Slashdot Mirror
More DMCA Censorship at Yahoo!
Thomas Hawk writes "Once again a Yahoo! user has found themselves on the short end of the DMCA stick. Video blogger Loren Feldman recently found that his video mocking (read parody) the Village People and blogger Shel Israel was removed from the Yahoo! service after Scorpio Music served Yahoo! with a DMCA takedown notice. The video in question contained a very brief fair use parody snippet of the Village People song YMCA as performed by a puppet. What's more, Yahoo! threatened Feldman with the termination of all of his Yahoo! services including the revocation of his Yahoo ID."
Oddly enough, my friend had a video removed from Youtube last month of four Robosapien RS Medias dancing to a Village People song.
eclecti.cc
people still use Yahoo?
'Number-memorizing Chinese people.'-Anon
With that kind of attitude on Yahoo's part, no wonder Microsoft is so eager to mate with them.
And here I was thinking that the village people (with the songs they sung), would take a joke, specially considering a puppet is involved.
:(
I hope they are not going to sue the puppet, though that would be interesting.
The world really is becoming a sad and sorry place
Opalised turds don't count then ?
Finally, Yahoo reveals that the way to delete a Yahoo ID is to commit serial copyright violations!
The real "Libtards" are the Libertarians!
Put put out a video telling every one how yahoo sucks, then close your yahoo account.
"Thanks for all the money you paid to us. We've used it to buy off ISO among other things" -Microsoft
Preparing for Microsoft takeover?
Write your own Choose Your Own Adventure. http://www.freegameengines.org/gamebook-engine/
no
It's an old 50s song or something. But appropriate. I do not even know who the "artists" are.
They -- yahoo -- wonder why their business has not done so well. Well, here is one hint: don't harass, intrude upon, or intimidate people for stupid reasons. Other corporations have slowly been learning that lesson, harshly and expensively.
Gee, I hope
This is still the land of the free and the home of the brave isn't it? Love it or leave it! Stop hating Amerika.
Since Yahoo! is in the delicate stage of being bought out by Microsoft, they're trying to avoid any lawsuits that could cause the buying price to be pulled lower. This is probably the reason that they are acting like consummate assholes. Normally the yahoos couldn't care less about pissant grandstanding through dubious legal stunts, but...this is a delicate moment in the take-over process.
Maybe Microsoft is behind this in order to use a barrage of picayune lawsuits as a justification for lowering their bid offer. Goodness knows, Microsoft's staff of eager-beaver Ivy League lawyers do live for this kind of thing.
Young man, there's no need to feel down.
...
...
...
...
I said, young man, pick yourself off the ground.
I said, young man, 'cause you're in a new town
There's no need to be unhappy.
Young man, there's a lawyer I know.
I said, young man, who can get you some dough.
You can sit back, and I'm sure you will find
Many ways to ruin others good time.
It's fun to sue with the D-M-C-A.
It's fun to sue with the D-M-C-A.
You can get yourself mean, you can have a good deal,
You can get folks to settle for whatever you feel...
Young man, are you listening to me?
I said, young man, what do you want to be?
I said, young man, you can make real your dreams.
But you've got to know this one thing!
No man does it all by himself.
I said, young man, put your pride on the shelf,
And just look there, to the D.M.C.A.
I'm sure our legal team can help you today.
It's fun to sue with the D-M-C-A.
It's fun to sue with the D-M-C-A.
They have everything that you need to enjoy,
You can hang out with all the lawyer boys
It's fun to sue with the D-M-C-A.
It's fun to sue with the D-M-C-A.
You can get yourself mean, you can have a good deal,
You can folks to settle for whatever you feel
Young man, I was once in your shoes.
I said, I was down and out with the blues.
I felt no man cared if my band were alive.
I felt the whole world was so jive
That's when a lawyer came up to me,
And said, young man, sign this release.
There is a law called the D.M.C.A.
They can start you back on your way.
It's fun to sue with the D-M-C-A.
It's fun to sue with the D-M-C-A.
