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Comments: 145 +- Your Rights Online: Music Rights Holders Sue YouTube Again on Saturday October 24, @08:17AM
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bennyboy64 writes "NewTeeVee reports on a criminal investigation that has been launched against senior executives of YouTube and parent company Google in Hamburg, Germany over allegations of copyright infringement. The case started after a complaint was filed by German music rights holders. Hamburg's prosecutor has formally requested assistance from US colleagues to compel YouTube to produce log files identifying who uploaded as well as who viewed 500 specific videos."
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Performance != Observance (Score:4, Interesting)
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Previously only downloading computer software (including games of course too) was illegal. I think that changed in many EU countries some years ago, and now also downloading music and movies and other copyrighted content is illegal. That would obviously include listening aka downloading from YouTube too.
Re:Performance != Observance (Score:5, Interesting)
Now with what they are trying to do, you might get your happy, cat-loving self sued, because the guy that put the video up was using copyrighted music, and you watched it. Now, i know there is the whole "not knowing the law is no excuse for violating it" thing, but there has to be a practical limit.
At this point, we know that youtube mutes videos with copyrighted music, or replaces it with music that is public domain, or removes the video entirely at times, just to protect grouchy rights holders. Armed with this knowledge, you expect to be able to watch videos on youtube, without the risk of getting in trouble for 'receiving stolen goods' and/or 'pirating music' (Because it got loaded into your ram in a temporary cache?) Who set this stupid precedent anyways?).
Hopefully, this case will set some decent standards so that don't treat the public like guilty before proven innocent criminals.
Parent
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The good thing however is that courts are usually quite sensible (well here atleast, probably not in USA) and look in to the purposes too. They would most likely laugh off a company that sues a person for randomly watching a video from YouTube that contained copyrighted music track. You'd have more ground when you bring in a case where the person had downloaded 100,000+ music tracks from P2P networks, knowing well that they were copyrighted.
That being said, even the antipiracy companies here have never went
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Well, when I'm forced to go to court, I'll b sure to bring a small boombox so the judge can be liable for copyright infringement too.
Because you copy the work into RAM (Score:3, Informative)
Can somebody please explain to me why it is apparently illegal to simply receive or observe a performance that violates a copyright? I was of the impression that only the distributing party would be liable.
Because you copy the work into your computer's RAM to view it. There is an exception in countries' copyright laws covering necessary short-term copies, such as 17 USC 117 and foreign counterparts, but a lot of these exceptions cover copies only from those copies that are lawfully made.
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That is a pretty ridiculous argument (spare me the citations, I'm sure there are 14 judges out there that have upheld it nonetheless).
When I listen to music from the radio it ends up being embedded in my memory - and yet I don't need a license to listen to the music.
I don't really have a major problem with copyright, but it is something that should be exclusively applied to people distributing things, not people who receive them. P2P technology is a gray area - I'm actually not opposed to liability there b
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Those with money make the rules.
It's a fucked up state of affairs, and the general public is hopefully hard at work trying to put the MAFIAA out of the rule-making business, but it's going to get worse before it gets better.
Re:Performance != Observance (Score:5, Insightful)
That may be true but if the majority of the rules don't at least maintain a somewhat convincing pretense of being for the good of everyone than everyone starts to loose respect for all the rules not just the stupid and or unjust ones. You end up with the collapse of society into a state of practical lawlessness.
Then if your lucky you get a fairly popular revolution that leads to a fairly stable new society for a period of time. If you are less lucky you get an endless parade of strongmen slugging it out for power. These folks in turn produce equally abhorrent laws that the majority appear to respect out of fear but passive aggressively work to undermine the system until its weak enough that the next strongman takes his turn.
You can see the pattern across just about every culture and time period in history.
Parent
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Personally I think this is great. The country I live in (Sweden) has made downloading illegal, as well as uploading. Everyone assumes that copyright infringment is something that only takes place on piratebay. Here is an example that shows how unintelligent it is to criminalize the person downloading something since more or less everyone assumes that if it's on youtube, it must be legal.
Imagine the law Nicolas Sarkozys is trying to pass in EU (three accusations of copyright infringment and you're banned fro
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But what if I want to have a laugh at the Lumberjack song and view it? A copyright holder could definately claim that the uploading of the Lumberjack song is infringement, and thus also the downloading.
Your point is generally correct, but Monty Python is not a good example. That comedy group actually has its own YouTube channel, where they have uploaded clips http://www.youtube.com/user/MontyPython [youtube.com]. The channel includes at least one performance of the Lumberjack song http://www.youtube.com/user/MontyPython#p/c/CDFEA6D52E5CC0EC [youtube.com], so they probably would not mind if you watch it...
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i think the world needs to view the internet as a separate country from the rest of the world. there has to be a set of regulations governing the use of the internet. for that to happen, a group has to be set up to agree what is universally and globally seen as criminal behaviour and then apply it to the internet. it can't be "this count
Re:Performance != Observance (Score:4, Funny)
Parent
Re:Performance != Observance (Score:5, Insightful)
Because Copyright is Sacred.
