Fran Blanche: This Is Not Legal
youtube.com
youtube.com
The video went pretty viral... 8 digit views, got me 5 digit subscriber count, was posted on dozens and dozens of news sites and blogs and shared widely. I was excited, off to a great start with this whole YouTube thing.
No music, no audio other than the engine sounds, absolutely zero reason anyone could possibly do a copyright strike... right?
Nope, some church minister in some tiny country did a copyright strike saying they own the rights to the word "spirit" in my video title (it was part of the name of the vehicle itself)... so they got all the money I earned from that video + I got a strike on my channel and a scary warning from YouTube saying my entire Google account could get banned including my Gmail. I disputed it with a very clear explanation of the situation, and they quickly reply saying they sided with the complainant and they'll be ignoring all future disputes.
Fuck YouTube/Google.
Edit: I went back to find the emails from Google and realised the story is even crazier than I remember. YouTube never reviewed the dispute, they let the person making the claim review their own dispute!!
> Hi [Name],
> After reviewing your dispute, [Dodgy Fuck's Name] has decided that their copyright claim is still valid.
> Copyrighted content: Spirit
> Claimed by: [Dodgy Fuck's Name]
Makes me wonder if anyone at Google is aware of the term "perverse incentive"
1. Commission some original background music on fiverr with copyright attribution. 2. Put it in a video. Post on youtube. 3. Copyright claim your own video from a different channel. 4. Show your copyright info if necessary.
This way, you still get a fraction of your own video revenue by playing both sides.
Step 1 is dispute claim.
Step 1A is the claimant choosing to release or reinstate the claim.
Step 2, if they reinstate the claim, you can "appeal".
Step 2A, the claimant can either release the claim, or file a formal DMCA notice.
Step 3, if they file a formal DMCA notice-- you can file a DMCA counter-notification.
Step 3A, if they disagree, they can sue.
https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/12104471#zippy=%2C...
Is it? If it's more expensive for them to get it right, then maybe not getting involved in the adjudication makes sense.
It does seem like a great reason for creators to not publish on YouTube, however.
Once there is sufficient competition I would expect them to start adjudicating.
And before someone jumps in and blames the money train, capitalism, etc. Please let me know how you would run a business that is not profitable. The money to pay salaries has to come from somewhere.
Personally I'd like to see them aimed at regional broadband ISP monopolies first, since that is an underlying infrastructure for the services we use.
I'm not sure where the FTC is on this, but I know the focus in media has shifted in recent years from Comcast etc. to FAANG. Perhaps that's because the problems from the platform-based monopolies enabled by ISPs are closer and thus more apparent to us. Or, maybe it's a campaign propped up by ISPs to take the focus off of them.
From a customer's perspective, it seems they take the money and run to the bank. Where competition is low, and that's a lot of places, so is the quality of customer service and the provided speeds. Fees can be high, and for the last 20 years they've been trying to figure out how to get even more money by gutting net neutrality. They can be very aggressive on this [1], and there aren't really any significant repercussions. You probably don't want to fine a company out of existence, and any fine you do apply doesn't mean much if they get to keep their customers.
These ISP and content conglomerates have just gotten too big, and I think it's biting us in the form of tech monopolies that sit atop them.
The FCC is trying to redefine broadband to be 100 Mbps [2]. Almost certainly, the 2 republican commissioners will vote against that, and the democratic commissioners will vote for it. So it won't pass until the final FCC chair is filled, which Manchin is stalling in the senate [3].
Chances are it comes down to midterms. It's an important issue, the challenge is making it relatable to the public amidst other issues.
[1] https://youtu.be/BEXuK073bkE?t=749
[2] https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/07/19/fcc-bro...
[3] https://www.axios.com/2022/06/03/biden-fcc-nominee-gigi-sohn...
Else, we could skip straight to 3A (which is still them not being involved, and it is their legal obligation to maintain safe harbor under DMCA).
