Posting Soccer Goals On Vine Is Illegal, Say England's Premier League

New submitter JonnyCalcutta writes: The football Premier League in England is warning about posting clips of goals on online services such as Vine and Twitter. The claim is that posting these clips is "illegal under copyright laws." I'm naturally dubious about blanket statements from rightsholders already known to push the truth, especially concerning such short clips, but I don't know enough about copyright law to understand the implications fully. Is it illegal? What can they actually do about it? Does adding commentary give the uploader any rights to post?

Comments

Pinch of salt needed

[Anonymous Coward]

They have a history of lying about copyright (claiming the the fixture list was copyrightable - they even sued over it, their legal arguments bordering on the vexatious).

No doubt they hold the copyright to their footage of the matches, but whether they can claim copyright over all video of the match regardless of origin is dubious at best. Where's the creative aspect required?

Re:Pinch of salt needed

[wonkey_monkey]

They are claiming copyright over their own footage.

The phenomena at question is that of people uploading mobile phone footage of TV footage, not of their own video of the match.

Re: Pinch of salt needed

[sg_oneill]

There is something called a "fair dealing" excemption that is recognized for british copyright.

Theres a case that pretty much specifically shows the premier league hasn't a leg to stand on.

Back in 1991 the BBC sued British Satelite broadcasting for showing clips of between 14 seconds to 30 seconds of goals , sometimes in slow motion, and the like from the 1990 world cup taken from BBC footage. The BBC said it had exclusive rights from FIFA therefore the BSB had no rights to rebroadcast the clips.

The court disagreed and found that the short clips where covered under fair dealing provisions and that it was ok to take the small clips and rebroadcast it.

Further under the Restricted Practice Act its possible to show that such exclusivity deals can *sometimes* be considered invalid as anti-trust , particularly if the exclusivity is for pay-to-view events covered under scheduled Listed Events.

In a nutshell, I suspect this is an empty threat and the premier league would have trouble convincing a court that a contract between it and the exclusive broadcaster somehow binds a third party who never agreed to it and thus has recourse to normal rights associated with copyright fair dealing.

Laws vary by country.

[gurps_npc]

So what may be illegal in England is not necessary illegal in the United States.

In the United States, you are definitely allowed to show a short clip of the the guy starting at the kick and ending at the goal.

Merely putting a comment under the video is unlikely to help your legal case in any country. But burning a voice over into the video would add 'original content' to it, and that might give you more rights.

Re:"Does adding commentary give rights"

[SydShamino]

Speaking for U.S. law, you understand copyright wrong. The fair use doctrine allows for use of copyrighted works for the purpose of "criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research".

Part of the criteria for determining if use of a copyrighted work is fair use includes the "amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole", so, for example, if I were to post a Vine video of a goal, along with commentary like "Manchester United played a great game today, with three goals including this exciting one by Bob Smith", then I am (your pick) commenting, critiquing, or reporting on the entire hour and a half game, while posting a five second clip of that game. In the U.S., that is clearly fair use unless the other side's lawyers have more money than you do.

I realize this story is about England, but I'm relatively certain that every Slashdot commenter including the parent is discussing this in terms of U.S. law, so I did as well.

Re:PL = Honorable Institution.

[Stargoat]

So because Suarez is in the UK, when speaking in his native tongue, he uses a word that sounds like nigger, he is automatically a racist? This word negrito, btw, a word Suarez's grandmother still calls him.

So much for the most cosmopolitan league in the world. It's no wonder that all the best players are leaving for Spain. I never thought the country of Wilberforce would be so racist in the 21st century as to make the USA look tolerant in comparison.