Copyright now essentially resembles a religious institution. Modern proscriptions on the copying and redistribution of data in the digital age resemble, if anything, proscriptions on the distribution of translations of the Bible in the 1500's at the advent of the printing press. In both cases the technology exists that enables people to transmit information freely and cheaply. In both cases, this new ability threatens the monopoly of an established order. In both cases, that order goes to extreme and unreasonable lengths to defend a status quo that has become farcical.
So, like the bishops of old, the copyright industry is forced to extreme measures. Attack anyone, at any time, anywhere who seeks to defend or aid or in any way comfort those who break their canon, and do so with the utmost ferocity possible. Our modern legal system enables them to be as vindictive as they like with all the power of the courts behind the. Youtube is and always will be a prime target of their ire, being as it is, the bazaar of modern user content generation and distribution. If they can, they will send the state to smash and tear down the stalls seen here, and send all the meddlers packing. But, they are forgetting the forces that created the bazaar in the first place.
As the supply becomes infinite, what happens to the price? As people have the ability to copy and now distribute data, text, music and movies at virtually zero cost, why is this data worth anything anymore? Trying to argue about creators rights or fairness or legalities is to sidestep the main issue; the data is fundamentally worth zero. Attempt as you like to construct sophistic or legal or moral arguments around this. But you have sidesteped this main issue, and its fundamental and central issue is aptly demonstrated by the stampede of ordinary people from all walks of life crashing through it and filesharing as they see fit. The public has made its decision.
You can protest. You can condemn. You can litigate. But ultimately your position is like that of church leaders who protested against the popular printed Bible. People aren't listening. No argument or law or sermon is going to dissuade them from breaking laws they think are silly or unjust. The concept of copyright is too abstract a thing for most people to see breaking it as criminal. The cost of digital distribution too low for most to see its content as being worth anything. The internet has fundamentally changed the nature of content and copyright in a way just as profound as the printing press and the general public has very quickly woken up to this fact. It's time for our legal system to do the same.
Parent
Price != Value (Score:4, Informative)
As the supply becomes infinite, what happens to the price? As people have the ability to copy and now distribute data, text, music and movies at virtually zero cost, why is this data worth anything anymore?
I disagree with your terminology here. Not your argument or conclusion (I have yet to take a stand on those), but your terminology.
(maybe that makes me a pedantic, but so be it. If the mods don't like this, oh well; I have karma to burn and I'm willing to have it be burned to say what I want to say.)
Value and price are two differen things. Value is, roughly speaking, how much we like having something and/or how badly we want it. Price is the amount of resources we trade away to get it.
I value much of the software I run. I value listening to JT Bruce's "A skeptic's Hypothesis". I value watching "Big Buck Bunny". But I pay aprice of 0 for all of these. (There's a transaction cost toall of these, sure, but no price).
What will happen to the value as supply rises? Pretty much nothing. The price will likely drop to zero. Also, people might get a closer approximation of their real preferences if there is more competition.
But they'll still like listening to $BAND just as much.
(someone used to call this "value in trade" versus "value in use"; I think it was a greek, but you're armed with the power of Google, so use it if you need.)
Parent
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It can be argued that printing made culture possible. Before the invention of printing, the production of c
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"The copyright system was designed with concepts like the internet in mind."??? No it wasn't bud. It was designed to give the cronies of the crown rights to make money from someone else's work. Then the idea came along that it would be better for the ARTIST to get the rights and not be under the whips of the DISTRIBUTORS so copyright was given to the ARTIST.
Well 180 years later and we have the distributors again owning the rights and stomping all over both sides.
Given you got that so horrendously wrong, wha
Re:Performance != Observance (Score:5, Informative)
This breakdown of the cost of a typical major-label release by the independent market-research firm Almighty Institute of Music Retail shows where the money goes for a new album with a list price of $15.99.
$0.17 Musicians' unions
$0.80 Packaging/manufacturing
$0.82 Publishing royalties
$0.80 Retail profit
$0.90 Distribution
$1.60 Artists' royalties
$1.70 Label profit
$2.40 Marketing/promotion
$2.91 Label overhead
$3.89 Retail overhead
http://www.rollingstone.com/news/story/6558540/walmart_wants_10_cds [rollingstone.com]
When the label _profits_ are greater than the artist royalties, and when online retailers want to charge me almost the same as if they were selling me a CD, the moral urge to buy music is weak.
Parent
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That's your prerogative; you may choose whichever artist you like based on their label. That still doesn't justify piracy. In that case, the artist's royalties would be less $1.60 per album.
As a side note, part of being with a label is that you have the highest chance of getting good sales, and the label takes half (or more) as insurance. If the artist didn't like it, they shouldn't have signed with them.
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This is indeed true. But, as in the case of copyright infringement, when so many people across political, social, cultural, economic and national boundaries have all simultaneously reached the same conclusion with regard to filesharing, this tells us at least that our current copyright laws are in need of modernisation and reform.
