Google Ordered To Remove Anti-Islamic Film From YouTube

cold fjord writes "The Verge reports, 'Google and YouTube must scrub all copies of Innocence of Muslims, a low-budget anti-Islam film that drew international protest in 2012, at the behest of an actress who says she received death threats after being duped into a role. The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals has granted a temporary takedown order on behalf of Cindy Lee Garcia, who filed a copyright claim against Google in an attempt to purge the video from the web. While actors usually give up the right to assert copyright protection when they agree to appear in a film, Garcia says that not only was she never an employee in any meaningful sense, the finished film bore virtually no relation to the one she agreed to appear in. In a majority opinion, Judge Alex Kozinski said she was likely in the right.' — Techdirt has extensive commentary on the ruling that's worth reading. It seems likely there will be an appeal, with the distinct possibility that Google and the MPAA will be on the same side."

Comments

In before...

[o_ferguson]

...Streisand Effect.

Re:In before...

[ackthpt]

People who make death threats aren't rational people. Expecting them to suddenly behave rationally is without merit. They'll just move on making death threats to the next person in line they have some perceived (real or imagined) gripe against.

Re:In before...

[ShanghaiBill]

People who make death threats aren't rational people.

If the death threats achieve the desired end, then why aren't they rational?

Re: In before...

[cpt kangarooski]

Sigh.

No, publicity rights are a branch of state tort law. Copyrights are a sui generis branch of federal law.

And a copyright release is just a copyright license (or more rarely, an assignment), which means that it pertains to a particular creative work. A publicity release has to do with using someone's face, image, statements, etc. While you could conceivably have them both in the same form, it's rare that you'd need to or want to.

And I assure you, they are not related even the teeniest tiniest bit. Not in their policy goals, or how they originated, or which governments created them, or who gets them, or how long they last, or what they cover. There is no commonality.

Are you too lazy to google for the difference between copyrights and publicity rights? Perhaps this web page from the Library of Congress will help you out: http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/co...

Re:In before...

[Artifakt]

The director didn't "trick" the actors - if the judge is correct in his analysis, the director committed fraud against the actors. No quotation marks, just a real criminal act, which, if true, also makes releasing the film automatically a criminally negligent act, (reckless endangenrment) again without any quotes around the facts.
It's like Traci Lords may have genuinely tricked the directors of her first few films into thinking she was over 18, or she may have "tricked" them, but it doesn't matter, as you still have no right what-so-ever to watch an X rated film that features a person still a minor under US law. People can argue over whether the producers knew Ms. Lords was under 18, or not, but it simply doesn't change whether you have a right to watch those films, either way.
        The argument in this case runs the same way, the judge has ruled that, at the very least, there wasn't a valid contract. (The producer was a previously convicted felon, who had legal restrictions as part of his probation against using an alias, and yet used one in representing himself to the actors and in signing their contracts, and who has pled guilty to this, and three other charges including making false statements, He's already convicted and serving time). Presumption of who is "tricking", or tricking whom also follows. You're trying to make this a debate over who may have committed this or that other act of trickery that is yet unproven, and may be just a matter of tort law either way, and ignoring that one side has been convicted of criminal acts, which makes your whole point moot. The contract is invalid, and all the actors have the right to seek protection from the consequences of their involvement. They are threatened with death, and that threat exists as a consequence of whole set of proven criminal acts.
        They have that right in some jurisdictions even if every single one of them suspected, or even knew that the producer was an ex con, or that the law prohibited him from using an alias, just like we can charge one person who planned a bank robbery with murder in the commission of a felony, even though the 'victim' was one of his fellow robbers. But if you want to claim you know for an absolute fact that all the actors knew the producer was committing a crime, go right ahead and claim it. They still have a right to be protected as much as possible from being killed as a consequence of the producer's felonious actions, and you don't have a right to have them put at further risk, whether that feels like your first amendment right is what you're invoking, or not.

Re:In before...

[flyneye]

Its too low budget and obviously biased to be believed. If they had a point made by any fact, it was lost in their enthusiasm to trash Islam.
However this opens the door to Christians taking down Atheist videos, Atheist taking down Christian videos, Islamic taking down Jewish videos, Jews taking down Islamic videos, $cientologists taking down Subgenius videos, Subgenii taking down $cientology videos and Anonymous taking down any server that displeases them.
I think we can live with a few offensive videos and keep everyones grubby mits to their goddamn selves.

Re:Dangerous precedent

[Ralph Wiggam]

The complainant is not a random critic who disagrees with the content of the film. And under normal circumstances, an actor would not have the standing to file a takedown notice either. But this woman claims that she was duped into appearing in the film under unusual circumstances and the judge seemed to agree.

Re:Copyright?

[Ralph Wiggam]

How can someone who performed in a work-for-hire claim copyright?

She's claiming that the work for hire contract was deceptive and is not valid. The judge apparently agrees.

When this story first broke, some people tracked down the film's creator. He seemed like a real scumbag who would certainly be capable of shit like that. He is an Egyptian Coptic Christian, and his people have certainly been fucked over by the Muslim majority in that country. But that movie seems like a terrible idea on many levels.

Actually it won't help.

[Anonymous Coward]

> The publicity can only help Ms. Garcia in this case, as making her disapproval known will likely help stop the death threats.

Actually if there was a fatwa put out with her name on it, then the threats won't stop unless it was rescinded.

In any case, all it does is prove to extremists that death threats are an effective means towards censorship.

Re:May as well be

[Ralph Wiggam]

It's close enough as to make no difference.

Actually it makes a big difference. To file a court case, you have to have "standing". A random person who's pissed off does not qualify. You have to be directly involved in the situation.

I'm also surprised that an actor in a film was able to get any claim of ownership. An actor is expected to know that a movie can change due to rewrites, or editing, or any of the reasons that films normally change between the beginning and the end of the process. But if you can show that the producer was intentionally deceptive- that he planned the whole time to make an anti-Islam hit piece but told the actors something else, then that's a different story.