Rumblefish Claims It Owns 'America the Beautiful' By United States Navy Band 97
ptorrone writes: Adafruit is now shipping the USA-made open-source Arduinos. In celebration Ladyada the engineer posted an Arduino rotating in front of an American flag with the public domain "America the Beautiful" by the United States Navy Band as background music. Adafruit immediately received notice from from YouTube stating that the song is owned by Rumblefish. Rumblefish previously claimed to own copyright to ambient birdsongs, too.
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it was the Christmas display that violated copyright if the music wasn't licensed for broadcast (and I opined that it was licensed), not me.
Are you sure that's the case? Let's consider that you made advertising money on the video, would the makers of the Christmas display still be considered at fault and liable to pay the publisher/author based on how much money you made?
My question is serious, I don't know, but I suspect that
1) the end user is ultimately at fault... although they may have recourse if the product was sold under a false claim
and 2) the fact of infringement does not consider whether profit was made (but damages may bring that in
Re:Copyright trolls are rampant on YouTube, making (Score:5, Interesting)
Got a list? Make it a video! A paragraph of text? Video! Series of static pictures? One picture and a line of text for a FAQ? Two bar charts? video, video, video! And watch that revenue pour in. It's fucking ridiculous and it's transparent. Don't use video format unless your information is best presented by video dammit!
Re:Copyright trolls are rampant on YouTube, making (Score:4, Interesting)
Reading your comment brings back the memories of when I was briefly working on a Drupal project. The firm impression I came away with is that the Drupal community prefers to document things by making a half-hour video rather than by writing a page of text, even though written documentation could be read and re-read several times in the time it takes to watch the video.
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There are ads on youtube? No wonder there's so much crap coming from there. "Please watch this ten minute video where I tell you some news that is shorter than this sentence." And all the ridiculous "please subscribe" crap, and "remember to 'like' us" like it was some stupid facebook clone.
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> I posted a video on YouTube of a singing Christmas display that used copyrighted music and there was a copyright violation complaint filed with YouTube on that, and I claimed Fair Use protection because it was the Christmas display that violated copyright if the music wasn't licensed for broadcast (and I opined that it was licensed), not me.
That's not fair use.
Prior Art Exists (tm) ... (Score:2)
each armed services band has filmed both the national anthem and American the Beautiful as sign-on /sign-off video for TV stations since the 1950s. those freebie films were sent gratis to all licensed stations. anybody who wants to fight need just get some copies of those promos and authenticate their release dates through the public affairs group of each service.
tldr: algorithm isn't 100% accurate 100% of times (Score:1)
404 no news found
Clearly they haven't checked my patent (Score:2)
On a method and process for conveying meaning or emotion via modulation of ambient air pressure (using a computer, of course).
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Unless you write software....
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But ... but ... it's "on a computer"! And even "on the internet"!
That's twice the reason to throw sense and logic out the window!
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That sounds suspiciously like my patent on aural telepathy. Expect to hear from my lawyers.
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But won't he be violating your patent again when he "hears" from your lawyers?
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not if it is personal use
Penalty for obvious false claims (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Penalty for obvious false claims (Score:5, Interesting)
There should just be a penalty that is paid whenever a false claim is made. If you are making legal claims that you own content, you should be able to back that up. If you are using bots to automate that process, you should still be held accountable for their mistakes.
Re:Penalty for obvious false claims (Score:5, Interesting)
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The standard when it is the other way around is triple the damages, so tripe would be just fair.
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I'm still partial to that tactical nuclear strike.
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He's talking about legal claims, not just asserting something.
Re:Penalty for obvious false claims (Score:5, Insightful)
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Please reply if you think eternity getting their guts ripped out by demons and being force-fed their own excrement and piles of flaming coals, while being skull-fucked by enraged hell-bears (or whatever it is, I never paid much attention to mythology,) is inadequate for copyright trolls, and write-in what YOU believe would be a more appropriate comeuppance. Thanks!
No -- copyright trolls are doing us a very important service. The people who need to have their guts ripped out by demons etc are the assholes who wrote the laws that have these horrible abusive provisions which the intellectual property trolls are so elegantly demonstrating.
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To easy to be gamed, just put a flat fee to process a DMCA claim to the web site owner. That will stop the robotic spam and general harassment.
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Once again we should work toward getting back to common law. A number of states have made Barratry at thing again, thankfully. What should happen is if you are right and you know your right you just ignore the bogus legal letter. If they then take you to court anyway. You phone up the local prosecutor who should go after them for filing baseless claims.
In Texas at least for repeat offenses it can be a felony! We should aim for that everywhere.
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How would that help? Barratry is only relevant when suits are being filed, and that's not the case with DMCA abuse. They don't take you to court: they just threaten to take the host to court, and the host folds because they don't see it as their fight.
