YouTube Was Evil, and Google Knew It

pcause writes "Silicon Alley Insider has the most damning evidence released in the Viacom/YouTube suit. It seems clear from these snippets that YouTube knew it was pirating content, and did it to grow fast and sell for a lot of money. It also seems clear that Google knew the site contained pirated content and bought it and continued the pirating."

Comments

So...

[spazdor]

I'm still waiting for the evil part.

Re:So...

[palegray.net]

The word "evil" is actually used (as in the context of "I don't care how evil we have to be, just do it") in the emails and instant messaging transcripts disclosed in TFA. Other choice expressions include "fucking copyright assholes" and "we don't actually care, we're just doing this to avoid being sued." I'm an open source software author myself (reference rpush.org, among other things), and I choose to license my stuff quite liberally. However, I absolutely demand that others respect the licensing terms I distribute my materials under, and I respect the licenses chosen by others. Violating that is absolutely inexcusable. It irritates me to no end that the open source community will frequently scream bloody murder over a GPL violation, then turn around and say stuff like this "isn't evil."

If ever there were a case for RTFA, this is surely it. I would have modded you down, but felt it was better to respond in full. Other mods, please mod parent down.

Re:So...

[palegray.net]

Given the nature of YouTube's content over the years, and the fact that all these emails and IM transcripts are coming out now, don't you think there might have been a need for just a little more due diligence prior to acquiring YouTube? Holy cow, thoroughly research a company before you buy it for over a billion dollars. What a concept.

Re:So...

[Chris Burke]

However, I absolutely demand that others respect the licensing terms I distribute my materials under, and I respect the licenses chosen by others. Violating that is absolutely inexcusable. It irritates me to no end that the open source community will frequently scream bloody murder over a GPL violation, then turn around and say stuff like this "isn't evil."

If ever there were a case for RTFA, this is surely it.

Okay I did, and the only truly Evil part was where that Jawed guy was actually posting copyrighted videos himself to drive hits, and the other founders told him to knock it off. As they should have, because that just sucks.

The rest is basically them making a conscious decision to not care that a lot of user-uploaded videos were copyrighted, and to put the onus on the copyright holder to send them take down notices.

I get your point about the GPL. I too see a lot of hypocrisy in attitudes on /., though I do understand it has a lot to do with the very human notion that we don't care as much about doing evil to evil people. It may not be just, but it's human.

Anyway, would I really scream bloody murder over an ftp site that knew people were uploading stuff that violated the GPL, but decided not to care and just act as a neutral hosting service until a GPL software copyright holder contacted them? Even if the decision was made because "neutrality" benefited them? No, not really. I'd be pissed at the one who stripped the GPL notice off in the first place. Not the ftp site that decided not to get involved in the fight and just serve as an ftp site.

So yeah. Youtube was aware that copyrighted material appeared on their servers. As if there's anyone on earth who was not aware. So what? I'm not seeing the "evil" until they either start ignoring take down notices (which they haven't) or start actively engaging in violations themselves (Which they apparently did at one point and which may end up getting them/google nailed).

Re:So...

[Chris Burke]

That is exactly my point.

Your point is exactly that there's basically no evil except where one guy chose to violate copyright on purpose and was bitched out by the others for it, demonstrating their lack of evilness?

I don't think so.

If they find nothing at all, it shows that Google failed at proper due diligence prior to buying YouTube.

The implication being that Google should have discovered this one instance of actual evil and based on that refused to buy Youtube. "Proper due diligence" is reading every internal email ever, and if you find one instance of something bad, no sale?

Makes no sense to me. Precious few purchases would ever be made if that was the case. Or, alternatively, practically every company ever fails your definition of due diligence.

But let's say they did see that email, and said to themselves "well that guy did this, but he stopped when told to, so no biggie." That's how I feel about it. And what would be the horrible crime here exactly?

Either way, it's bad.

I'm not seeing it. A few instances of actual copyright infringement would not be the end of the world for Google. It'd barely be anything.

