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IMSLP Taken Down By UK Publishers Group

Posted by timothy on from the so-there-were-these-four-consonants dept.

gacl writes "According to a post at the IMSLP Journal, the IMSLP, the largest site on the 'net providing public domain sheet music, has been taken down yet again. The UK-based Music Publisher's Association has sent GoDaddy, the IMSLP's domain registrar, a DMCA takedown notice. The IMSLP argues that the notice is bogus. More detailed discussions on the matter can be found at the IMSLP Forums."

25 of 117 comments (clear)

  1. Ridiculous by Pricetx · · Score: 3

    I have found the IMSLP to be a very useful source of scores whilst studying music, and all of the scores are in the open domain. I just don't understand what there can be to argue about?

    1. Re:Ridiculous by fuzzyfuzzyfungus · · Score: 5, Informative

      Distributing things for free is a crime against the sellers' divinely granted right to profit in perpetuity. If any commodity's price is allowed to reach its marginal cost of production, there are precious, precious rents going unextracted!

  2. Service restored by ustolemyname · · Score: 4, Informative

    Seems to already be back up. Site already refers to the outage in the past tense, "The recent IMSLP outage was..."

    1. Re:Service restored by ustolemyname · · Score: 3, Informative
      ... And the other half of that statement

      To MPA's credit, they have voluntarily retracted their claim. IMSLP will also be working on technical measures to prevent any future attacks.

    2. Re:Service restored by jimicus · · Score: 2

      To MPA's credit, they have voluntarily retracted their claim. IMSLP will also be working on technical measures to prevent any future attacks.

      Love to know what they're going to be. Obviously they could run their own DNS, but the registrar can still pull the glue records pointing the world at their DNS servers.

      I guess you could use a registrar that doesn't have a tendency to roll over without at least reading the letters (that particular one didn't specifically mention the DMCA but other than that the tone was more-or-less the same), but I was under the impression that the whole point of the DMCA was to force the ISP to pull content first and ask questions later - essentially forcing the legal threat onto the person who's least equipped to deal with them. So really you'd want a registrar outside the US - and preferably outside any country with similar legislation.

    3. Re:Service restored by Jason+Levine · · Score: 2

      I was under the impression that the whole point of the DMCA was to force the ISP to pull content first and ask questions later - essentially forcing the legal threat onto the person who's least equipped to deal with them.

      My understanding of the DMCA is that it charts a course of action for ISPs to take when they're accused of hosting copyrighted material without proper consent. First, the ISP takes down the content. Next, they send a note to the account holder who uploaded the content informing them of the DMCA action.

      At this point, the account holder (in this case IMSLP) can A) accept the takedown and move on or B) formally tell the ISP that the DMCA claim is without merit. Once the latter is done, the ISP has to restore the content and is relieved of any legal liability. The person/company that sent the DMCA notice then has to file suit with the person/company who uploaded the content and prove (in a court of law) that the DMCA notice *was* valid. If they don't (either losing the suit or not filing one), the content stays online. If they do (proving that a copyright violation occurred), the content is taken down again.

      Yes, this often leads to big companies suing individuals, but the alternative is big companies threatening ISPs with lawsuits if content they don't like isn't removed. Without the DMCA's removal of ISP legal liability, any person/company with enough power could claim copyright over any uploaded content and force its removal.

      On the flip side, without the DMCA, being an ISP (or a message board operator or running any service where users post content) would be extremely risky legally as any individual could post a copyrighted item leading to a fine against your company. The larger a service got, the greater the risk that one rogue (or copyright-lax) user would post something that earned the company a fine. And, of course, the larger a service got and the more money it made, the more likely big companies would try to find that copyrighted content to either A) stop the service from growing or B) tap into the service's revenue stream. In the face of a legal landscape like this, many online services would fold rather than risk legal action and fines.

      --
      My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
    4. Re:Service restored by tomthepom · · Score: 2

      To MPA's credit, they have voluntarily retracted their claim.

      And then, not so much to their credit, they demanded that the takedown email be removed from the IMSLP Journals website They then repeated the demand to 'takedown the takedown' even after the IMSLP informed them that they had written permission to reproduce it. The IMSLP's comment on this says it all;

      Seriously, you can't expect to take down a major website, with a bogus DMCA takedown notice, and then try and hide the evidence. Can you see that? It makes you look ridiculous.

    5. Re:Service restored by russotto · · Score: 2

      My understanding of the DMCA is that it charts a course of action for ISPs to take when they're accused of hosting copyrighted material without proper consent. First, the ISP takes down the content. Next, they send a note to the account holder who uploaded the content informing them of the DMCA action.