They have everything that you need to enjoy,
You can hang out with all RIAA boys
It's fun to sue with the D-M-C-A
Young man, young man there's no need to feel down
Young man, young man pick yourself off the ground
It's fun to sue with the D-M-C-A
Young man, young man are you listening to me?
Young man, young man what do you wanna be?
you'll find it at the Y-M-C-A
no man, young man does it all by himself
young man, young man put your pride on the shelf
then just go to the Y-M-C-A
young man, young man I was once in your shoes
young man, young man I said, I was down and out with the blues.
My comment has too few characters per line and I'm really hoping that this brings up the average - though I don't know that it will be enough. Apparently not on the first try- though I did bring up the average an entire character. Let's see if this was sufficient. Wow - it did go up another word but still too few. This could take a while. And of course the entire joke is ruined now. But I've got a stubborn streak in me that just kicked into full gear. Holy cow- 26.2 characters per line is not enough. I'm gonna have a novella down here to go with my funny (or not funny - we'll see) lyrics. Or maybe I'll just go down in flames as off topic for this section. Oh the suspense. 28.4 is not enough. For crying out loud. I like Slashdot, I really do, but this is annoying. If there are going to be ads in the comments then I ought to be able to at least post song lyrics - or should I say parodies of song lyrics. And while I hate to play this card, if that's not possible for the hoi polloi, well it'd be a nice bonus for the um you know - paying customers. I mean I don't think that is asking too much. Time to check again. Oh really - 32.6 is too few? There has to be something more to it than that. I've posted lots of comments that were shorter than that. The one I'm looking at right now above mine isn't that long. There must be something else in the formula there. But I'm not giving up. I'm going to keep at it until this thing gets past. On the bright side, no fear of seeing "Slow Down Cowboy!" now is there? I'm an eternal optimist. And I really feel like I'll be making the world a better place once this goes live
It's hard to believe that's how Micronians are made. Why don't we see it right now by having you both kiss one another?
Microsoft welcomes you to Microhoo! del.icio.us, flickr, and mail!
Please download this proprietary nsakey.exe file to verify if you are general loser to our advantage. Silverlight required to proceed with the download.
Who really cares.
While it might be seen as lame for Yahoo to just capitulate like this, there's no doubt good reasons for them to do it - I assume being on the wrong end of a DMCA suit in the US can be expensive both in terms of lawyer fees and potential fines (?? assuming they can get sued for damages).
If the video creator is sure its not infringing they can just put it up themselves on another service and then they can go head-to-head with Scorpio Music.
Whether its in Yahoo's interests to keep it up is probably a painful number crunching risk analysis excercise ("how much potential revenue are we going to lose by refusing to host this and the possible subsequent bad press, versus how much will we lose if these douchebags try to make a big deal out of this and we end up in court because of it?") - I'm sure its easier for them just to ditch it.
You really think Yahoo (or any other large webhost/portal) is going to spend the money to have people sitting around all day checking the validity of every single DMCA takedown notice they receive?
Yahoo did what they were supposed to do under the law.
Now it's your turn to file a counter-notice
[Fuck Beta]
o0t!
File a counter notice. You've got rights. Exercise them.
Why didnt he file a DMCA counter notice? Fair use is still protected.
Viral software licensing is not freedom, it is in fact GNU/Socialism.
They should publish every such request at their front page for everyone to see and for the shame of those requesting the takedown. One box with latest news, one box with latest takedowns.
Swedish plasma phys. PhD student; MSc EE; knows maths, programming, electronics; finance interest; seeks opportunities
Hi I'm Thomas Hawk and I'm submitting a story to /. that mentions "DMCA" so I know Zonk will post it and drive up my hits. Thanks for visiting everybody!
Again a DMCA notice... this is not the first time it happens to a user. Also non-USA citizens are subject to this crazy law, when they post material on a US based server. Or not even necessarily that it seems, do legal reverse-engineering or encryption related work in your own country, visit the USA, get arrested, it's possible, no? But leave that discussion for later.