Cynical hat firmly in place, you could go a step further and just say that if it's more expensive for them to do it fairly then this is actually "right" from their point of view...
If they don't sue the purported infringer, Google treats the original copyright complaint as invalid and releases the strike.
The law is broken and needs to change.
The complainant submits a complaint, the receiver submits a counter notice, youtube is granted immunity to put the content back up after 14 days (unless the complainant initiates a lawsuit within that timeframe) and the complainant has no recourse but to take the alleged-infringer to court.
Technically, submitting a copyright claim with blatantly false information is perjury, but your only recourse as the victim is to beg a prosecutor to take the perpetrator to court over it. There is no civil remedy for false DMCA takedowns.
As far as I am aware, not a single person has ever been convicted of perjury because of information supplied in a DMCA takedown.
That said, there are also civil penalties for false takedown notices under 512(f), which I believe have been successfully litigated. Still, the effort vs reward in litigating them is almost never worth it.
The claimant should require some skin in the game to prevent this sort of nonsense, maybe a bond or surety of some kind held in the US?
This is of most impact to channels big enough for somebody to treat it as a full time job, but not so big that it will ever be worth YouTube’s time to provide them any level of service.
I guess, as long as they comply with the takedown, they feel sufficiently safely harboured, and don't feel compelled to implement the other part of the process since like what are you going to do, sue youtube to force them to host your video and run ads on it?
Judges sometimes take pride in interpreting a law to mean something other than what the words say. Let alone the risks of interactions with other parts of the law. Amateur understanding doesn't count for much.
Of course, even being able to DMCA counter-notice isn't really a help, because you're just telling the claimnant to sue. You even have to dox yourself. What people want is to just not have to deal with copyright in these specific cases where there is no element of copyright being infringed.
The relative success of anti-SLAPP statues and motions would indicate that there is at least some empathy for "not forcing people who have not committed a crime to prove that they haven't committed a crime".
I'm curious why this isn't being done more frequently, but if it is, what recourse do YouTube content creators have to still make it profitable for themselves.
Bungie is now suing them. I'm surprised they didn't go harder after Youtube, but I guess that's a lot more difficult in court. https://torrentfreak.com/bungie-files-lawsuit-to-punish-send...
According to the article "yes", but google working on it. I'm surprised Bungie didn't go after google. They clearly talked to them, but Google's has a lot of money, as opposed to random disgruntled player.
https://www.theverge.com/2016/4/28/11532734/youtube-complain...
"When both a creator and someone making a claim choose to monetize a video, we will continue to run ads on that video and hold the resulting revenue separately," the company said. "Once the Content ID claim or dispute is resolved, we'll pay out that revenue to the appropriate party."
It seems like this would be a perfect target for class action lawyers who go after very large targets (ie Google) for causing distress en-mass.
https://www.lieffcabraser.com/contact/
You could try contacting them.
> I have private access to some pretty cool motorsports/boat-racing/etc stuff
The flip side of Youtube being a free hosting service is that they have no obligation to host anyone's content. We think of Youtube as being a commons or community resource, but it's not, it's privately owned. You have no more right to put a video on Youtube than you have to put an advert on the side of Google HQ, it's their choice to make and they set the terms. It sucks, but that's the way it is.
You're either leaving out material facts that completely change the story or making the story up.
For starters...Youtube's copyright strikes are geographical...IOW, you can't assert a copyright against a video posted by a user in another country.
Second, Google doesn't let you file a copyright strike on the basis of a single word in the title. Words, by themselves, are not copyrightable. Especially not when they deal with trademarks...
Third, after you file a counter notification, the claimant must prove that they've taken legal action against the purported infringer by providing evidence of such action. Generally, this means a copy of a complaint, or at the bare minimum a letter from your lawyer asserting your ownership and offering terms for a settlement. If they don't, Google treats the infringement claim as invalid and removes the strike.
Fourth, if you dispute the strike (by filing the counter notification), Google doesn't pay anybody for the video until they receive proof of the legal resolution of the dispute, because if they pay the wrong party they'll end up having to pay the rightful copyright owner.
