YouTube-mp3 agrees to shut down
completemusicupdate.com
completemusicupdate.com
In the middle of all this how much are the artists getting for the streamings? how popular must one be for getting more than a cup of coffee worth of royalties each month?
If authors are not making that much money do the copyright laws make any objective sense? Since after all they were created first and foremost to protect them. If they are not protected than music be free/libre because of the cultural value it has for humanity.
but only recently has music been a huge money maker. It changes things when an art becomes a business with profit motives.
Though, I suppose either music or storytelling may have been relatively more important, and larger percentage of the total activity of pre-historic human groups, than those 'industries' are for us today.
I thought this one was the easiest to answer but that might just be because it's a problem I've faced.
Essentially it's a public performance. Just like bars, restaurants, hotel lobbies, etc that play music from a CD or iTunes; or even businesses with hold music on their phone lines; if you want to play copyrighted music publicly then you need a licence eg PRS (UK).
I think there was one argument about whether mobile phone ringtones were legal or not because of this rule. I'm not sure if that was just a thought experiment or if it was a case that one party tried to take to court but I'm sure someone else on here will recall the story.
http://ipjournal.law.wfu.edu/2009/12/are-cellphone-ringtones...
Unless it is?
I can definitely see it being against ToS or some EULA, but IIRC those aren't legally enforceable and would be a civil case, anyway (i.e. not an actual crime).
If your server responds to my request and gives a copy to me, how can I be doing anything illegal?
There probably isn't a law which says that I have to use Chrome to access YouTube. IMO, youtube-dl is just another browser (albeit a very specialized one).
Also, I wonder what would eventually happen if we started making specialized browsers that first send a "EULA"? It would say something like "By responding to this request, you agree that I am authorized to receive a copy of whatever you send to me..." I guess it would work for a while before big sites started blocking your requests, but there's nothing to say that each EULA has to be standardized or easy to recognize (kinda like how big sites bury the EULA/TOS in fine print).
This, IMO, should be a required reading for anyone participating in the discussion on copyright. The crux of the issue is that law does not operate in the same reality computers (or, for that matter, physical reality) do. Unlike bits, it recognizes the cause-and-effect history of things, so e.g. one file can be illegal while other is perfectly fine, even if those files are bit-for-bit identical.
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The snarky answer is that a sovereign state can make anything illegal that it chooses to.
But we shouldn't allow anything a server responds to to be legal. After all, just because your server responds to my SQL injection attack doesn't mean it should be legal for me to steal your database.
There's a pretty clear difference in intent from hitting the video page with a browser and hitting with a tool whose only purpose is to make a local copy.
There's also the TOS:
YouTube hereby grants you permission to access and use the Service as set forth in these Terms of Service, provided that:
You agree not to distribute in any medium any part of the Service or the Content without YouTube's prior written authorization, unless YouTube makes available the means for such distribution through functionality offered by the Service (such as the Embeddable Player).
You agree not to access Content through any technology or means other than the video playback pages of the Service itself, the Embeddable Player, or other explicitly authorized means YouTube may designate.> "But your honor, their server sent me the data! Clearly I was authorized!" won't fly in the real world.
I don't see why not. There is such a thing as an implied contract. What do you think would be the reason that it wouldn't fly? I mean if the TOS that nobody ever reads is good enough, why wouldn't authorization be implied when the server responds, regardless even of what the TOS says?
Also the TOS seems a bit ambiguous, but my main defense against that would be to send my own TOS to the server on every request.
As I said: intent, which would definitely be scrutinized in a case where you're up in front of a judge. There's some interestingness in determining whether the ToS is actionable or not (and in some countries it isn't), but I find it really hard to argue legally or morally that Youtube can't mandate that you don't hit their service with a tool whose only purpose it is to copy videos.
It's a bit more murky when dealing with a tool like youtube-dl which is a program you run on your own machine, but pretty cut and dry for a web service you're providing to others.
>why wouldn't authorization be implied when the server responds, regardless even of what the TOS says? Also the TOS seems a bit ambiguous, but my main defense against that would be to send my own TOS to the server on every request.