What actually surprises me is that there are no similar portals in e.g. the EU. All major portals and sharing sites are US based - Yahoo!, MSN, Flickr, Youtube, Facebook, MySpace, you name it, they are all in the USA, I can't think of anyone based fully in Europe. And as such they are subject to the US's draconian copyright laws.
This again makes me wonder why none is being set up outside of the US jurisdiction. How about a facebook.de, or a youtube.nl, fully hosted in that country, and incorporated there as well. What is holding the Internet back? It is not that Europe doesn't have the IT infrastructure, on the contrary. It may be better than what's available in the USA. Same accounts for the people. I may assume there as much business sense on both sides of the pond.
Yet all these video-sharing and other creative enterprises on the Internet seem to sprout and flourish mostly in the USA. The world is really a wonderful place.
WOW! Yahoo is acting as if Microsoft already owns them! ;)
Remember there are still fair use laws even though the video sites like youtube aren't ripe for the picking yet.
a very brief fair use parody snippet of the Village People song YMCA as performed by a puppet.
Isn't "fair use" for a court to decide?
Yahoo! threatened Feldman with the termination of all of his Yahoo! services including the revocation of his Yahoo ID
Isn't it great having everything integrated into one easy-to-use service? Pictures, searching, games, dating services, emai--oh fuck--they just canceled everything in my entire life.
Same goes for Google everything. If one company controls all the services you use, all it takes is one idiot at that company to make your life hell.
There's no place like
Would that I had mod points to award you, good sir.
What is the legal stance on parody?
I know that penny-arcade had a run in with this when they did their strawberry shortcake meets alice comic.
The only thing I could find was this: http://www.publaw.com/parody.html
Thoughts?
Lawyers?
I wouldn't consider the mad hatter mad. Just reality impaired. He sure can make a mean cup of tea.
Hang on, isn't this (the first part at least) how the DMCA supposed to work? I thought hosts/ISPs had to honour the takedown request and then investigate if a counter claim or dispute was filed so that the host can claim safe harbour.
Thank goodness the UK doesn't have anything quite as bad as the DMCA (yet...)
The bit about terminating services is a bit more extreme, but seems to be some standard practice taken too far - "You've breached part of the ToS by posting breaking a law, so we'll terminate your account" but without the part where they check whether it was a copyright infringement or just another quick DMCA claim.
What's more, Yahoo! threatened Feldman with the termination of all of his Yahoo! services including the revocation of his Yahoo ID.
Only threatened? Yahoo! revoked my account a few years ago for no reason at all. They refused to provide any justification as to why and there was no way to appeal or recover any information. That was the last time I used Yahoo!
He is lucky they only threatened.
That's a slightly larger problem than it may seem at first. A Yahoo ID as at the same time an OpenID. People using that account as an OpenID are subject to the whims of Yahoo. I'm not yet sure of the implications this bears, but it will become a problem when people become more reliant on OpenID.
parasight.de
Ya know, it would hilarious if someone turned this around and made a parody of the DMCA by changing the lyrics and setting it to the tune of "YMCA".
As much of a copyright violation that it may seem to be, it would still be *VERY* Fair Use, since it would be a parody.
Knowing Google's lust for data collection, the Soviet Union is still alive and well inside the psyche of Sergey Brin....
DMCA takedown is basically a question from ISP to the content publisher on weather the material is distributed legally. The publisher can just tell Yahoo that the material is legal. In this case, the videos will be restored and subscriber's identity will be made known to the author of DMCA notice to settle the matter in court if necessary. The process is mutual and in fact the issuer of DMCA notice is liable for any damages resulting from the downtime.
Unlike DMCA counter-circumvention provision this is actually a good thing. ISP is off the hook and instead the customer and the purported copyright owner get to give up their claims or duke it out in court if they choose. Genuinely infringing material can be immediately removed from public access, ensuring that say, Photoshop source code does not make it into too many hands before the court battle is settled.
What I don't get is this: I thought the principle behind the DMCA was that Yahoo, on being served a notice, would take down the possibly illicit material, and that the poster could get it back on by identifying himself and taking legal responsibility.