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Because they generate enough legal business to have lawyers on retainer and thus pay no incremental costs for more suits. You, of course, enjoy no such advantage.
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There is. All you have to do is file a take down notice about the take down notice. At which point, Youtube can put it back up until a court actually rules on the issue.
To date, the courts have not been kind when someone actually stood up and challenged bullshit DMCA requests.
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To date, the courts have not been kind when someone actually stood up and challenged bullshit DMCA requests.
That's disappointing. Can you share some examples?
Harrassment and frivolity (Score:1)
Isn't there anything in the law to penalize frivolous claims of ownership as harassment? Copyright does not need to be defended as voraciously as trademark, so there is no need for them to keep pumping the entire Youtube side through algorithms and blindly send takedown notices.
Even if there were, well-- you'll have to hire employees to vet the hits. That's the cost of doing business.
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
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how many YouTube contributors want to/can afford to pay for a lawyer to sue over what, at best, would be a tiny, measured in pennies, royalty check?
Call the EFF, they tend to do well about this sort of thing, for little to no cost.
Barbarians at the Gate... (Score:1)
This is another example of what I call "barbarians at the gate". I didn't come up with that phrase. I don't remember where I first came into contact with that phrase.
The idea, as best as I can recall, is something like this: The empire won't fall simply because of the increasing decadence of the empire. It falls because it eventually gets weak enough that the barbarians, ever-present at the gate, can bring it down with a simple raid.
These people are "barbarians at the gate". They don't care that they are tr
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And, according to a documentary with the dude from that BBC automobile show (I do not watch much TV but I like documentaries), it is a word that is meant to sound like it is interpreted. (I forgot that word too. Like moo, woof, etc... I am too lazy to look it up.) Anyhow, the claim was that the word was from 'bar bar" which is how a gibberish speaking foreigner would have sounded to them. The dude was the one that they fired from the BBC show, Clarkson maybe? The documentary was something like The Brainy Ba
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Thank you! The post that I made was awful as I could not actually remember a damned one of the details while also being too damned lazy to look it up.
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navy seals are on there way.
What baffles me is.... (Score:2)
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If this scum has a history of making false claims then why are they still allowed to make claims at all? Better yet, why haven't they been banned from Youtube altogether?
Alice posts a video using music that Bob owns the copyright to. Carol posts a video that uses music Bob falsely claims to also hold the copyright for. Unfortunately Bob's false claim against Carol doesn't change the fact that he actually does have a legitimate legal claim against Alice's video. So kicking him off the system means he's going to issue a takedown against Alice. The whole point of bringing him into the system was to give him an incentive to leave Alice alone.
The problem here isn't Bob and A
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The problem here isn't Bob and Alice -- that part of the scenario is working fine. The problem is Bob and Carol. There's no incentive for Bob not to make false claims against Carol. That's the bit that has to be fixed.
Bob, Carol, and Alice get along much better when Ted is added to the mix.
Crying wolf (Score:2)
I think the idea is that too many Carols and Bob ought to lose the right to cry wolf against Alice.
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A knowingly false DMCA claim is perjury. A copyright owner that cries wolf with the big megaphone of the DMCA could be looking at doing hard time.
Typical Slashdot... (Score:1)
They're omitting a really, really important point here in the OP..they barely hint at it in the title, but that's it. The claim isn't against the music itself; it's against a recording of a specific performance of it. That performance is, actually, copyrightable.
Here's another way to look at it. Let's say someone uses the song "Dear Prudence," off the album by the Beatles, in a movie. They owe royalties to the owner of the library that holds the rights to that. But let's say they use "Dear Prudence," t
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Not sure, but aren't works made by the US Government not covered by copyright?
Re:Typical Slashdot... (Score:5, Informative)
From the link:
"
America the beautiful / Samuel Ward [sound recording], Title: America the beautiful [sound recording] instrumental and vocal, Composer: Ward, Samuel. Arranger(s) Dragon, Carmen. Performing Ensemble: United States Navy Band. Lyricist: Bates, Katharine Lee. Publisher(s): Department of Defense. Form: sound recording.
Note(s): Taken from CD entitled: “Remembering the Navy Hour.” Featuring the Navy Band and Sea Chanters. Recorded by Sheffield Recording, Ltd., Inc. at the George Mason University Center for the Arts Concert Hall.
Credit: Performing Arts Encyclopedia, Library of Congress.
This Composition is in the public domain because its copyright has expired. This applies to the United States, where Works published prior to 1978 were copyright protected for a maximum of 75 years. See Circular 1 “COPYRIGHT BASICS” from the U.S. Copyright Office. Works published before 1923 are now in the public domain.