They're providing the service, you are not. If you don't like their service's requirements, you are free to not use it. The logical conclusion of this hypothetical world is that anyone sending the X-User-TOS header would simply be met with a 403. Most other companies would follow suit, since it's absurd for a service that serves millions of users daily to comply with the legal demands of all of them.
Worse, nothing has been gained in this world. Just as YouTube is free to demand you use the website or not at all, they are free to reject clients who demand extra obligations. Their back yard, their rules at the end of the day.
IANAL. You cite a concept from contract law, but forget another: frustration of purpose. Saying there is an implied contract that you get access would frustrate the purpose of the original access contract.
I don't see how this argument would actually hold up for youtube-dl (whereas I do see how it would hold up for a third-party website like youtube-mp3).
In youtube-dl, the process goes like this:
1. User connects to website, requests copy of video. 2. Website agrees and serves copy of video. 3. User makes private use of copy of video, e.g. saves it to disk.
In this circumstance the user isn't doing any copying or distributing of copies, they're just making use of the copy they're given. It's exactly like recording a TV show playing over the air.
(Note the difference to a website like youtube-mp3, in which there is a step where youtube-mp3 makes a copy of the data they received and distributes it to the user.)
I have a hard time seeing how youtube-dl would even count as unauthorized copying. Not just in an "it's virtually unenforceable" sort of way, either.
If it's unauthorized copying to use software on my computer to download and store copyrighted bits that I obtained directly from the authorized source (in this case YouTube), then Google would need to help go after themselves, since Chrome is doing the same thing (as youtube-dl).
If I can create/use a CLI tool that (presumably) acts like a browser (youtube-dl) and you can't implement a way to prevent that, then that's your issue -- not mine.
Legally, I'm probably wrong, though, since intent is usually way more important than what you actually do (e.g. porn vs nude art).
EDIT: looks like others pretty much confirmed this thought process in the time it took me to write it.
I guess that would've been illegal, too?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audio_Home_Recording_Act#Exemp...
Problem became when CDs etc. started shipping with easily cirumventable DRM. Because you are allowed to rip the CD to disk for backup purposes and for playing on your mp3-player and even share with your close family. We even pay a special tax on storage media to compensate artists for the right to do this.
But as soon as the media contains DRM it becomes illegal, because circumventing DRM is illegal. Nevermind that the action you are trying to do is legal and with the tax you are even paying for it - but you can't legally do it. Same would apply to youtube. All they would have to do is encrypt the stream with a ROT13 equivalent with a static key, call it DRM and bam - now it is illegal to use youtube-dl.
Unless the assumption with this shut down is that any results of using the service would always be used for selling or playing in public.
Rule #1 ---- No one talks about youtube-dl!!!!!!
Ambient light sensors can probably detect a person walking past.
http://appft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=H...
This type of net neutrality was co-opted by content platforms who used it to lower their rates in a fight with the ISPs. The voice of individual internet subscribers was lost in this.
They, YouTube, RIAA, et al, do want to have their cake and eat it too. They took advantage of the internet and rushed to put their content on open networks, without fully understanding how that network operates fundamentally. Now they want to change how we communicate to suit their business models, and in the case of YouTube, do whatever they can to shut the door behind them so no one else can go through.
If there is one thing you can't accuse of RIAA of it's rushing to embrace the internet. Think about how long it's taken for digital downloads to become a first class citizen for music purchases! About how many streaming services have shut down under because they couldn't get enough labels to licence their music. etc
I'm sure the only reason many labels have official YouTube channels is because people were uploading music videos already so they figured they might as well get that ad revenue themselves. Otherwise they'd just be licensing their content the old way to radio networks, TV stations and, more recently, the limited number of streaming services who can afford their expensive contracts.
In any case, (incoming analogy) the church is better off with the printing press and allowing the bible to be translated from Latin. Its distribution and reach has expanded greatly. And it can still burn heretics.
Their adoption couldn't have been slower if they tried - which I honestly believe they did try because YouTube doesn't fit their traditional licensing models.
