Big Win for User-Generated Content Hosts in Vimeo Case | Hacker News Reader

Big Win for User-Generated Content Hosts in Vimeo Case

eff.org

58 pointsdwaxe7 comments

Glad to see this. I just subscribed to the Vimeo $60 plan in order to upload my daughter's Irish dance recital.

YouTube flagged the audio as infringing on some commercial recording even though it was a live performance of very old traditional tunes; apparently the software matched three jigs to someone's CD version. They put the burden of proof on me,caught in an overly wide net. Luckily Vimeo's more laissez faire.

I was pushed over to Vimeo for similar reasons. I uploaded a game trailer (that the publisher had given me rights to use) to YouTube, and immediately after the upload finished was given the message "This video has been removed due to a Terms of Service violation". No further details or way to contact YT were given, so I decided at that point to look at alternative hosts.

For copyright violation, the only option I was presented with was to send an appeal to the copyright holder.

Youtube just passes the buck to some copyright holder who in my case at least was completely unrelated to my recording, other than coincidental order of tunes. I don't know, maybe three traditional tunes played in that particular order can be copyrighted, though that's a bit ridiculous. Thousands of performances of traditional music would suddenly be infringing.

I was happy to give Vimeo my money to get around this, and I doubt I'll be giving Youtube money for any of their commercial offerings, until they can straighten this mess out. I do understand they're probably overwhelmed with sheer volume, but still.

And, of course, I've never heard back from the copyright holder, who has no incentive to get involved.

Do Second Circuit decisions affect areas outside of the second district (NY, VT, CT)? If not, is the location of the host that matters?

As I understand it, and I have a weak understanding, the judgement only has a direct, enforceable effect on the area of jurisdiction, but can be cited by other district courts and ultimately the supreme Court in decisions.

It will affect federal decisions in all jurisdictions unless there is a contrary/conflicting opinion from another appellate court. In that case, it would still be relevant but not controlling.

Between this and net-neutrality, it's a big week for the internet.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com