The rest, hey maybe legally it's an issue, but I don't think it should be. I don't want every hosting service to have to act as copyright police as well. I think that's nuts, and bound to result in over-aggressive policies that stifle free speech.

Re:So...

[Cyberllama]

The DMCA provides a Safe harbor if they take stuff down any time the *rights holder* submits a takedown notice. So yes, they knew there was copyrighted stuff and this is effectively what all those quotes amount to:

"Why do we have users submitting reports on copyrighted materials when the law doesn't require such a step? It's the rights holder's job to complain, not the users -- and for all we know the users may be complaining about stuff the real rights holder wants to stay up there for promotional reasons.

We're doing all this extra enforcement on material people want to see that the law does not require, and it's not very smart of us. Let's just scale back and only remove stuff if the right's holders complain. "

It turns out that this is a very reasonable philosophy for two reasons:

1) Most rights holders don't care. Pretty much every major media company but Viacom has recognized the value of having content on Youtube, as long as it's only partial clips of a show or a low-quality music video. It's a very effective and cheap form of promotion. They could object, but they choose not to. Thus making Youtubes decision to stop *pre-emptively* removing it based on user reports the correct one for those companies.

2) Many of those clips may in fact have been uploaded by the rights holders themselves. In another recent batch of documents from this lawsuit we saw that Viacom was hiring companies to promote their shows and one of their tactics was to upoad clips to Youtube. In other words, *much* of the "infringing" content on Youtube was put there on behalf of Viacom. Does it make sense to have users reporting these clips to be removed when they might be there *officially*?

Double Standards, or Above the Law? -

[Anonymous Coward]

I find it unlikely that Google considers this evil. After all, given their stance toward books and other literature, they seem to think that they have every right to reproduce and host content at their whim.

This isn't a double standard at work. Google simply believes that it's above the law, and 'evil' can be conveniently redefined to mean whatever suits the company's interests at the time. Don't fall for the feelgood narrative.

Re:Double Standards, or Above the Law? -

[spazdor]

Google simply believes that it's above the law

I believe this about myself too, but I prefer to say that the law, in its current state, is beneath me..

Re:Double Standards, or Above the Law? -

[rlthomps-1]

IANAL, but the case about books and literature is much, much more complicated than that and has a wide ranging impact on the basics of referring information on the Internet, what constitutes fair use, and what counts as a "reproduction"

Don't fall for the feelgood idiot riffing on the "Evil Google" narrative.

Re:Double Standards, or Above the Law? -

[ajs]

I find it unlikely that Google considers this evil. After all, given their stance toward books and other literature ... Google simply believes that it's above the law, and 'evil' can be conveniently redefined ...

That has to be the single most abhorrent abuse of the word "evil" I've ever seen. Google believes that the contents of libraries should be made available of the Web. They have a strong point, and I think I actually agree with them, though I realize that the increased ease of access will cause problems for the current publishing business model. What you appear to be saying is that any attempt to increase the public's access to content that would damage an existing business model is inherently evil. I believe that to be nonsensical (though if you simply disagree, I take no exception to that... it's the demonization of the concept of an electronic library that I think is wrong).

Now, on to YouTube: YouTube is a tough nut, and I think we'll be doing the world a disservice if we resolve it as if it were a single issue in a vacuum. The core question reverses the library/business model issue. It is suggested by Viacom et al. that the ready access to information creates an environment in which the standard protections afforded to those who provide physical space for information (e.g. cork boards) are not acceptable online and that carriers of that information must be held liable for the use of those spaces. We're not arguing that Google is evil, we're arguing that they knew they were getting themselves into a legal morass which would likely result in Google defending their side of the case in court and shaping the laws of our land with respect to the Internet. That is actually quite the opposite of evil.

In both cases, I'm cheering for an outcome that happens to coincide with Google's interests, but I would be (grudgingly) rooting for the same outcome were it Microsoft or Monsanto being attacked for the same reasons.

Re:Double Standards, or Above the Law? -

[jesset77]

My understanding is that the DMCA requires a copyright owner to notify the hosting site of each infringing item. Knowing in general that content is posted without a license isn't infringement.