What possibly helped their their adoption of YouTube - and I'm just speculating on this last point so please take this with a pinch of salt - was how software has become good enough to run automated scans across YouTube and raise DMCA reports on any infringing content. This means record labels / distributors can not only block unwanted content but also ensure their own YouTube content gets all the ad revenue. I'm not saying this was a major contributing factor but it probably doesn't hurt their opinions of the platform.
Do you mean "a third-party website, accessing a copyrighted work on e.g. Youtube, making a copy of it, and distributing that copy to a user who requests it?" Because I'd be curious to see why/where this is "explicitly" legal.
But note the distinction from "a user accessing a copyrighted work on e.g. Youtube, then making a copy of it on her own computer for personal use."
While writing, I meant making a copy of streamed content. However, I do indeed completely fail to see how a website doing what you describe could be illegal.
> "a third-party website, accessing a copyrighted work on e.g. Youtube, making a copy of it, and distributing that copy to a user who requests it?"
That describes exactly what a browser does. Accessing Youtube and downloading the video for private use is legal, so is converting that video to audio only. There is no copyright violated, because users (in Germany) have the right to make copies. Why should it matter with which tool the copy is made?
Now, there was a recent criminalization of pirate video streaming sites. But there the argument of the court was that it is visible to the user that the content is illegal/unlicensed. That's not the case with Youtube.
I don't see any legal argument for the illegality of sites like youtube-mp3.
> Why should it matter with which tool the copy is made?
I don't know for sure, but I would think it matters if the tool is a third party's website (again, not on the user's computer).
To me, it seems like the difference between setting a TiVo to record a TV show for you (like using your browser or youtube-dl to access Youtube), versus asking a neighbor who has the same cable package to record the show for you and hand you a copy. Now if that neighbor is a for-profit business, that sounds more similar to the YouTube-mp3 site. And that doesn't sound like it would be legal (for the site to operate. Nothing illegal about what the user is doing).
Also, to be clear: I'm not happy that the YouTube-mp3 site is shutting down, I don't think there's anything immoral about what it does, and if I were making the rules then it would be perfectly legal. I'm just trying to understand the issues at play.
Being a for-profit business is more likely to change the equation. On the other hand, that's not that much different than selling a VHS recorder.
Actually, discussions like this are a good example why we need a copyright reform. But the issue there is that every time that was tried in the last years, it was used to add more uncertainty and less rights (in the proposals). We would need the contrary.
Personal use is allowed and nothing should be pay.
Only commercial use, need to pay for reuse, broadcast song.
This is a fair-use, blaming end-user people is so stupid.
Now Youtube, and all BIG one make a lot of money but are muscian more rich? NO, it's even more hard.
Are people still foled by major and music stolen by these compagny? Yes, welcome slavery 2.0
People that don't have money to fight now can just shut up against these big compagny even with small youtube channel you can see people stole video for each other, like the last one you get a kid stole another kid video after 2 days. He have stolen 40 videos, same content, same title, etc.
Do we agree to live in a such world, when you can't do something with value added? Sure we need to protect the right but in a same for every musician. Every musician should have the same right to protect their music but that's not the case.
Also I don't think we need to pay to give service. Example. I have a bar, people listen to some music ok, but why I need to pay? I make a free adversting of that music? It's not that enough? I don't earn money with that music, I earn it with the bar.
The same can apply with movie. We need movie that can come from another place that hollywood and there big industry of movie, they are all crap but sell because like pop music it's what generate revenue.
The European Union Copyright Directive explicitly allows member states to have legislation allowing copies for private uses. Germany for example makes use of that exception. It is allowed to make copies of copyrighted works for personal use (with some restrictions). In exchange we pay a special tax on storage media which goes to right holders (for example 36€ on a smartphone).
That topic is far away from my area of expertise but we had some high-profile court cases regarding private copies and if there had been any way to shut that down via the Berne Convention it would surely have been tried.
Copies for private use are as such not a gray area, but explicitly legal. I fail to see how a site that helps making those copies could be illegal in any way. There was a court fight in Germany over the backups the site was doing, but it is telling that it was only about that, not the core functionality, and that this current attack on peoples right was launched from an US court.