Would you happen to have any experience with cases where Google doesn't restore the video/monetization after a counter notification? I mentioned this in another comment, but I found this article (which is somewhat old, and from a random website I'd never heard of) where apparently Google acknowledged the counter notification but chose not to restore the video out of contractual obligations to the claimant: https://www.newmediarights.org/copyright/DMCA/youtube_refusi...
Would you happen to have any experience with cases where Google doesn't restore the video/monetization after a counter notification?
Yes, we contacted Google Legal with a letter from our General Counsel after the claimant failed to file a lawsuit asserting its ownership of the disputed content, and the matter was resolved within about a month. Google restored our ability to monetize videos and paid us for the amount held in escrow during the dispute.
Note that, as with all things Google, if you let the customer support system handle your complaint, nothing gets done because the CS dept in India doesn't have the power to do anything. You have to go around the CS system and talk to a person in the department that's actually responsible for your issue. For a legal issue like this, that means reaching out to their Legal department directly.
How does that work? So anyone in Norway can copy anything produced in the US and not be taken down on a copyright claim?
For cross-border violations you need to reach out to Google Legal.
Just going to guess... Was this vehicle the Spirit of Australia II?
She also discusses "Visual Claim"[0] and how this will make things worse and how copyright trolls have nothing to lose with doubling down on illegitimate claims.
One issue I have with her is her insistence that alternative video platforms, such as Odysee/LBRY, will never have a chance against YouTube. That's definitely true today but anti-trust or other government action could eventually shake that up.
(IANAL, so I may be totally off base with those terms.)
tortuous interference with a business is a good angle to start from.
malignant process or malfeasance may be possible as well.
But the bottom line is that most individual creators could never justify the legal costs of fighting copyright claims.
However, if a few thousand people sue Google on a small amount, a simple demand to repair monetary damages (this seems to have a different name every country), or co-name Google with a John Doe because Google has the information on Doe or is the only presence on that particular country, they will need to represent or risk a default. And the process won't scale on their side only.
A legal and ethically correct DDoS on Google, but requires thousands of people motivated enough to navigate the bureaucratic depths.
And Fran's comment about lawyering up is probably valid on USA where, AFAIK, the procedure for small claims is different.
IIUC, the idea was to sue in small claims court not on DMCA grounds, but on whatever state laws might relate to tortious interference, slander of title, defamation, etc.
Edit: reading in another thread that perhaps this is content ID. Not that, that is any better.
I thought that was Copyright law?
I pay for a Vimeo account but almost no one watches my videos compared to YouTube.
>Organizations including Viacom, Mediaset, and the English Premier League have filed lawsuits against YouTube, claiming that it has done too little to prevent the uploading of copyrighted material.[8][9][10] Viacom, demanding $1 billion in damages, said that it had found more than 150,000 unauthorized clips of its material on YouTube that had been viewed "an astounding 1.5 billion times". YouTube responded by stating that it "goes far beyond its legal obligations in assisting content owners to protect their works"
>Viacom won a court ruling requiring YouTube to hand over 12 terabytes of data detailing the viewing habits of every user who has watched videos on the site
>In April 2012, a court in Hamburg ruled that YouTube could be held responsible for copyrighted material posted by its users. The performance rights organization GEMA argued that YouTube had not done enough to prevent the uploading of German copyrighted music
Note that, for actual DMCA claims, YouTube WILL go to bat for their creators, especially if it's an obvious case of videos falling under fair use, eg https://youtu.be/aY1CYF3MKec?t=27
In general, Content ID was created in response to Viacom dragging YouTube through court for not preemptively stopping people from uploading episodes of Spongebob. Viacom was planning to take it further up the appeal process until a settlement was reached which lead to the creation of Content ID, eg "viacom will upload copyrighted material to YouTube and YouTube will automatically scan every video to check if it violates viacom's rights". After this happened, of course, other copyright holders like AT&T (WarnerMedia)/NBC/etc and small international rights-holders weren't going to let themselves miss out on this revenue stream, so YT expanded the system to allow any rights management firm or copyright holder to use the system if they were big enough or powerful enough in their region.