It seemed to me (not an American, not a lawyer) like a good system: the host is responsible in the first instance and takes material down without judging about the illegality (which the host can't), unless the poster takes responsibility and claims it is not illegal (fair use, own work, whatever), and it can be settled in court.
Apparently, it doesn't work that way...? Or does the poster not have the guts to stand up for his right? Or does yahoo go further than required by the DMCA?
Tell me again, how did you guys end up with this DMCA and when do you think you will be rid of it?
I'ma delete your Yahoo ID, ya warcriminal pansy, you.
This is what the modern world has degenerated to.
Thats not true! After anal I end up dropping two or three kids off at the pool.
It is a lousy system. It is guilty untill proven inocent and the burden is on part of the defence. Let them go to court. Let them pay the wages and then let the court decide wether it must be taken down or not.
If then de acused thinks he is in his right, he can say so and the legal battle can begin.
What will hapen is that most won't even bother to fiel a suit and/or courts decide they can't be botherd with such trivial things.
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
parody is fair use that is protected by the 1st amendment. Yahoo is hiding behind the dmca. They have a history of cencorship with china
They're using their grammar skills there.
I had less trouble closing my bank account than my MySpace account.
censorship is about civic speech, not about the decisions of private entities
No, you're thinking of the right to free speech (the first amendment in the U.S.).
The OP makes about as much sense as screaming "censorship!" when a publisher rejects you
It depends on whether they rejected you because what you submitted wouldn't sell or because they were afraid of a boycott (or personally disapproved). David Lee Roth losing his radio show due to poor ratings was not censorship. Don Imus losing his when he had good ratings was.
or when the President decides a movie rated PG-13 would be better than one rated R for his own family's viewing time.
That *is* censorship. Parents censor what their kids see all the time; that isn't necessarily bad, but it's still censorship.
At the same time, I don't like the fact that any idiot can claim ownership of a work and get something that they don't like taken down.
There probably isn't a good solution, at this point, so we have to choose the lesser of the two evils, and I think that the current system is just that.
DMCA counter-notification is basically saying to a lawyer "Go ahead and sue me, asshole". And to make it worse, as soon as they do sue, they get to have the material taken down again, until the court case is finished (years later). There's no upside to it.
That *is* censorship. Parents censor what their kids see all the time; that isn't necessarily bad, but it's still censorship. No, it really isn't. You're being a dumbass (you too, mods)
What confuses me is that the song "YMCA" wasn't sampled, it was covered, and then only briefly. The publishers of a song *cannot* stop someone from performing a cover; they (or more likely their proxy) can merely demand statutory royalties. Certainly Yahoo has a blanket ASCAP/BMI/SESAC license to account for all of the music that gets streamed from its servers.
This seems like a blatant misapplication of the DMCA and truly poor due diligence on the part of Yahoo!
No upside, except that fat harassment suit you can hit them with when it's all said and done. Oh, an the warm fuzzy feeling you get when you finally slay the giant that's trying to swat you.
No Yahoo has always acted like assholes. Back in 2000 they stopped auctions of Nazi stuff that was for sale IN THE UNITED STATES, on US servers, by US company because a bunch of cheese-eating surrender-monkey from France didn't like it. Ever since that I've had nothing to do with Yahoo or their shitty service.
LICRA v. Yahoo
No, it's Yahoo! saying, "I don't have a dog in this fight". If the person assumes all legal responisibilty, I believe Yahoo! puts it back up. But why should Yahoo! continue to (possibly) aid in infringment? Where's their win?
Your ad here. Ask me how!
I agree that it is a neat idea on paper, but it has not worked out in practice. It is too easily abused, and there is nothing large corporations like better than abuse. If this part of the DMCA act were to have a chance of being a good law, it would require that content producers send their takedown notice to whoever posted something first, and have a legally mandated period to await response (perhaps 72 hours), and only then be allowed to send their letter upstream. As it is, producers send batches of takedown notices to the same place, because it is easier for them, and faster.