Viacom is trying to kill the entire possibility of letting the general public post anything at all, for fear somebody somewhere might think they own it. Google's just a convenient target with deep pockets just in case a court is dumb enough to swallow.

This point is accurate. Viacom doesn't care that you can hear it's music or see it's shows on Google's services or on Youtube. Viacom knows as well as we do that it isn't losing any sales, and oftentimes even gains sales when this happens.

What Viacom cares about is that in the coming decade indies will compete against it, and indies will rely upon open services to do so. Viacom will use any means available to make it illegal for anyone to upload anything, due to the one in a zillion chance that the content might be copyrighted by someone somewhere.

Copyright law isn't good enough for the entertainment industry, they don't want the expense of dragging millions of individual infringers into court. They don't want to be on equal footing to the little guy. So they created the DMCA.

But the DMCA wasn't good enough either, because even when they ask Youtube to take down material scattershot (often opening themselves up to perjury because they do not make qualified humans check their assumptions and oft times sabotage material that clearly legal on a regular basis) many uploaders file a counter-DMCA to bring it back up, and the industry is back to the expensive process of settling matters in court one citizen at a time.

So now they would much prefer to see open media sharing die completely. They pine for the days when the entertainment oligopoly effectively controlled the global distribution of all media. When media distribution was an economy of scale.

Viacom wants nothing short of protectionism. Piracy is just a red herring to achieve this goal, and Viacom is glad that it can get some of that herring juice onto Google's brand now.

me too

[unity100]

im also still waiting for the evil part. if anyone blabbers to the contrary, im ready with a phletora of evidences of REAL evil ranging from monsanto to comcast-nbc, viacom, microsoft, and many many more.

Re:me too

[unity100]

it is unamerican, because it is feudal. it gives control of the intellectual life over to a few. the needs of the few coming before the needs of the many, is contrary to american revolutionary ideas. leaving all of those aside, those interests are controlling your own government through the candidates and senators they sponsor. currently it is 'by the corporations, by the corporations. it should be 'by the people, for the people'.

despite the illusion that is 'you can also own a copyright', a very tiny minority of population owns the bulk of copyrights and patents and profits from them, preventing others from getting anything. in a way, situation is no similar than a peasant having a chance at being a baron in middle ages.

Re:me too

[Stormwatch]

The copyright clause says "limited times". Well, they could extend copyright to a billion years, it'd still satisfy the letter of the constitution. But NOT its spirit.

Re:me too

[spazdor]

I'm gonna have to disagree respectfully. If Congress has taken to making laws that violate the intent of the constitution, I think it's the Supreme Court's job to strike these laws down - or at least, to force Congress to put up or shut up. If Congress's aim is to change the constitution, then the Supreme Court, to me, has a clear duty to force them to do it via a constitutional amendment, rather than getting away with mere statutory law.

Re:Piracy?

[shutdown -p now]

No, what YouTube (and Google) was allegedly involved in was gross copyright infringement. Quit calling it piracy already.

Of course. I mean, it's a mere 400 years of precedence for the word "piracy" having the meaning of "copyright infringement"; nothing to bother about, right?

Even more damning

[Toonol]

I think if they search harder, they may find that as a search engine, google indexed pages about piracy, hate speech, and terrorism. How evil is that?

Don't get me started about the PHONE COMPANY. They carry all sorts of damnable content. I've heard copyrighted music over a phone, before.

But it isn't that easy

[Sycraft-fu]

As YouTube's council recently pointed out, more or less any video is copyrighted. If you make a video, it's copyright to you upon time of creation. Few people actually bother to release their stuff in to the public domain, so the works remain copyrighted. Now that does NOT mean they can't be posted on Youtube. The holder of a copyright can determine how it is allowed to be used, including given away for free to anyone.

Now, as that applies to big media companies the problem is that they themselves, or their agents, like PR agencies, do indeed upload content to Youtube. So just because a work is uploaded that is owned by a big company, it doesn't mean there has been infringement. Perhaps the company themselves did the uploading. They don't always do it through some official account.