That said, third party Content ID claims for works not exclusively owned by the claimant are against YouTube's partner terms. The enforcement is just lacking.
This is obviously not the case. This is really the entire point of having Content ID in the first place: Had YT been free to monetize under their own contracts whoever uploaded an episode of Sponge Bob, Viacom wouldn't have had a case.
Okay, so that's supposed to make a legitimacy claim. I've had arguments with the internet claiming that I made upres copies of digibetas when photographic evidence showing the 16mm prints on the telecine, but the internet still disagreed. So I KNOW the pain.
However, let's say that you, me, and Dupree all have a print of the Apollo 12 scene. We all pay to have the things done to have it available as a digital file, and eventually we all post our independent videos to YT. If we did some sort of perceptual hashing to each video, would it not be logical to assume we'd all be flagged? At that point, what's an algo to do?
Flagged for what, exactly? The perceptual hash would show that all three of you uploaded the same video, but not that any those uploads were infringing. Nothing should happen unless someone (either one of you, or another party) tries to claim that they're the copyright holder for that video. Which ought to require at least some hard evidence.
Ideally[0], if that were to happen, YouTube would manually investigate the claim to determine whether it was reasonable, and the parties accused of infringement would have a chance to challenge the claim or offer another reason why the uploads are not infringing, such as prior permission or fair use, before anything permanent was done. Since the video is in the public domain, the claim should be rejected and the video marked as public domain in the content database after the investigation to preempt any further false claims.
Of course investigations like this require actual work. It's always going to be easier to just take down the video—especially since they're hosting it for free. Ad revenues won't cover the cost of investigating claims, much less protracted legal fights.
[0] Ideally ideally, copyright would simply be repealed and we'd all be much better off. But short of that…
What if every time a creator receives a bogus claim+demonetization he/she immediately deletes the content from YouTube and moves it to a different platform, making sure there is a link somewhere to reach it without breaking YT rules? The troll won't get the money as well and some users could still watch the content. Yes, other platforms aren't comparable wrt the user base, and that would also defeat the initial purpose, but once the video is demonetized the creator wouldn't get the money anyway, so it could be a way to hurt the trolls where it matters most.
Assuming explicit links are disallowed (didn't check) the link could be exported as a torrent hash; it's not a link per se but search engines would find it, and they usually have a pretty long lifetime.
As an example, the following hash: 2E28D47963BF639EDAADCA33583546B39156D62D
Brings a 10+ years old Debian Linux image. The file would probably be dead now, also younger hashes are a lot easier to find, but all we need is the hash leading somewhere.
There are other ways to embed links in a video; for example either a barcode-like pattern on video, or short fsk sequence embedded in audio, that could be translated on the fly by a browser extension into ad address and lead there without any user intervention.
I had high hopes for the nebula model, but the platform owners have already clearly telegraphed their intent with regard to harvesting user data, nickel and diming, and at some point inserting ads.
The only solution is a platform that respects everyone. peertube is a good contender, although curation and payment for content (which are separate problems to distribution and discovery) need work. Tilvids seems to be doing okay curation-wise (although adoption is low).
Perhaps for payment, a client that locally tracks your view count and then stochastically tells you to deliver your payment to a particular creator to avoid a middleman holding the tin and sticking their fingers in.
Odysee is just a website frontend for LBRY. Of course, Odysee operators can choose who to show on their website.
Pretty good heuristic for these things is to assume cryptocoins are always at least one scam.
Youtube is free to do whatever they want on their own platform, within the law. Arguing that they dominate the market brings antitrust laws into play here. On these grounds their TOS about ContentID (basically we'll decide whatever we want and you'll take it) can be evaded.