YouTube's terms of service, in part, read:
4. General Use of the Service—Permissions and Restrictions
YouTube hereby grants you permission to access and use the Service as set forth in these Terms of Service, provided that:
A. You agree not to distribute in any medium any part of the Service or the Content without YouTube's prior written authorization, unless YouTube makes available the means for such distribution through functionality offered by the Service (such as the Embeddable Player).
B. You agree not to alter or modify any part of the Service.
C. You agree not to access Content through any technology or means other than the video playback pages of the Service itself, the Embeddable Player, or other explicitly authorized means YouTube may designate.Then of course ToS/Eula is toilet paper in EU.
And its 100% legal to download whatever I like (audio/video, not software) in my country thanks to CD tax RIA fought so hard for.
And how is it radically different from a restrictive open source license? You can say the same about software engineers, how post their code publicly and 'freely', but also control what you do with that code.
Speaking as a musician, I have posted my tracks on Youtube and supplied a link to download them for free on Bandcamp. But when I released a music with a label, I delegated all the distribution rights to that label, and they made a decision not to offer free downloads. I may disagree with their decision, but it's theirs to make since I signed the contract.
It can control your right to redistribute. Hence youtube-dl is legal, but a website that runs youtube-dl and gives you the result isn't.
One way to view it is whether the license grants additional rights beyond default copyright law, or attempts to restrict rights. By default under copyright law, if a webpage serves you a video, you can do whatever you want for personal use, e.g. strip the ads out using software, save a copy for later backup, etc. The same is true for software, of course. The terms of use for these webpages try to get you to agree to waive some of these rights.
Now by default, under copyright law, you don't have permission to re-sell or redistribute copies of the work, and there are limits on derivative works you can make. Most open-source licenses grant you additional rights which normally would be restricted by default. The licenses say, you have permission to do some of these things under some circumstances. But they usually don't try to to take away rights you already have, e.g. "you may not store this code on any solid state drives or modify it in any way for personal use to include the letter Q".
Having culture locked up in these corporate sites that can wipe it out or remove it in less than a second makes me so anxious.
Also, the real problem isn't technical here. P2P file sharing technologies - from BitTorrent to IPFS - work well and efficiently. The problem, which makes the Internet media evolve towards big players owning CDNs and not towards IPFS-like network, is legal liability. When I watch a video of a wrong colour on YouTube, I'm protected by Safe Harbour. If I watch the same movie over BitTorrent, I risk having my life ruined by copyright laws. As long as this can happen, we won't have fully decentralized media.
Look into Proof of Stake (PoS) - people are looking into more efficient blockchains (although there's some controversy over whether it will work)
Current supply[1]:
PoW-mined: 43.5% PoS-mined: 21.8% Development Subsidy: 7.3% Airdrop: 13.7% Dev Premine: 13.7%
Blackcoin is also PoS mined, and NXT reaches consensus using PoS but if IIUC is not mined per se.
https://steemit.com/video/@heimindanger/introducing-dtube-a-...
Would something like that be possible with Ethereum or otherwise blockchains in general?
If I've been following the whole Ethereum thing correctly, as an outsider who kind of looks down on it, this is right up it's alley. You write some sort of smart contract which allows for the uploading and downloading of music blobs, charges for the service, and if insufficient coins are garnered for storage deletes the least used files.
I don't think you need a server or any such thing, and the only way to force a take down would be to take down the underlying services.
What's to stop the MPAA/RIAA and ISPs from just suing everyone on the network who's hosting part of the file? If they can sue bittorrent users, what's the significant legal difference here?
It's like if someone started a point-to-point delivery business where they take anonymous, secure packages between different places, no questions asked, and then are surprised when the police show up and say they're pretty sure that a good portion of the packages they've been carrying are drugs and pipe bombs, and ask them to roll on their clients, or at least stop delivering packages. And then the delivery man tries to make a philosophical argument that they aren't morally or legally responsible for the contents of their packages, and in any case it really shouldn't be illegal to distribute drugs or pipe bombs.
