YouTube Ordered To Remove Videos, Filter Future Uploads By German Court 215
suraj.sun sends this excerpt from Deutsche Welle:
"YouTube was told by a regional court in Hamburg on Friday not to display seven out of 12 contested clips without permission from the German copyright fee collecting society Gema. Gema claimed that its members were losing money every time their music was being displayed on YouTube. A proper licensing fee between the two sides expired in 2009. The Hamburg State Court ruled YouTube would in future have to install an efficient mechanism to filter out such content uploaded by users or face a fine of up to 250,000 euros ($330,000) for each case, or up to six months imprisonment. Knowing that a foolproof filter system looks next to impossible, Gema is now hoping that Google will finally agree to a new bilateral licensing treaty whereby the collecting society would not get an annual lump sum for the contested videos, but a fixed fee each time copyright-protected videos are watched."
Just withdraw from Germany. (Score:5, Insightful)
I hope that Google plays hardball, and simply blacks out Youtube for Germany. The resulting user outcry would then be turned against Gema.
If not filterable... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Or... (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm picturing a brutally honest landing page, explaining why.
The unfortunate part is that they can't afford to do that here in the US.
Re:IP wars will lead to scorched earth tactics (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, more to the point, once those Gema represented figured out that they had just lopped off their own noses despite their face, it's likely Google would be in the far stronger position at the bargaining table.
At the end of the day, Youtube holds all the cards. It's the most visited video delivery site on the planet. You can be sure that if 80 million Germans suddenly found a message saying "Because of your courts and GEMA you will no longer be able to use YouTube", it wouldn't be long before GEMA came crawling back begging.
Re:Just withdraw from Germany. (Score:3, Insightful)
And then ... (Score:5, Insightful)
"... the collecting society would not get an annual lump sum for the contested videos, but a fixed fee each time copyright-protected videos are watched ..."
And then start paying people to watch the videos.
Profit!
Re:If not filterable... (Score:5, Insightful)
Gema will do that for them. It's a very simple calculation after all: something like 90% of the videos will have some Gema affiliate copyrighted music (if not more, if you ask them), then take the number of hits to YouTube from German IP addresses, well 90% of that number times a license fee of say E 0,50 a song (still give or take a 50% discount on the iTunes price) gives the number Google must pay.
OK, I think the "pull out of Germany" option might be the cheaper one after all. Never mind.
the vulnerability of single gatekeepers (Score:2, Insightful)
This is the problem with allowing single entities (no matter HOW they are intentioned) to be the gatekeepers to the internet. It makes the entire system vulnerable to censorship. The more diverse it is, the more resilient it is.
So remind me again: why is it that we seem to want to allow a few giant companies like Facebook and Google to control all our content?
Re:Just withdraw from Germany. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:the vulnerability of single gatekeepers (Score:4, Insightful)
Because when you have dozens of smaller players, none of them have the warchest available to defend your rights and will, instead, capitulate to the smallest demand. When you have mammoth agencies who are interested in protecting the internet (more Google, less Facebook), you will also have the mammoth warchest to fund it.
If you had a dozen smaller players competing for video bandwidth in Germany, you'd get some paying the licensing fee, others pulling out, with a net effect that Gema gets money while there is no outcry from German citizens. WIth Google/Youtube, you first got an actual court case, and pulling out of Germany becomes a real, viable response that will likely result in a lot of complaining by German citizens, which is much more likely to get the government of Germany to look at legislative options to tone down Gema and entice Youtube to return.
Re:Just withdraw from Germany. (Score:5, Insightful)
Right there with you, and I'm in Germany. I have to use tor for about two videos in five anyway, so they might as well block it completely and generate some political pressure against these asshats. Pirate party's already polling at around 10% these days; a bit more blatant censorship will just make the network rights issue even bigger.
Losing money each time watched... make me laugh (Score:5, Insightful)
Without youtube most of these people's works would have faded from public view or remained obscure.
Re:the vulnerability of single gatekeepers (Score:2, Insightful)
available to defend your rights and will, instead
So your assertion is that youtube cares about defending my rights?
*blink*
Uhhh.. sure they do.
They'll do what causes them least financial harm, and that is all. Big companies have a long history of caving into censorship demands. The ONLY viable defence is to not put all our eggs in one basket.
Re:Just withdraw from Germany. (Score:2, Insightful)
What makes you think that GEMA wouldn't get the German court to force the same compliance on the competitors?
No (Score:5, Insightful)
Google should comply wit the court order by blocking these videos. Ideally, they should block them by redirecting users to videos by bands not controlled by Gema with a message as to why they were redirected. If the users like the redirected videos enough, well that solves the problem completely.
Re:YouTube hasn't been the same since Google takeo (Score:4, Insightful)
That's because opponents see YouTube as a piggy bank that you can shake and make it rain money.
Re:Just withdraw from Germany. (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Just withdraw from Germany. (Score:5, Insightful)
As much as I dislike the USA's actions with regard to IP law, this article has absolutely nothing to do with US IP law or any of its cartels. Instead, it's about a German copyright cartel, though it's interestingly causing the exact same kind of problems (if not worse) that its US peers have been causing.
Don't blame the USA for BS going on in Germany. There's plenty of legitimate stuff to blame us for.