At this poi
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There's no law against receiving or observing copyrighted material. In that case, the liable party would indeed be the distributing party. If you seek it out, or copy it yourself, then you may be liable yourself.
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Downloading copyrighted material (without having the right to do so) is illegal atleast in Sweden and Finland since some years ago, and since Germany is in EU too and they're trying to get info on the downloaders aswell I suspect it's the same thing there.
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Nice try at appearing multilingual, however, I would suggest using a different internet translator next time as your statement makes no sense.
If you wanted to say "We are germans, what can you really expect?", that would be "Wir sind Deutsche, was erwarten Sie?"
P.S. great captcha: condom... he he - the robotic overlord says it in a rather excited way
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He was probably using Google Translate
If we accidentally watched a German video (Score:2, Interesting)
...can we sue the musician?
Well, nothing new here... (Score:3, Informative)
Nothing beats a failure like failing again!
Crazy (Score:4, Informative)
i suppose (Score:4, Interesting)
They have no business in knowing who viewed them (Score:5, Interesting)
They have no business in knowing who viewed the videos. After all, since YouTube explicitly disables videos which are infringing, I have to assume that if I see a video on YouTube, I have the right to do so. If a video happens to be uploaded illegally, that's not my fault as viewer, and I cannot be made responsible for the fact that I was shown that video.
Just for the record: I don't have any idea whether I've seen any of those videos. Since those are just 500 videos, and YouTube has so many more, I suspect I haven't. But even if I have, I have done nothing wrong, and therefore they clearly have no moral right (and I really hope also no legal right, although in these times you never can be sure) to demand to find out whether I've seen any of those videos.
I hope I'll not have to start using anonymous proxies to protect myself when just doing normal, legal activities!
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If there is any successful attempt to hold viewers accountable for infringement by watching the videos than it seems to me that entire Internet is useless for anyone withing reach of German law. How can an end user ever begin to ensure that any of the content on any site they might be visiting has been licenses appropriately or is not otherwise infringing?
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I have to assume that if I see a video on YouTube, I have the right to do so. If a video happens to be uploaded illegally, that's not my fault as viewer, and I cannot be made responsible for the fact that I was shown that video.
Not that US law is relevant to Germans, but USC 17504(c)(2):
(...) In a case where the infringer sustains the burden of proving, and the court finds, that such infringer was not aware and had no reason to believe that his or her acts constituted an infringement of copyright, the court in its discretion may reduce the award of statutory damages to a sum of not less than $200.
Or the short version: Yes, you can.
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You aren't. You're supposed to pay up for each and every item you ever view, hear, watch, or play.
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Plus, how are you (the viewer) supposed to know if the video infringes anything until you have WATCHED it? You can not possibly go by the title! Have you seen how some of the vids are titled? They often have little or NOTHING to do with the video content.
And even after you have watched it, how are you really supposed to know the legal status of the video? It is not like you know if the uploaded has written permission or anything!
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Not to mention that YouTube always takes the middle of the video for the thumbnail. Some uploaders are abusing that to post completely unrelated videos with the middle few seconds being what they want the thumbnail to be.
YouTube should make the thumbnails from random places so that uploaders can't fake them so easily.
Pretty much makes Europe offlimits, doesn't it? (Score:2, Insightful)
...as well as who viewed 500 specific videos
The possibility of being dragged into a German court just because you viewed something is a game-changer, I'd say.
You'd have to weigh the potential time and money lost responding to German legal proceedings against just how bad you want to see any website that is within reach of the German legal system - unless you know the contents of all Flash animations and other media for the entire website in advance .
Does Google accept !GermanContent as a query modifier?
What? They're f#@$ing with YouTube again? (Score:2)
Just wait until Hitler finds out. He's going to snap, man.
Again? But that trick NEVER works! (Score:2)
You know something is seriously wrong if... (Score:2)
Put up the take-down order NAMING THE PARTIES (Score:2)
instead of the video so we can all see exactly who is asking for this.
It would make an acceptable policy for me and let me know that working for objected to this.
It would let us know who's who exactly and would stop the lawyers from scurrying back under their rocks.
Shine a bright light on these copyright infringements, the infringers and the protectors.
Something like:
"This video removed on order on working for pursuant to a decision taken on .
Click here for a link to a PDF of the court decision.
Click he
NAZIS! National Socialists! (Score:2)
Sorry. It was just the first thing that popped into my head when I read this: "Hamburg's prosecutor has formally requested assistance from US colleagues to compel YouTube to produce log files identifying who uploaded as well as who viewed 500 specific videos."
I better build a secret room above my neighbors' house so I can hide. Once the Germans get ahold of my name I'll be doomed.
Rampant Greed (Score:2)
The greed of the music/video industry is only exceeded by those in the oil business.
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You have no idea of modern art. You still think art has to be something traditional like music, paintings etc. Actually they are producing legal art by using the law in creative ways (and creativity is the base of art, isn't it?) and performance art where the performance is done by lawyers in the courtroom.
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i could not agree more. there are lots of things that i've found clips of on youtube that lead me to finding and buying CD's of that work.
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Oh, and if you delete the po