If you are building a piracy service a blockchain just complicates things and adds no value.
A pretty good rule of thumb is that if you can replace block chain with a database or anything else and lose no functionality, not to mention remove the whole thing together and simplify your solution it's not block chain but bullshit.
Spotify doesn't have the music I want to listen to.
Compare what.cd to iTunes. Compare Karagarga to Netflix, people actually go out of their way to create the best version of a movie, maybe the western release has incorrect hardcoded subs and awful picture quality. Someone goes out of their way to find the best version of it which may be something obscure like a Japanese laserdisc, rip it, fix subtitles and audio etc and release it for no monetary gain just the pure love of the media.
People actually being paid to release this stuff care far less about it than enthusiasts.
Doesn't even have to be 'verboten' political. It would be easy for an AI bot trained to curtail e.g. 'hate speech' to delete loads of things that are just unorthodox.
PS: I know DRMs are broken eventually. But Netflix seems to be holding its ground for now, and seems to be attacked only through HDCP (the weakest link for now since you can find capture HDMI cards with stolen keys) for the highest-quality content.
I guess it's kinda surprising to me that it still works after all this time, that there isn't some sort of authentication involved to prevent it.
It would also be easy for them to just break the extraction code. The old code used to break every time the signature function changed, and while the current code solves that problem, there are still so many things that they could do to break it, and yet they don't (the current code has only broken a few times that I can think of, and I don't think any of those were intentional on Google's part).
Technically it could violate these parts of the ToS, but they're all grey areas:
- access through anything than the site or 'approved' clients (but youtube-dl does use the site, so it could just be classed as another user agent)
- running automated services against them (running youtube-dl manually is probably fine, even for whole playlists or channels, but running a 'youtube-dl as a service' site like the one in this case is almost certainly not)
- downloading videos (but youtube-dl can also be used for streaming, despite the name)
I'm guessing that Google simply doesn't give a shit, as long as you're not using using it abusively (e.g. offering it as a service or using it to do mass-scraping).
In practice, they could combat the practicality by various methods, like embedding the ads in the video stream, throttling the stream to hurt the use-case of downloading vs watching (they already do this I think).
Ultimately YouTube could start properly DRM-ing all their streams. If you watch a film you've bought from Google Play via YouTube it is protected by Widevine DRM, and youtube-dl fails.
It seems like YouTube feel it's cheaper at the moment to try and frustrate downloading this way, but if they ever feel like it's a lost cause they'll just pull the Widevine lever.
Unfortunately there is no information about the case available in English, here is some German: http://convert2mp3.net/index.php?p=legal
Google is a for-profit monopoly. Stop thinking they're the fucking good guys.
In the age of the internet, there is very, very little that a record label will do for you that will leave you better off. Producing and distributing music is approaching triviality. Arranging concerts and touring isn't easy, but no full-time job (which is effectively what music is for you at that stage) is, and there are plenty of independent acts that have done and still are doing it. More often than not, all industry involvement will net you is you losing out on revenue from record sales with few upsides.
I'll be glad to see the RIAA and record label asswipes go belly up in a blaze of tears, weeping, and gnashing of teeth, all while wondering why their business plan that consisted entirely of leeching on actual productivity failed.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/4K_Video_Downloader
I use this with VLC to watch lectures with fine-grained control over the playback speed (i.e., 1.7x, not just 1.5x and 2x).
I don't think it's fair to imply some sort of moral contract that if I serve you videos with ads, you're obligated to pay attention to the ads as well as the content. You are free to do what you want, including pay someone else to cut the ads out for you or install a tool that does it for free. I have to accept these possibilities when I choose how to distribute my 'content' and so do the advertisers.
(I realize that we're currently in an "equilibrium" where a lot of 'content' on the web is ad-supported so it's difficult for creators to distribute in any other way. That's unfortunate both for creators and users.)
alias youtubemp3='youtube-dl --extract-audio --audio-format mp3'>Let te user transcode to mp3 if they need it.
convenience factor