arstechnica.com — Universal, in court to defend itself for pulling down a dancing baby video clip, tells a judge that its claim was made in good faith. The use may have been "fair," but that doesn't matter; it was still an infringement, and the letter was justified.
Jul 21, 2008 View in Crawl 4
ottoJul 22, 2008
locojones: No, see that's the problem, the whole point of a takedown notice is that the person(s) issuing it have to actually believe that the material is *illegal*. Whether it infringes or not is not the issue.See, you are suggesting that Universal *actually believed* that it was illegal for somebody to post a video of their child playing just because there was incidental Prince music playing in the background.I find that unbelievable. No reasonable person would believe that the material was illegal to distribute. They issued the takedown notice *in bad faith*, because they could not have truly believed that it was illegal.
kidtitanJul 22, 2008
The fork in the road for real artists and consumers is someone truly interested in creating art from the works of another will go through the courtesy and respect for the originating artist and obtain advanced permission prior to work and/or distribution.As a culture, are you suggesting being civil or maintaining decency should be forgo so technology companies can peddle more products?Mechanical, sync, publishing, usage licenses are not mystical nor difficult to obtain. It is that very licensing process that motivates truly talented artists to create and continue to create. And keep many good people employed in the support industry.Have you ever tried to obtain advanced permission? Or are you just showing your lack of understanding and knowledge?
pnunnJul 24, 2008
@waltertxclocker:It's not civil disobedience. It is greed and disrespect for the hard work of others. You are stealing from, in the best case a major label and in the worst case an independent or even the bands themselves. Civil disobedience doesn't take away from private citizens. Between your misuse of that term and the abuse of fair use in this context I think my hope for resolution in the copyright/artist's rights vs. the fair deal for consumers arena is a little more quashed than it was before reading this.Fair use was meant for good things- education, ART, student use. Not this. It was lame to issue the takedown notice- but I can't help but think equating it with fair use and then having the bloody pirate contingent jump on board is an abuse of work that was done for far less selfish reasons.You and your ilk are sickening and you abuse good intentions for the freedom of information for the good of the people by confusing your own selfish hoarding mentality with a crusade for justice in the industry.You are only making things worse. The major labels have taken advantage of the consumers and the artists- but at the first opportunity for democratization the consumers have cannibalized the business. The musicians are eating the cost now- but eventually, the albums won't come like they used to- and then, as usual, people will start to think about what they did only in the darkest hour of the outcome.Yeah, sure, f**k Metallica. They f**ked everything up. SO did the labels. What so many diggers seem oblivious to is that ass-f**king the independents isn't righting the situation. f**k the RIAA too- whatever. Now, if I could just see one of you do something that actually f**ked the RIAA and not someone else.As for this lady and her lawsuit- as someone who worked for a long time on committees formed to preserve and digitize aged masters of MLK speeches in the WSB archives, and who campaigned to make that footage publicly available as well as working to ensure that low bandwidth internet users could have some way of viewing it, I am completely disgusted by this thoughtless abuse of fair use and its intended purpose.
pnunnJul 24, 2008
@ Walt-Making fun of your focus that was limited to correcting your name and not your spelling errors is hardly petty name calling. Nor was that trash talking. You still have yet to take on direct points and your wiki did nothing to support you. I realize where I can go to look up your information- I don't think it is relevant. You spent a while back there masturbating over the nature of civil disobedience yet failed to attach anything you are doing to it effectively. I think, as I stated before, that you keep making fairly obvious statements that you seem to think trump anything said to you.The whole reason we are talking here is your proud announcement of your pirate status being taken on. The premise that it is civil disobedience has yet to be proven.The idea that touring is more expensive than you know is not offset by your claim that no one is entitled to money- especially bearing in mind that it was mentioned in specific reaction to your claims that touring and blah blah was where musicians should get paid. You take no responsibility as a consumer and similarly you keep abandoning responsibility for the comments you made that myself or kidtitan address directly.The fact that you have been reduced to acting as though everything I said was trash talking because I made fun of you correcting me about your name is only further evidence that you have no ready defense beyond the handful of things you keep recklessly trying to apply here that aren't within the scope of any points I made. The truth is, with your little pirate post- you were trash talking if anyone was.Your behavior is the result of consumerism so rampant it has devalued the goods and services that fund its own existence. Your justifications are the result of repeatedly filtering information and selectively avoiding what you don't want to hear. I have yet to deny need for industry change, so refuting my point with that is non-essential. I have yet to deny that musicians need to adapt and my whole career has been founded on that principle and it is why I work when my peers don't.ONE MORE TIME- the initial point was- how is it that when