Why would the government do that though? The main complaint in this instance is that YouTube is attempting to enforce the government's rules. As far as I've seen, major complaints against YouTube when they act in the interests of a government (or political party in some instances).
Copyright strikes are such a blatant example of the legal system being bought and paid for by the wealthy, it's not even funny.
Nothing against creating content for yourself, or your friends, or future people though. Just don't expect fame or money.
It is a problem, but it's not genuinely an obstacle for creators finding audiences. Making good content that people like and getting enough traction to have a userbase is orders of magnitude more of a risk than getting a copyright strike.
From personal experience I can't say the system works any better if you're a creator whose content is getting ripped from other sources and put onto YouTube either. I've had people ripping numerous videos and it apparently takes longer to complete YouTube's takedown form than it takes for the ripper to upload the exact same video to their channel again. I thought there was supposed to be some provision in the safe harbor laws that YouTube hides behind to deal with repeat offenders but apparently it doesn't carry any practical weight if there is.
I'd be the first to agree that copyright protection has been expanded too far and the mechanisms for enforcing it are often used unfairly and in a heavy-handed way. Reform is well overdue. I'd have slightly more understanding if those methods did at least work in cases of flagrant infringement that are exactly what copyright law was always supposed to prohibit but it seems they don't. Not for the little creator at least.
After public outcry, YouTube issued an apology and banned the claimant.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/phoebeliu/2022/07/12/lofi-girl-...
While I'm an occasional stream listener, I've been mostly away from tech for a month and only noticed the coverage in this video from TAETRO.
"a big problem for music producers on youtube" - TAETRO https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A49EKpd5rrE
They talk about the Lofi Girl situation and also describe the same issue Fran describes but with sample-based music production (as opposed to sample-based video production). Even if you're using non-exclusive, royalty free samples, you can get screwed by another producer using the same samples.
"My Video Was Demonetized by 16 Record Labels...I'm Pissed" - Rick Beato https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R3NnrWrkKZM
This is another take on the broader issue of hyper aggressive algorithms being poor judges of Fair Use. Rick has a few great videos on the subject (any many more on making music).
I don't know why we keep re-hashing how the internet is dead to knowledgable people who 'are not supposed to be there' or are not being financially supported from someplace. It is just true.
These days it is VERY hard for a "consumer" wait sorry a "human product" to curate and share their own interests. Most popular internet platforms and forums are toxic to independents or people without money. While I'm sad that we're enabling content demolishing trolls but everyone around this topic is exhausted.
I'm probably going to delete this but damn can we not. This conversation isnt productive and people who can make this outrage productive are too expensive. Every time I see something like this I do a spit take and water my plants with Brawndo cause Brawndo's got electrolytes because thats what plants crave.
As an aside, I used to really love how cable tv attracted all of the advertising idiots while the internet wasn't pummeled to death with money and influencers. Cable and the internet had their own place. Now we see web destruction on a scale we cant replace or re-create a space for what the internet used to mean. There is no 'side stream' to filter out non consumer traffic.
Because let's not pretend that the internet was easy to navigate back in the day. You wanted the alternative nichy stuff, you needed to work for that. That never changed, neither online nor offline.
Wow thanks for the advice. I cant believe I didn't know those existed.
If Apple made a YouTube-alike or Microsoft, they would likely find the YT creators are champing at the bit to get onto their platform.
Has there ever been a real go at YouTube by a company with significant resources?
Yes I am aware of Nebula but it is not a serious competitor to YouTube. I say that because I tried to use it on PlayStation - which is where I watch all my YouTube and couldn't, which means Nebula is not a serious competitor. Any serious competitor must be available on all the most popular media consumption platforms, and it must not require signup/signin to start watching - that's the baseline set by YouTube.
Even NetFlix - why have they not created a new service for user created content?
See this comment [0] in this thread, the current incarnation of youtube is the result of millions spent in legal fees. What's the incentive to do it all over again with little hope of success? IIRC YouTube wasn't profitable until very recently.
