Ask HN: Is my startup legal? MovieByHeart.com

That is copyright infringement, and would not constitute fair use.

Around ycnews it is often said to not worry about that. No one will sue you until you get big, and then you can negotiate. I have no opinion on that advice.

Studios are unlikely to license you big name movies and TV shows.

Can you contact independent filmmakers instead? They may be giving their work away for free already. You could create a market for it. Your customers pay to use your service, and then you give a cut to the filmmaker. Filmmaker makes money where he wouldn't have before, and also gets greater exposure for his work.

I would not agree that it's copyright infringement. We've transformed the content of copyrighted work and is using it for a transformative (educational) purpose.

"since the defendant has engaged in both types of transformation, we would expect a court generally to find that the defendant’s use is transformative and that the transformativeness factor weighs in favor of the defendant’s fair use claim (though how strongly it does so may vary depending on how transformative the defendant’s use is)" http://www.utexas.edu/law/faculty/treese/fair_use_transforma...

Transformation and educational purpose do not mean what you think they mean.

1. Transformation is more than adding your own translation on top of the movie. You need to change the meaning or expression of the work. The meaning of your version is exactly the same as the original by definition (you are making a word for word translation).

2. Your "educational purpose" argument is diminished when you affect the market for the work. The movie studio will argue your students should rent/buy the movie and watch with subtitles. Your website is taking away sales. Also, if you try to earn money from this you are no longer seeking any educational purpose.

3. You are broadcasting the original movie without permission. That is copyright infringement.

4. Regarding your quote, you should read the Blanch v. Koons case and look at Blanch's original work versus Koon's alleged infringing work to see what transformation requires.

What I mean by transformation is that we transform movies into games (Voice Over videos) by muting some dialog lines. That changes the meaning of the work. It's not entertainment anymore. No one will watch movie with half dialog lines muted.

The only thing students can do with DVD is to watch it (passive entertainment).

In our case students learn dialog lines and than perform them with the help of Voice Over videos (active learning).

I think that we create a new market for people with a specific need. When people pay for access to Voice Over videos they will pay because they want to overcome Anxiety, not because they want to see movie for entertainment.

Thats how I see it. May be I wrong

That changes nothing. Still copyright infringement. See above.

Thank you for your comments. It seems I have to follow your advice and contact indie moviemakers or use public domain movies

I have an idea for you. This might work. You REALLY need to read up on Copyright Law, though. To be honest, you might not be the best person for this. You may want to speak with an experienced copyright person. Anyway...

This might work: Stop broadcasting the video. You make an audio only CD where you and friends play the parts in the movies. The customer is instructed on when to start the audio CD so that it syncs with the movie. You can also distribute a book that tells the person when to start and stop the movie/audio and then do your thing with your company.

So all you are selling is an audio CD, which you performed, and a companion workbook.

This MAY work because what you are doing is making a "cover song" of the movie audio. You will need a mechanical license, if it is even available. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mechanical_license

I have never heard of this for movies, but it might work. A mechanical license will be cheaper and easier than negotiating with a movie studio.

This is how it works in the music world: http://www.harryfox.com/public/FAQ.jsp

No idea if you can do this in the movie world, but you should check it out.

Rifftrax.com (some of the MST3K stars) has been putting out very good voiceover tracks for current movies. You might ask them what kind of licensing they needed to go through.

They probably don't need any license. What rifftrax is doing is selling you an mp3 with their own comedy on it. It is a completely new work. The customer buys/rents the companion DVD and then syncs.

That is slightly different than OP because OP wants to broadcast the movie, or at least the exact words. The exact words are what he needs to license, even if he does perform them himself.

If OP can figure out a way to teach people language by making his own rifftrax mp3 then he is in business. Good call prodigal_erik.

Rifftrax guys gave me an idea - what if I setup Amazon shop and will sell legal DVDs. People who buy DVD get access to the same movie on my website (invitation code). Will it work?

No, it wouldn't work.

The reason why is at the very heart of copyright law. You need to learn this area.

Owning copyright to a work gives the owner EXCLUSIVE rights to distribution of that work.

Therefore, just because you sold a legal copy to a user via Amazon you do not have the right to broadcast the work on your website. Only the copyright owner can do that, because he has exclusive distribution rights. Your broadcast isn't authorized even though you selling DVDs is authorized.

Be careful with this stuff. In my opinion you are playing with fire here. The RIAA has no problems with burying people who distribute songs illegally. MPAA has done less of this, but you don't want to be the example.

I think I will start with public domain movies and than follow your advice re: indie filmmakers and mechanical license

Thanks for your idea. I will think about it. Really appreciate your advice.

I'd love to work with independent filmmakers. Unfortunately the main market is outside US and for overcoming Foreign Language Anxiety it's important to use movies people already know and love.

I've been learning mandarin as a second language for the past couple of years and I came across subtitle translations of English movies to mandarin (so, you could burn a DVD with these subtitle files and be able to see the Mandarin). This has helped me in the learning process.

Many of the subtitle sites have been taken down by the MPAA. I love the idea of your site, but I think if it gets big enough, they will eventually take you to court.

Thank you for your reply. I think they can close this project down without taking me to court

You might be able to get permission or license it. I think it would probably be much cheaper than actually licensing the content. Have you tried contacting anyone in the industry?

I wasn't be able to find any educational license that could be suitable for this project. And I don't know who should I contact in the industry

Clicable http://moviebyheart.com