This composition is also in the public domain in countries that figure copyright from the date of death of the artist (post mortem auctoris) in this case Katharine Lee Bates (words), (August 12, 1859 â March 28, 1929), Samuel Augustus Ward (tune) (28 December 1847 â 28 September 1903), and that most commonly runs for a period of 50 to 70 years from December 31 of that date.
This media file is a work of a U.S. Department of Defense employee, made during the course of the person’s official duties. As a work of the U.S. federal government, the media file is in the public domain.
Generally speaking, works created by U.S. Government employees are not eligible for copyright protection in the United States. See Circular 1 “COPYRIGHT BASICS” from the U.S. Copyright Office.
"
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Music is not free! Someone stole this music and should be locked up as a thief. All music belongs to members of the RIAA.
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Tennille was the only girl to be a Beach Boy. Fact.
Re:Typical Slashdot... (Score:5, Informative)
Except for the fact that all works by U.S. Government employees in the line of duty are by default public domain, and not eligible for any copyright protection at all.
So I seriously doubt that the US Navy has an agreements with Rumblefish or any other organizations to collect royalties for their performance. It wouldn't be legal if they did.
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I would assume from the name that "Sheffield Recording, Ltd., Inc." is a company, and not a person, so not a government employee.
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Oh, hmm... It seems that US copyright law gives the exclusive rights for a sound recording to its "author" and then doesn't much clarify who that is. The US Copyright Office's guide "Copyright Registration for Sound Recordings" says unhelpfully: "The author of a sound recording is the performer(s) or record producer or both." Okay, which of those?
In practice, this isn't usually an issue for commercial recordings, because whoever is paying the bills makes everyone sign away any potential rights. But that mig
Hold them liable (Score:4, Informative)
Reuters claimed to own Nasa's video of the 1969 Moon Landings
CD Baby claimed ownership of music by an artist sang by the artist and used with their permission.
I have frequent claims on classical music especially military marches that are clearly out of copyright and are live performances.
The organization should lose all rights to claim copyright via youtube's content id after one false claim of copyright.
Youtube should also be liable for allowing blatantly false claims once they have received notification of the copyright status of public domain works.
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Wrong, we should penalize them to that extent, these are parasites on the human race, stagnating the normal process of adopting artistic works into culture.
Re:Hold them liable (Score:5, Insightful)
Strenuously disagree. This is more than a billing error here, it is an implicit threat of expensive legal action wrapped in a takedown that at the least interferes with someone's free expression. They need to take it seriously or go away.
Civilization has long understood the dangers of crying wolf and even has a number of fables about it in order to teach young children not to do it.
They are welcome to use their algorithm as a screening test, but they shouldn't be claiming ownership of things without human verification. Since their algorithm must have some 'idea' what it thinks the work is, it should only take a few seconds per filing to have a human verify that what is playing is what the algorithm thinks it is.
Perhaps the ban on the easy method of making a claim should expire after a time, but the message is fairly clear: If they prove they are unable to responsibly use a largely automated system, they will be forced to do it manually in order to force them to consider each case more carefully. It may even be acceptable to grant them 3 strikes rather than 1, but only if they issue a personal (hand written) apology from their CEO to the person they wrongly claimed against.
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Pulling someone's content from a free hosting service isn't "a threat of expensive legal action". The content is pulled; no further action required. If you can convince the free hosting service that they really do want your content, then great; otherwise you are entitled to redress in the form of getting your $0 back.
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Actually, it is. You get a choice, lose your free expression, or risk legal action by formally denying the DMCA claim in the hope of getting your own work back in the public view.
BTW, the DMCA also applies to paid hosting, and self hosting.
They just need testicle stomping from us all (Score:1)
Here is a family member through father (Wikipedia link below of Henry Clay Work)..
but looking through the list of songs *there* I didn't find "America the Beautiful" which I'm pretty sure I found published that way in an old song book compiled from Henry Clay Work's old songs my family had when I was a kid. My Father has passed, and the book could be anywhere by now.
.
I would have like to have found it, just to send it to whomever those assholes are with a big 'Fuck You!' and perhaps someday a good ass-kicki
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This ATB probably is copyrighted (Score:1)
Three Strike (Score:3)
So what should be done in the mean time (Score:3)
Let's see. Find all the public domain songs that others claim copyrights to. Create videos - lots of videos. Post to all the video sites. Repeat until the problem is fixed. Gives the trolls something to do to.
One small issue (Score:2)
America the Beautiful was not written by the United States Navy Band. They are, obviously, one of the groups that performed it.
Not sure if the tune in question was synthesized or if this was a playback of a USNB recording. Being modern, it could be that someone owns rights to the USNB's recordings. (Although I find it VERY strange that a commercial entity would hold rights to a government band.)
If it was just the melody, that predates America the Beautiful based on the sources I can find quickly. (yeah,