post takedown notices. It hinders freespeech & destroys the right of anonymous speech."

This would be a decision made by YouTube which is not required under the constitution or any law to promote anonymous speech or any kind of speech. It's like claiming that the company you work for can't fire you for telling your Boss to F**k off because it hinders free speech. Good luck with making that case.

Re:You're confused

[tinkerghost]

The comment I was responding to implies that the only way to qualify for the safe harbor provision is to put in place a system of registration. If the only way to 'comply' with the provisions of a law is to require registration of your users, then yes, whether it's writen into the law or not, it's part of it. If the court determines that the only way to comply with the law is to abrige free speech, then the law has to be tossed. As for your analogy, it's nothing like that at all. Given the nature of the internet, and the goals of YouTube, it's much more like making everyone show photo ID to get into the park; so that if you play a song on your guitar, the RIAA can make sure you chip in your performance fee.
Beyond that, the other point of: even if YouTube requires registration to post, Viacom still has to issue take down notices. There is no gain except to bypass a couple of supeonas.

Yo!

[WeeBit]

SIC EM GOOGLE!