EFF Launches "Takedown Hall of Shame"

netbuzz writes "Recognizing that public shame is a potent weapon, the Electronic Frontier Foundation today launched a new Web site — its Takedown Hall of Shame — that will shine an unflattering spotlight on those corporations and individuals who abuse copyright claims to stifle free speech. Among the early inductees are NPR, NBC, CBS, and Diebold."

Comments

They forgot one

[TubeSteak]

How about the Church of Scientology?
Their censorship is the entire reason the /b/tards started harassing them.

Re:They forgot one

[bfmorgan]

EFF might not have enough lawyers to fight the take down notices from the Church of Scientology... Whoops, I just got one.

Video professor

[Brian Gordon]

What happened to Video Professor? Should have made the list IMO:

In mid-August, in federal court in Denver, the Video Professor, a self-proclaimed consumer advocate, sued his own customers for posting comments on two consumer comment Web sites. The sites, infomercialratings.com and infomercialscams.com, are run by a Nevada company, Leonard Fitness, Inc.

The Professor alleged that his detractors had violated federal trademark laws by saying negative things about the name of his product, as well as committing defamation and several violations of state law

Re:NPR?

[schnikies79]

Free speech is free speech. Picking and choosing your examples is just as bad as censorship.

Clear number 1

[Anonymous Coward]

Shouldn't the number one "shame" spot go to the congress that passed the DMCA?

Re:Clear number 1

[RIAAShill]

Shouldn't the number one "shame" spot go to the congress that passed the DMCA?

No. The DMCA does not mandate removal of allegedly infringing materials. Without the DMCA, copyright holders could still send "cease and desist" letters to service providers, or otherwise request that allegedly infringing materials be removed. Service providers would then have to decide whether to comply with the demand/request or risk being held liability for monetary damages, perhaps under a theory of secondary liability. Even worse, service providers might have faced monetary damages even if they were unaware of specific acts of copyright infringement.

The DMCA "notice and takedown" safe harbor provides a voluntary way for service providers to avoid monetary liability based on the potentially infringing activities of their users. Even better, if users issue a counter notice, then the service provider can replace the allegedly infringing materials without incurring monetary liability.

Service providers that use the DMCA notice and takedown safe harbor are thus able to provide public fora without being having an incentive to police user activity to minimize the risk of owing damages in their users engage in copyright infringement. This is good from a free speech perspective.

If a takedown notice is sent, service providers do not have to comply . They can keep the materials online, provided they are willing to risk being found liable. Thus, service providers who choose to use the DMCA to protect themselves from obvious instances of infringement can still choose to protect the availability of their users' submissions.

This is good for service providers and good for users. Why do you think Slashdot has designated an agent under the DMCA?

Given the benefits of this provision, Congress should not be ashamed. Only those copyright holders who send out abusive takedown notices and the like, and those service providers who indiscriminatly hang their users out to dry, should be ashamed.

Re:NBC - MSNBC ?

[bennomatic]

That's one of the sillier posts I've ever seen. There are lots of things that a media outlet can do that are worthy of complaints even if they are not under the umbrella of censorship.

Examples:

• Promoting lies and misrepresentations as if they were facts.
• Creating a fake "grassroots" movement and promoting it as if it were real.
• Publishing verbatim talking points from one political party as if they were objective news.
• Claiming to be a news agency while dropping any hints of objective reporting.

Now, it's normal for a media outlet to have its own slant or bias; even a corporation evolves a "culture" which colors what is reported. However, Fox is not even rationally consistent with its judgements; take, for example, back to back reports on Britney Spears' younger sister being pregnant vs. Sarah Palin's daughter being pregnant. Bill O'Reilly went from calling Spears' parents "pinheads" to saying that "the liberal media's judgement of Palin is outrageous" without taking a breath. It would be funny if it weren't so tragic.

Local Fox affiliates have normal news. The parent news agency, with their "Fox and Friends", Beck, Hannity, O'Reilly and more, are entertainment at best, a propaganda agency at worst, even in those segments where they claim to be news.