The CEO's of those huge companies aren't likely to be even interested in legal matters unless it's the DOJ calling about anti monopoly practices - that's what they pay their legal counsel for.
I don't think they'd give the slightest rats about fighting out the content ownership issues, especially since YouTube has already shown that it can be done.
>> What's the incentive to do it all over again with little hope of success?
Why "little hope of success"? No-one at that level has even tried.
It's completely different from trying to take on facebook, in which you need to build the network before the whole thing works. With user created content they can start at any size.
The minute it was bought by Google and their deep pockets, it was lawsuit after lawsuit.
They just need to promise to fix the problems that content creators like Fran are unhappy about. Alot of YouTube content creators are very unhappy but they have no choices offered to them.
Bring over some of the biggest YouTubers by buying them - such as Linus Tech Tips.
Offer better terms than YouTube does for monetization to the long tail of content creators.
Money talks, and those big companies have more money than you can fit in a phonebooth.
Spotify did something similar when it paid big money for the Joe Rogan podcast.
Obviously, there are more than 1000 big youtubers. The fee could be reduced and the budget increased by growing the union.
Millionaire youtubers can already afford high-priced lawyers if they want to, I'm not worried about that.
Who I am worried about are regular people who create content but don't have large followers and don't make to it to the frontpage of HN, but still get hit by copyright trolls.
The rich still benefit from organization.
Also, an organization may have legal standing where an individual does not, and can then deploy their lawyer-army. Where an individual has to wait for an issue to personally affect them, the organization will almost always have at least one affected member and can therefore keep up the pressure constantly, and eventually perhaps make the internet a better place.
They're saying that individual, successful/rich/"powerful" YouTubers can defend themselves against these spurious claims already, but that by organizing they would be even more well equipped, at less personal cost, and also make it possible for smaller creators to also defend themselves (with even less cost).
None of that has anything to do with any Vietcong analogy I can think of.
(Though in practice, it probably wouldn't be everyone - see the differences in how well-protected major- vs minor-league baseball players are.)
Edit: Maybe I've misinterpreted your comment, but I stand to the importance of publicity that may be lent by such cases.
Content creators don't use youtube for its video hosting. There are dozens of video hosting sites, many objectively better. Content creators use youtube because that's where the eyeballs and advertisers are, which also means that's where the money is.
And, 100k won't be enough to pay for one developer, let alone a herd of reviewers/lawyers to handle all of the DMCA noticed that will flood in, regardless.
I don't see how this doesn't get solved without amendments to the DMCA, which is probably where the money should be put.
I mostly agree with you. But $100k/month will definitely pay for a developer.
I was curious though how easy it is to make a claim on a video and started the process on a video from one of my favorite creators. I did NOT finish but found that it is surprisingly easy just to start a claim.
I (kind of) understand why Google/YT has created such an easy arbitration process once a claim has been made because they don’t want to deal with the legal headache, and the associated costs, with having to get in the middle if everything.
What I don’t understand, and am hoping someone can explain to me without flaming me, is why they don’t make the process to START a claim a little more complicated.
The way it is setup now, I could create a fairly anonymous (yeah, I know) Google account and then make a claim on just about any random YT content. There is no process at all to identify ME.
As an example, if I want to market a mobile app in an app store, I have to provide proof of my business name, tax status, business license (if applicable in my local jurisdiction), etc.
As another example, if I want to start a retail store that sells the Nintendo Switch, in order to buy the units at the “wholesale” price, I have to provide documentation of much of the same for marketing a mobile app plus I have to sign agreements that I won’t sell the units for a price outside the range dictated by the manufacturer.
Lots of process involved in these two examples.
Why does Google not require verification of at least being some sort of a real entity? Is it again just too much headache (i.e. work) to do so? Is it because that would be too exclusive and on this end of the spectrum they are actually defending the little guy by allowing anyone to lay claim to something?
Thank you, btw, to the OP for introducing me to this channel. She has a very ‘interesting’ personality and some intriguing content.