As such it makes sense to respond to infringement notices and remove the content, but not to run around assuming that you know what is and is not ok to be on there. Other than videos by the government (which are public domain at creation) or ones that people have bothered to release in to the public domain, it's all copyrighted material. However a great deal of it the copyright holders WANT to be on there, including when said holders are major media companies.

What's more evil?

[drDugan]

You know what's evil? Copyright term of "70 years + life of the author".
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright_term

Almost every single thing creative that someone creates today will *never* enter the public domain within our lifetime. Nothing. The owner of the copyright must explicitly grant it to the public domain, or license it for other's use, distribution, sharing, mashing, basically anything more than fair use... Copyright is no longer about promotion of creativity, its a legal exclusivity and an effectively permanent lock on all creative output by business interests. Add WIPO and ACTA and soon within 10 years or so, it will be a global exclusive lock, again driven by business interests.

The current copyright laws are simply a denial of any sense of balance or social good in intellectual property.

Yes, Piracy

[RobotRunAmok]

Quit calling it piracy already.

It's piracy. Get over it. The word has evolved beyond parrots and yarrh's to include appropriation and distribution of files for which no license to distribute was provided by the content creator.

Language grows. "Hacker" used to mean a really bad golfer. And "Geeks" bit the heads off chickens.

Re:Safe Harbor

[chaboud]

Mod parent +1000.

One loses the safe harbor protection when they demonstrate awareness or knowledge of user-directed content's infringement. What if one of the users was a representative of a copyright owner? Just because something was expensive to make doesn't mean that your knee-jerk reflex should be removal.

Profit doesn't come into play in the general case, as they're not selling the content directly:
Title 17, Section 512.(c).(1).(B)
"does not receive a financial benefit directly attributable to the infringing activity"

Even if the majority of your files are infringing, that's not the same as direct attribution of financial benefit.

This does demonstrate some awareness of materials that have studio copyright naturally attributed to them, but it doesn't mean that the poster didn't have copyright. Basically, there's a DMCA-specified procedure for notification, and many of these conversations discuss exactly how to go about handling those provisions.

Clips of shows like Leno and Conan could fall under fair use by users (news agencies do it), so, again, where's the beef?

This just plainly isn't that damning, and it's certainly not that evil. The original poster needs to chill out. Anyone who's ever sat in a meeting with lawyers discussing the ins and outs of the DMCA would find these statements in no way out of place. Put them in the full context of the emails, and it looks like Viacom's just out to make a money grab from deep pockets. The Viacom lawyers must be busy trying to wave shiny objects in front of executives to keep them from noticing the huge revenue loss that came from not sorting things out with Hulu...

s/understood/incorrectly believed/

[Mr2001]

They understood that without a way to protect the intellectual creations, such as books, music, architectural designs, inventions, et al, there would be less motivation for people to spend the time, and energy, to create them.

They thought there would be insufficient motivation. But like many other 18th century beliefs, they were mistaken: don't forget that many of the founders owned slaves, too.

We in the 21st century now know that copyright is not required to motivate people to spend time and energy to produce such content: millions of people do it every day, for free, just because they like to share their creations.

To be fair...

[symbolset]

Another article:

Meanwhile, Google says, Viacom "regularly uses so-called 'stealth marketing' to get its content onto YouTube. The goal is to create the appearance of authentic grassroots interest in the content being promoted." Google cites a marketing executive at Viacom's Paramount studio who said that clips posted to YouTube "should definitely not be associated with the studio -- should appear as if a fan created and posted it." To accomplish that, Google says that "Viacom employees have made special trips away from the company's premises (to places like Kinko's) to upload videos to YouTube from computers not traceable to Viacom."

Also, "Viacom has altered its own videos to make them appear stolen." Indeed, Google says that a former president of MTV, not named, testified that Viacom didn't take down clips from The Daily Show and The Colbert Report because "we were concerned that Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert believed that their presence on YouTube was important for their ratings as well as for their relationship with their audience."

So... who's evil here?