      Right. Which points out one of the myriad problems with this particular notice; namely, that the registrar is not hosting any of the material.

      At this point, the account holder (in this case IMSLP) can A) accept the takedown and move on or B) formally tell the ISP that the DMCA claim is without merit. Once the latter is done, the ISP has to restore the content and is relieved of any legal liability.

      The "formally tell the ISP that the DMCA claim is without merit" is an invitation to sue. Literally; part of the counternotice is a statement that you accept jurisdiction in a particular US Federal Court. Furthermore, once notice is given, the material has to STAY DOWN to give the complaining party a chance to sue, or the safe harbor is lost.

      The person/company that sent the DMCA notice then has to file suit with the person/company who uploaded the content and prove (in a court of law) that the DMCA notice *was* valid. If they don't (either losing the suit or not filing one), the content stays online. If they do (proving that a copyright violation occurred), the content is taken down again.

      Which means that at best, the material stays down for the duration of the suit. Which can take years. It's like an automatic preliminary injunction in favor of the claimant. At worst, the copyright holder could notify the ISP that they are suing, and then not do so. The material remains restrained forever.

      Yes, this often leads to big companies suing individuals, but the alternative is big companies threatening ISPs with lawsuits if content they don't like isn't removed.

      They do that anyway. In fact, that's exactly what a DMCA notice is.

      On the flip side, without the DMCA, being an ISP (or a message board operator or running any service where users post content) would be extremely risky legally as any individual could post a copyrighted item leading to a fine against your company. The larger a service got, the greater the risk that one rogue (or copyright-lax) user would post something that earned the company a fine. And, of course, the larger a service got and the more money it made, the more likely big companies would try to find that copyrighted content to either A) stop the service from growing or B) tap into the service's revenue stream. In the face of a legal landscape like this, many online services would fold rather than risk legal action and fines.

      This was being litigated when the DMCA came around and made it all moot. And the decisions were not all in favor of copyright claimaints. See, for instance "Religious Technology Center v. Netcom"

    6. Re:Service restored by _0xd0ad · · Score: 3, Informative

      Furthermore, once notice is given, the material has to STAY DOWN to give the complaining party a chance to sue, or the safe harbor is lost.

      Not exactly. The complaining party has 10 business days (14 days) to get an injunction to prevent the material from being reinstated; if they do not get the injunction in that time period, it must be promptly reinstated or the ISP actually becomes liable for damages if it is later found that the material did not in fact infringe on the complaining party's copyright.

      http://www.plagiarismtoday.com/2010/06/03/7-common-questions-about-dmca-counter-notices/

      A host then passes along the counter-notice to the person who filed the original notice. The works remain offline for 10 business days, after which, if no additional action has been taken by the filer, the works can be restored.

      The copyright holder can petition the court for an injunction to prevent the restoration of the original works, but if it is not obtained within the time allotted, the works are restored to the site.

      http://www.chillingeffects.org/question.cgi?QuestionID=132

      If a subscriber provides a proper "counter-notice" claiming that the material does not infringe copyrights, the service provider must then promptly notify the claiming party of the individual's objection. [512(g)(2)] If the copyright owner does not bring a lawsuit in district court within 14 days, the service provider is then required to restore the material to its location on its network. [512(g)(2)(C)]

  3. Classic line in the 'Legal Notices' page by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    If you wish to add a link to mpaonline.org.uk from your own site, you may do so provided you agree to cease such link upon request from the MPA.

    I LOL'ed.

    1. Re:Classic line in the 'Legal Notices' page by Ant+P. · · Score: 2

      But it's fine if I link to those litigious bastards from someone else's site, right?

  4. i'm confused by Hazel+Bergeron · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Can the DMCA be used to take down whole domains immediately now?

    Does that mean I can find one infringing film on youtbe and disable youtube for a week or two?

    What exactly is the legal basis for what's happening here, and what technical method was used to stop access to the site? The article doesn't make it clear.

    1. Re:i'm confused by Hazel+Bergeron · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Is that a legally stipulated procedure? You go straight to the registrar, which isn't even necessarily hosting any content? And the registrar itself is liable somehow if it doesn't comply?

    2. Re:i'm confused by fuzzyfuzzyfungus · · Score: 2

      This appears to have been slightly different: The site never went down(it was accessible by IP or by an alternate URL); but the registrar handling their primary domain name responded to the DMCA request by changing the DNS entry for that name to no longer point to the correct IP.

      A 3rd party host is an additional point of vulnerability; but it was not the vulnerability exploited in this case.