It's basically a pro-censorship-by-default position at the behest of the big rightsholder cartels.
People assume that without copyright there would be no way for artists to make an income, but the two aren't really related. It's actual purpose is to prevent art from being made unless it is sufficiently "original"
It is quite sad and irritating that unencumbered content is under attack by IP trolls who raised dubious claims and are prevailing under YT's flawed system.
"Because copyright protection happens so easily, and lasts so long, you should assume that any work you want to use is copyrighted, unless it is very old or produced by the U.S. government." https://www.baylor.edu/copyright/index.php?id=56543 The U.S. government would have to go to YouTube and assert they produced the work in question and then sue YouTube. It doesn't help there is no clear definition how much of a work you can use before it is considered infringement. This means each claim that is made and disputed could end up in court to be decided. I don't have the solution to this. Until new laws are passed to change the situation people without the means to challenge lose.
* create account
* find victim
* make claim
* earn money
I watched this one and thought to myself that it almost seemed like an ad for recruiting trolls.
One of these content creators should create a second account and file claims against themselves, and perhaps other willing victims. Then produce a video about how easy it was to show the flaw in the system.
YouTube doesn't let just anyone make ContentID claims and start trolling. You do need to jump through a few hoops to get an air of legitimacy first.
What would you do? Even if you try to side with creators, you might eventually be let go for making too many mistakes.
I understand that YouTube doesn't adjudicate claims themselves, but I think this may explain why they don't. Their adjudicators are heavily incentivized to take everything down. As a result, YouTube is hands off.
If this is an accurate framing of the situation, then incentives may not be properly aligned. Alternatively, YouTube (and others) simply have a monopoly position that needs to be out-competed.
there is no such thing. All YT is obligated to do is give you and claimant a place to voice your opinions, and if you still insist to own rights to a piece of content then claimant can file DMCA, if you counter DMCA then they are free to sue.
They take a song, rename it under a fake name, and then when you upload the actual song you get a copyright claim from the fake song.
They especially do this with small and traditional record labels that do not have an online presence.
This is not about one creator vs another and filing counter-claims via DMCA, this is about extra-judicial automated bureaucracies designed by Google.
https://cloud.typography.com/6361472/632446/css/fonts.css takes ~700ms
https://standard-fonts.s3.amazonaws.com/789323/56D15C61E7EF4... takes 2.1 seconds.
Even once cached, the entire site (e.g. search), is slow enough to be noticeable.
About 9 years ago I worked for a fairly large (20+ million users) video platform. These numbers on catalog pages would have been barely accepted for an entire page load, let alone a couple CSS file.
Let’s say you create a program that people all around the world can run that uses random t0r exit nodes to submit GPT-3 filled DMCA take-down form submissions programmatically and varies it in a way that it can’t be profiled by anomaly detection systems related to submission characteristics, etc.
Thoughts? Or how would you hypothetically improve the design of this theoretical thought-experiment?
YouTube are a monopoly on public web tv. That needs to change, and YouTube are the ones who are gonna bring on that change.
There should be some decentralized platforms.
Videographers want to upload their videos to Vimeo, and it's just as good of a video platform as YouTube (better in some ways). But there's no social movement around it, or many other video platforms, and that's what people actually congregate to.
We should just have author's rights, which must be non transferable. Non profit file sharing should be allowed in all cases. I say this because we effectively live in that scenario, except sometimes, very rarely, someone is sued if they get big enough.
Also, in her rant about people who tell her to lawyer up, she referred to her hypothetical interlocutor as "colonel trucknutz." I plan to steal that and use it in conversation to address people when they disagree with me.
And then accept your own appeal?
(May be a network issue. I'm located in Europe.)
You make a claim ? That costs $50.
You win : we refund you
You lose : we make $50
And here you go
Why are people still on YouTube?
I really think Netflix should have a crack at it. (But clearly labeled as a different kind of thing. )
And, why are people still on YT? Well, because it's where everybody is. I.e., critical accumulation, out ruling any other considerations. It may turn out that having a viable path to justice on such a system of critical mass may be as important as having anti-trust clauses.