your actions really only affect independent musicians -who may not have the resources to survive despite them- "civil disobedience." Again, I ask, how and to whom is your "civil disobedience" effective or heroic? Stealing from the rich is one thing, but stealing from the poor is another. How have you actually f**ked the RIAA? Show me that much. Show me how stealing a record from a small label that isn't even a member or client of the RIAA hurts the RIAA. That's all I am asking for. The thing is- you can't, because you haven't thought too much about it- and really don't even appear to be able to fully digest the idea. You aren't doing anything but empowering the RIAA and their litigations don't help the indies you shut down either. If you are so concerned with seeing their whole thing shut down, then why do you feed into the system that empowers them?CIvil disobedience would be buying locally, direct from the artists. Avoiding the chains that carry RIAA protected records. Boycotting those protected records. Stealing anything from anybody and telling yourself you are some digital liberator is absurd. Letting musicians know you appreciate what they do can be as simple as making a donation of a dollar. It isn't about whether or not you have to pay- it is about whether or not you can see fit to compensate individuals for entertaining you. Before the record industry and the way of things now- as far back as Vienna and Mozart and even before- there were patrons of the arts. These people funded musicians to take the time to make something worth listening to. They funded it because they wanted to listen to it and they realized the composers could not come up with their great ideas on an empty stomach. They funded it because they wanted to hear it. Sometimes it was a queen, sometimes it was the clergy, sometimes it was private citizens. Either way, it was a mark of class to patronize the arts and a point of pride to have funded a great sonata. If music is important enough to steal- you must attribute it with some value- yet you won't face up to it. But the notion that the time it takes to make it is worth money goes hand in hand with the idea that time IS money. The concept that a relevant cultural contribution requires time and energy and is therefore worth a quantifiable sum of money is not some fiction breathed into life by the RIAA- it is as old as music itself. And for the record- your notions about principles of intellectual property are extremely ignorant to the multiple fields (including the inventors and software creators of the world among others) it is meant to protect. According to you, it would seem- what with your understanding that information is free and no one is entitled to be paid for it- that the patent offices can close for good right now because there is nothing to protect and no one has the right because...uh... I guess because we have computers now? So, Walt (again with the petty name calling- oh how it undoes all I say!)- what do you do exactly? Clearly you don't take much pride in it and will have no problem doing it for free? Am I right? If your employer steals your work, takes credit for you or won't pay you- will you roll over and expect no one to think too hard about it? Oh, and would you mind sending me a free copy of any papers you have ever written, art projects completed and or manuscripts in process so that I might determine which information of yours I might care to liberate on my own?
kidtitanJul 24, 2008
As I explained earlier; yes I have watched the material, and yes I believe Universal's actions are dumb. However that does not change the way current law is written. Material heard is easilyy identified as property of Universal; and not used in a criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research fashion. And posted on YouTube, a for-profit distribution channel.Fair Use's definition is vague as best. No one other than parties involved in infringement has the right to approve or disapprove permission.As the doctrine specifically states: The safest course is always to get permission from the copyright owner before using copyrighted material. The Copyright Office cannot give this permission. YouTube nor Google has right to approve usage nor has reached decision for usage with copyright owners. Just because it was posted does not mean it is legal. Do you have more judgement powers than the copyright office?What I've been talking about is not to presume guilt prior to conviction. Especially in this case, which lady is suing, not Universal. You have presumed Universal's guilt prior to a judge's decision.Let's stop this, your phenomenal arrogance in your own knowledge and self appointed powers of decision is too tiring to continue a worthwhile debate. As much as I don't appreciate your "statements" I grow even more tired of your "suggestions". Find another avenue to continue your crusade, and maybe people with your same mentality of not needing a court decision over a large body of uninformed public's opinion will agree with you.
ottoAug 21, 2008
Dunno if you'll ever read this thread, but now we have a ruling, and guess what: the judge agrees with me.<a class="user" href="http://blog.wired.com/27bstroke6/2008/08/judge-copyright.html">http://blog.wired.com/27bstroke6/2008/08/judge-cop ...</a>Quoting:"Even if Universal is correct that fair use only excuses infringement, the fact remains that fair use is a lawful use of a copyright," U.S. District Judge Jeremy Fogel ruled. "Accordingly, in order for a copyright owner to proceed under the DMCA with 'a good faith belief that use of the material in the manner complained of is not authorized by the copyright owner, its agent, or the law,' the owner must evaluate whether the material makes fair use of the copyright."Fogel added that an "allegation that a copyright owner acted in bad faith by issuing a takedown notice without proper consideration of the fair use doctrine thus is sufficient to state a misrepresentation claim."So there. Now we know. I win.