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RIAA: Google Failing To Demote Pirate Websites
Nerval's Lobster writes "The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) claims that Google has failed in its attempt to lower the search-results rankings of so-called 'pirate' Websites. "We have found no evidence that Google's policy has had a demonstrable impact on demoting sites with large amounts of piracy," read the report's summary (PDF). 'These sites consistently appear at the top of Google's search results for popular songs or artists.' Last August, Google indicated that it would start lowering the search-result rankings of Websites with high numbers of 'valid' copyright removal notices. 'This ranking change should help users find legitimate, quality sources of content more easily—whether it's a song previewed on NPR's music website, a TV show on Hulu or new music streamed on Spotify,' Amit Singhal, Google's senior vice president of Engineering, wrote in a corporate blog posting at the time. Google, which receives millions of copyright removal notices every month, also offers a counter-notice tool for those who believe their Websites have been unfairly targeted for copyright violations."
The RIAA can fuck off.
A search engine is supposed to search and display what it finds. I'll be the one to do the filtering
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
I want my search engine to search the web for my query. Do not try to figure out what sort of legitimate use I have for my query, give me the results! Maybe I'm a copyright infringer trying to steal music, and maybe I'm a gun happy lawyer trying to sue the pants of the site owners.
"We have found no evidence that Google's policy has had a demonstrable impact on demoting sites with large amounts of piracy,"
when does the riaa hollywood accounting get some action? Ripping off hard working artists with manipulative deals is fraud in other businesses.
Anecdotal observation here.
Went to Google and typed in Mumford. Guess what, no pirate sites appeared on the first page.
But there was a Wired article complaining about the "no unauthorized copying lending public performance etc. statement on the back of their latest album.
Maybe the RIAA doesn't want us noticing that the 'no unauthorized lending clause' has no legal basis.
Yes, because everyone *else* in the world even remotely/tangentially having anything to do with digital media, has an obligation to spend considerable time and money protecting Sony, BMG. etc.'s business.
Search engines must hire additional coders to ensure that internet is censored as per Sony 's whims. Hardware manufacturing companies must spend significant extra money on ensure DRM compliance. ISPs must spy on their customers to ensure that no copyright-infringement happens. Police which is funded by public tax money(you and me) must spend valuable time and effort on catching the nefarious "music stealers". Senators who are elected by the people and paid by public tax money, must instead ensure laws favoring BMG/Sony that make copying files a worse crime than rape or murder.
Whereas, the same "victim" companies, move their headquarters outside to cheat the American public out of the benefits of any tax money they might have had to pay. We have all the obligations to them. They have none to us or even the actual creators of the said music etc.
Soon doctors will likely be required to ensure that they perform free deafening procedures on everyone who might end up listening to "infringing music".
The solution is simple. Realize that lobbying is equivalent to bribery and force your senator to pass a law against it.
Oh yeah? I searched for "useless twits", "thieving bastards" and "lying motherfuckers" and in none of the cases did "RIAA" appear near the top of the list. Clearly google has a lot of work to do to fix their search engine...
The PDF has a very handy list of "notorious" sites, many of which were new to me. The RIAA should have Googled "Streisand Effect" before they released that....
Q: What does the "B." in Benoit B. Mandelbrot stand for? A: Benoit B. Mandelbrot
...that Google realizes this is just a complete waste of time and put a couple of interns on it, so they could get the RIAA to stop calling them day and night.
Wouldn;t it be cheaper to buy some auto-response systems and put them in the "RIAA support lines" with the message of "Your call is important to us. An operator will be with you as soon as possible (a.k.a never). Please hold and jerk off"?
Questions raise, answers kill. Raise questions to stay alive.
It's to their users... no doubt their idea of "piracy" includes fair use content as well... observe how they list Youtube as separate from "authorized"....
They list mere counts of average number of times a site appeared that had 10,000 or more removal requests, or 1,000 or more remove requests.
Out of millions of remove requests received by Google; 10,000 pages at issue on a large site do not necessarily qualify as "a large number of requests".
RIAA's arguments are non-constructive, and they have offered no evidence that Google has not taken successful action to demote piracy results.
http://www.google.com/transparencyreport/removals/copyright/ Google produces a report that includes a breakdown of all requests Google has received since July 2011 to remove copyright-infringing content from its search index. Google updates the information daily.
Perhaps Google, like many an adult, dislikes being ordered about by spoiled children.
Make that spoiled, sanctimonious, amoral, dishonest, hypocritical, mentally skewed, ethically bereft children.
Ever since RIAA realized they can sue grandmothers for millions and people with open WIFI access points, they've gotten super sue happy. The bar down the street got sued for $100,000 for doing karaoke. I mean everyone is getting sued. The radio stations online are sued to do tribute. The Canadian government got influenced so they impose taxes on CDs to give tribute to RIAA. RIAA probably realizes there is more money to be had in suing people than actually producing something now since everything goes in their favor. Now they're weighing up a big whale and seeing if they can take it sounds like it. Someone needs to stop the RIAA, they ruin lives because they're just plain greedy and have no morals to stop them. They started with screwing artists, now they're trying to sue everyone possible. It's just sick.
God spoke to me
maybe the suits at RIAA are getting personalized results, just like everyone else.
think about it - if all they click on are pirate sites, that's going to fairly effectively override any pagerank tweaks that google can throw at them.
a RIAA lawyer is hardly going to click on spotify, hulu or itunes if they're looking to C&D someone.