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Warner Music Forces Lessig Presentation Offline
An anonymous reader writes "Larry Lessig, known (hopefully) to everyone around here as a defender of all things having to do with consumer rights and fair use rights when it comes to copyright, is now on the receiving end of a DMCA takedown notice from Warner Music, who apparently claimed that one of Lessig's famous presentations violated on their copyright. Lessig has said that he's absolutely planning on fighting this, and has asked someone to send Warner Music a copy of US copyright law that deals with 'fair use.'"
Reader daemonburrito notes that the (rehosted) "video remains available at the time of this submission."
Lessig is probably the most knowledgeable person on the planet when it comes to US law on fair use.
Ooooh they're gonna get creamed. And I will be laughing like a drain!!
"And the meaning of words; when they cease to function; when will it start worrying you?"
Larry: Non-free Audio Fair Use for music constitutes 10% or 30 seconds of a song (which ever is shorter) and it must be in a low enough quality (didn't investigate the audio on this video to find out if it satisfied Ogg quality of 0 rule).
[Citation needed].
It's certainly case law if that's even true, and I'm skeptical that it's a universal rule even if true. The statues place no such requirements, and, in fact, there are many times when using an ENTIRE work would be considered fair use.
Wrong.
What is fair use and what is not fair use is determined based on the facts of each individual case. Something that is fair use in one instanceâ"say a parodyâ"might well not be fair use in another like a movie review.
There are guidelines, much like the one quoted. However they are only guidelines and are in no way binding on courts unless they have been cited in a superior court case.
This is fundamental misthinking about copyright. Copyright (in the United States) doesn't exist to protect authors, it exists to "promote the progress of science and the useful arts." (U.S. Const., Art. I, Sec. 8) To the extent it fails to do that -- or, a fortiori, impedes such progress -- it is because the rules of copyright are poorly crafted from the perspective of the Constitutional basis of Congress's power to grant copyrights in the first place, and need to be reformed to serve that purpose.
I don't blame Lessig for ignoring her though, when reading the minutes of the case, I think its pretty cleat Sandra was attempting to derail his argument with a tangent.
Further more, if what you said was true, this just shows that judges had already made up their mind on the case and never cared about Lessig's argument to begin with.
Copyright might work if the section after the part you quoted was applied ("by securing for limited times").
GLaDOS for President 2016! "Well here we are again. It's always such a pleasure." -- GLaDOS, 2011
I got hit with that once, doing a documentary on Austin's air-guitar competitions. I thought that 10-15 second clips, recorded through an analog hole - a microphone placed not near the speakers, but near the air guitar stage (I was more interested in capturing the grunting and movement of the performers than a picture-perfect rendition of old 80s tunes) ... point is, I thought that'd be fine.
Time Warner, as a whole, just doesn't get technology. CNN thinks "holograms" are a great way to tell the news, they want to put caps on broadband, and they are so worried about protecting "their copyrights" that they don't understand how or why people buy music, and what they use it for.
Every business that they run that has any technological background at all is running itself into the ground because they want to sell you something first, then TELL you how THEY want you to use it, and are willing to go to absurd lengths to make sure that you only use it in the manner that they wanted you to - not the reason you bought it in the first place.
This is why they'll sue auto repair companies playing CDs for employees to listen to at work, why they'll knock on people doing anime fun conversions, why they'll knock on air guitar guys.
It's also why they'll offer broadband but put in caps so people can't use it, why they'll offer news programs but only present one or two sides of a multifaceted issue...
What can I say? They're crappy.
I used to work for NetQoS. I no longer do, but want to keep the excellent karma attached to this account.
Why would an amount of time that was deemed sufficient protection over 200 years ago when the printing press was a novel creation be ANYWHERE CLOSE to what protection is needed today?
Two or three times what it was then? Try 1/3 to 1/10 of the original time. We now have bestsellers that, in their first week, sell into the seven digit numbers - not of profit - but of units. Five years of protection would arguably be too much with modern technology and distribution methods.
Anything more - ANYTHING - and you're caving into the mindset that the xxAA wants you to be in. Our goal should not be parity with the original length of protection, but significant shortening thereof.