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DMCA Safe Harbor May Not Apply To Old Copyrighted Works
tlhIngan writes "On Tuesday, the New York appellate court denied Grooveshark the DMCA safe harbor protection on songs like Johnny B. Goode. What happened was due to an oddity in the law, the DMCA does not apply to state-licensed copyrighted works (those copyrighted before February 15, 1972). What happened was Congress overhauled copyright law to make it a Federal matter, but all works prior to that date still come under common-law and state statutes. The end result is that Grooveshark does not have DMCA safe harbor protection for older works and may be sued for copyright infringement (barring other agreements, e.g., UMG and YouTube), even though they fully comply with the DMCA otherwise, taking down copyrighted materials. Grooveshark is a "music locker" service allowing users to upload music for others to listen to."
that corporations denied us access to our culture.
You might see music as a "product", but it's been a cultural output since the beginning of time.
Nothing that old should be covered by copyright, anyway. To give safe-harbor to those hosting new works but not those works that should be in the public domain shows that out "legislators" are batshit crazy. Only a certifiable lunatic would pass laws like the ones we have on the books.
Yeah, we all know how well "music locker" concept is. Kinda reminds me of a store called Woolworth's. You know what's remaining of that once GIANT business? Foot Locker. Oh wait, isn't THAT dead, too? No joke, Woolworth's dissolved into Foot Locker, and Foot Locker dissolved into nothing. So will be the way of ALL P2P music sharing services, like Napster, Kazaa, Kazaa Lite, Kazaa Codec Pack, Napster, and Torrent services like The Pirate Bay and Enpornium. I suggest that you move back to CDs and use your camcorder to record movies of your CD player boomboxes if you want to make backup copies. I am not even joking.
--RIAA Narc
The only good part of the DMCA was that it applied a safe harbor protection - if you follow the law, and take stuff down when asked and don't openly solicit unauthorized content, you're safe.
But now apparently that protection doesn't apply to roughly half the things that could potentially be uploaded. So you have to manually review and approve any file, since you can't know whether it falls under DMCA safe harbor or not. Thus eliminating any potential benefit of the DMCA until 2044 or so, longer if they extend copyright durations again (so, longer).
So then, what's the point? It's a law that applies far too harsh penalties, outlaws modifying your own property if it's been magically declared a "protective measure" and is abused more than most tax loopholes. If the one reasonable bit about it has been struck down, well, I think it needs to be gone. And I'm sure Google et al. will be agreeing.
This decision is severely damaging.
I don't think it will be long now before suits are filed against most of the digital locker services to try to "catch" them with pre 1972 content.
And if they manage to shut down the file lockers, they will ramp up the courage to go after YouTube. And with it already proven that it is nearly completely impossible for YouTube to perfectly filter everything automatically, they will lose.
I have decided, and told my children to look at any music they are purchasing and make sure it is not copyrighted by UMG.
I am fine with buying digital music online, but I am not fine with giving any money to a company who supports policies that could destroy the internet.
Companies that try to pursue actions and decisions that cripple the internet are IMHO enemies of mankind.