  5. WhoreDaddy. by unity100 · · Score: 4, Informative

    The shittiest, slyest, most sinister hosting/domains provider on the internet (after 1&1 terror of course) that is the Godaddy.

    so whorey that, they are STILL making losses every year since their founding by underselling, without a year in the black to show for their history.

    on top of that, they have no ethics in regard to internet conduct, they can take down your site just like that from a dmca complaint without any possibility of objection from your side, and even before you are notified of the dmca. they can take away your domain name just like that too.

    on top of that, the ceo is a egomaniac who is more into advertising himself than running a proper business serving people. and his latest stunt is below

    http://youtube.com/watch?v=HXVH4OsfapI

    disturbing video. shot by, and edited by bob parsons, ceo, godaddy himself. and uploaded to his blog. yes, such people exist.

    so, you can say that this article doesnt come as a surprise to anyone who knows what whoredaddy is.

    stay away from 2 provides on the internet even at the cost of your life : 1&1, and whoredaddy.

    --
    Read radical news here
  6. Bright side! by flex941 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Look at the bright side of this. Now I know this site (with the very interesting content it has) exists! Thank you MPA of UK.

    1. Re:Bright side! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

      Check out Mutopia as well. The Mutopia Project re-typeset the scores in lilypond and also has midi files available.
      http://www.mutopiaproject.org/

  7. Re:Frankly... by MichaelSmith · · Score: 2

    I hear that their complaints department is the only part of the company which makes a profit, and that they will be first against the wall when the revolution comes. Can anybody confirm this?

    --
    http://michaelsmith.id.au
  8. Re:Mirror? by JCZwart · · Score: 2

    According to the statement on the IMSLP Journal, you could still reach the site through http://petruccilibrary.org/. It's up and running again though, but I still think I'll bookmark that one url as well.

    From the journal: Workaround: You can still reach the site by using either petruccilibrary.org or petruccimusiclibrary.org Note, however, that some links on the site that refer to IMSLP.ORG may be broken; you will have to manually replace IMSLP.ORG with one of the two above domain names manually in the URL bar.

  9. Re:Frankly... by Internetuser1248 · · Score: 3, Funny

    Interestingly enough, an edition of wikipedia that fell through a time-warp from 200 years in the future defines the Complaints Division of the Godaddy Corporation as: "A bunch of mindless jerks who were the first against the wall when the revolution came."

  10. Misleading by langelgjm · · Score: 2

    Sure, copyright is not a literal translation of Urheberrecht, just as it is not a literal translation of "droit d'auteur." But given that Germany was one of the original signatories of the Berne Convention, and also conforms to TRIPs, its "author's right" law provides in large part the same sort of protections that American copyright law provides. Yes, there are important differences, but to say that German sites using the English word "copyright" are lying is pretty misleading.

    --
    "Anyone who [rips a CD] is probably engaging in copyright infringement." - David O. Carson
    1. Re:Misleading by Bigjeff5 · · Score: 2

      Mod parent up.

      Germany is a member of the Berne Convention (a founding member, even - the US came very late to that party), which is the basis for our current copyright laws.

      While there might be slight differences, they are extremely similar, by necessity of complying with the treaty.

      The InfoSec Directive of the EU (to which Germany complies) is very similar to the DMCA, but I'm not entirely sure about whether or not US DMCA take-down tactics are possible under the EU directive or Germany's version of the law.

      As langelgjm said, German copyright is completely non-transferable (which is really, really nice, IMO), but there do exist exclusive licenses which are nearly as good as transferring copyright. It gives the licensee full control over the work. Since corporate ownership of copyright is not possible in this instance, they generally have agreements with their employees to grant exclusive licenses to the company. It works out about the same.

      --
      Security is mostly a superstition... Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than outright exposure. - Helen Keller
  11. In an age of abundance, business is about... by Paul+Fernhout · · Score: 2

    http://www.artificialscarcity.com/ more and more...
    (my site. :-)

    Alternatives:
    http://peswiki.com/index.php/OS:Economic_Transformation
    http://groups.google.com/group/openmanufacturing/msg/4f49f5fc25b8b3e9
    http://knol.google.com/k/beyond-a-jobless-recovery

    We need to transition to a model where enterprise is more and more about dealing with real scarcities (either local or global).

    --
    A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.
  12. Re:How do we protect this? by davester666 · · Score: 2

    DMCA notices are like tasers. When there is no penalty for misusing them, they are misused.

    --
    Sleep your way to a whiter smile...date a dentist!
  13. Re:How do we protect this? by mysidia · · Score: 2, Insightful

    I have a good faith allegation that every site on the internet infringes upon my work. I call my work "a neat web page"

    It includes content such as: <html><head><title>A neat web page</title><body>Neat</body>

    I have it from a good source, that even sites like Slashdot contain parts of my work such as "<html><head><title>"