Because of the nature of the internet, violating these procedures would have to have punitive damages. Because most content on the internet is published freely and without expectation of monetary payment, it is difficult to argue a case of monetary damages, but the damages are certainly real.
Write your own Choose Your Own Adventure. http://www.freegameengines.org/gamebook-engine/
So wait... the DMCA made a parody of YMCA poster so he couldn't use his Y!IM? OMFG, IANAL, but IMHO, this is BS.
Except that there is a much better solution: Rather than requiring Yahoo et al to take down the material immediately, require them to notify the uploader of the takedown notice and give them, say, a week to respond. If they don't, Yahoo takes down the material. If they do, they identify themselves and take responsibility and the material never goes down until the court says it does. Thus, no preemptive censorship, but still no excessive burden on the courts. It just takes a week before something can be removed, which is still far quicker than a court action and is a small price to pay to avoid censorship.
You can't successfully sue based on a DMCA notice, unless the entity sending the notice perjured itself about one specific thing -- whether or not they actually represented the copyright owner that they claimed to represent. And you don't slay the giant. If you win the case, several years down the line, you just get the right to put your stuff back up. If you lose, you have to pay the giant damages. Either way, you're paying a lot in lawyers fees. So is the giant, but what's a lot to you is pennies for the giant.
I actually had a run in with Yahoo a few years ago regarding my Yahoo ID. When they first launched Yahoo Groups way back in 1998 or so (I think it was called Yahoo Clubs at the time), I was explaining the concept to a co-worker over lunch. I said jokingly, "You can create a club for anything you want and invite people to it. So if you are into smoking crack and want to discuss it with other people, you start the Smoking Crack Club and invite your friends." After lunch I went and created the Smoking Crack club on Yahoo Clubs and invited my co-worker as a joke. We had a good laugh over it.
Fast-forward a couple of years. I received an email on my Yahoo account, which I never used, from some random Yahoo user thanking me for starting the Smoking Crack club and that he had met quite a few people in his area to smoke crack with. I thought it had to be some sort of joke, but I checked it out and to my surprise there were over 300 members in the club all sharing stories about smoking crack and looking for people in their area who they could get together to smoke crack with! I was somewhat surprised and shocked that I was accidently responsible for creating this club, but I didn't shut down the club just because real drug users happened to be using it. I figured the crack smoking that they were doing was illegal, but talking about smoking crack isn't illegal, so who cares?
Fast forward another couple of years and I can't login to Yahoo one day. Instead of logging in, I get a message about how my account has been suspended. So I call up Yahoo and get a hold of a person and all they can tell me is that my account has been suspended for a Terms of Service violation in Yahoo Groups. They refuse to tell me any specifics and tell me that there is nothing I can do and my account is permanently suspended.
The real issue I had with this is that I had a Yahoo Credit Card and I needed to log into the Yahoo Points web site with my Yahoo ID to get my Credit Card rewards. You got one Yahoo Point for every dollar charged to your credit card and you could exchange points for electronics and gift certificates. At the time I had at least $200 in points (based on the gift certificate exchange rate) that I could have cashed out but hadn't gotten around to yet. I tried to explain this to the Yahoo customer service person I was talking to, but they didn't even know what Yahoo Points were. I also called my Credit Card company and tried to explain it to them and they said I couldn't change my Yahoo user ID associated with the credit card points and my Yahoo account suspension was between me and Yahoo. So I just canceled the credit card and got a different one that is not associated with a site that can shut down your account with no explanations on false pretenses.
The kicker is that I looked over the Yahoo TOS very carefully and could not find anything that could give them a justification for shutting down my account. The only thing I found that came close was a clause that said something about how you couldn't use your account to "discuss illegal activities". But the kicker is that I never used the Yahoo Group that I had created and never discussed anything on it, illegal or otherwise. I just created the group as a joke many years prior. Somehow just creating a group that people used to discuss illegal activities was justification for suspension in their eyes. So anyway, Yahoo doesn't have a history for being very judicious in shutting down their users.