15 years later and still nothing even close to a viable YouTube alternative.
She doesn’t want solutions and instead will just give up and go back to work.
But for anyone else: your own domain, videos on s3, sponsors instead of ads.
Pay a techie to set it up if you are not techie.
Use YouTube too but just for traffic into the site. Shorter/lower quality video there with link to site for better videos.
Your site will have the better UX! You can get them on a mail list. Get closer to the audience. See if they want to pay for a premium membership.
In terms of the domain name system and takedowns: You are subject to the law still but I believe that it will be the law itself rather than a Go program in a google server saying “tough shit”
Example: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_v._MikeRoweSoft
The process DMCA uses is: 1) person claiming their copyright is being infringed sends a DMCA takedown notice to the platform. 2) Platform takes down the content (doesn't "keep it up and redirect revenue" like YouTube does) and notified the person who posted the content. 3) The person who posted the content can submit a counterclaim, at which point platform provider reinstates the content.
Then the person claiming their copyright is being violated disagrees, they have to sue the person in federal court for copyright infringement at that point.
Also there are penalties for making false DMCA claims. There don't appear to be ANY penalties for repeated, egregious violations of YouTube's own claim system.
What YouTube is doing isn't DMCA enforcement AT ALL.
Even if the copyright claims are illegal, youtube can still chose to do whatever they want in regard to blocking or removing content on their platform with no regard to anything or anybody.
(I believe we need Internet access, e-mail and hosting of various types of media to be public infrastructure rather than spurious privately owned services)
[edit] Of course this was downvoted, and that's fine, but tell me how I'm wrong, or what you disagree with..
The copyright situation is a mess though. Another poster said that they nope out of the idea of creating content due to stuff like this. I understand that feeling. On the other hand, their content would simply be ripped and reposted on somewhere else without some sort of technical means to enforce copyright. Either way, people who know how to abuse the system are going to abuse the system to their own benefit. There is no effective means to combat that abuse. The courts are out of reach to most people. Even a company as big as Google would have trouble handling and verifying claims. Even if they could dedicate the resources, it would probably expose them to being successfully sued in borderline cases. (Fran can point to her original reel, not everyone can do the same.)
EDIT: for those who are insisting that I am twisting Fran's words, I made it perfectly clear that she said if anybody. If you disagree with what I am saying, fine, but please don't claim that I am saying she said something she didn't because I am not.
I interpreted this as having a laugh at how ridiculous it is for someone else to claim it's their footage, "I have the original right here!"
What she says that if it was possible to have a copyright claim it should be her because she owns the reel. But not that she has copyright.
Not because of protesting YouTube's ridiculous copyright system, but because she uses that smug tone to talk to people who owe her nothing, and are making reasonable suggestions (like syncing with alternative platforms) for mitigating the problem.
Calling her a whiner is unnecessary abuse.
Maybe, but my objection isn't to the fact that she doesn't want to use alternative platforms. That's understandable. It's to how she looks down on people who dare to make that suggestion.
Even if the immediate problem were fixed, it would ultimately not change anything in the long run because it would only motivate uploaders to continue entrenching themselves on the website. You cannot have real change without competition.
Being called a whiner is not "abusive".
She complains about the website, yet she goes on to unfairly disparage the alternatives. By the end of the video she is patting herself on the back for being a "youtuber" and staying loyal to the website.
Welcome to adulthood.
She wants a full time income doing something fun, using a free platform that does the marketing for her at no cost and complains when the rug gets pulled. This is business. Even in a job you can be replaced, fired or your skills go out of date. Life is a constant fight, everyone has to be up for that.
Sorry, "being up for" being the target of racketeering and fraud-- I expect better than that.
Indeed, one might say it's the only fight that matters, as other options just lead to unabated extortion.
The facts are she is whining while not willing to do anything about it (lawyer/contesting)