Viacom v. YouTube

Recently I had a friend who used Youtube to promote her new album in a very successful way. She uploaded some demo clips on Youtube and sent out Emails asked us to watch. It’s easy for us to recommend her clips to all of our friends through Emails. So everybody just checked her clips on Youtube and found she really had a great voice. Some of the link sent to the owner of restaurants or host of some great music related events. One month later, when she started to promote her new album, she got several chances to sing in restaurants and several events. She’s a new signer, but through Youtube, tons of people getting to know her. Moreover, they bought her albums to support her. Youtube really provided a platform for those who want to share their talent through video clips. If you dare to show, you’ll definitely find your fans. It’s a great opportunity for those super-star-to-be. They don’t have support from big music companies and don’t have promotion budget as well, unable to afford buying any advertisement on any channels. But at least they have YouTube.

Also, I can understand that through some special features like “share” and “friends”, you can hide your videos that only allow friends to access. No privacy concern and you can share only with your close friends overseas. It’s a thoughtful function to me. So I think it’s unfair to state that YouTube hinders plaintiffs’ attempts to locate infringing videos to protect their rights only because they have this kind special service. It is true that some users use this function to hide their videos which contain infringed content. But I’ll say you can always figure out doing illegal things through some legal functions.

Moreover, I don’t really think YouTube shift all the burdens entirely onto copyright owner to detect infringing videos. There’re over billions clips over there, it’s too hard for YouTube to police all the infringing works. People use that platform to share their creations for free, shouldn’t let YouTube suffer undue burden!

Viacom v. Youtube

It seems that, in the viacom v. Youtube case, we can have some viewpoint similar to the Sony case. One of reasons that the court held that Sony's betamax did not infringe copyrights of many producers, is that it had substantially non-infringing use. Similarly, main purpose of Youtube is to guarantee users to post and show their own opinions and expression without any restrictions. The objective of Youtube is not to freely share copyrighted works. Before Youtube, it was hard for citizens to express their opinions to the public unless they obtained any kind of support of a broadcasting station. However, thanks to Youtube, anyone can create and post video clips to show their opinions. They don't need the broadcasting station's support or help any more. Of course, there may be some copyright infringing contents in Youtube. However, Youtube is properly handling this issue by immediately taking them down. It seems that Youtube should win in this lawsuit because it is closely related to the freedom of speech.

Innovators' presentation

Hi everyone! Innovators decided to make a video as their presentation (available if you click on the title of the post I suppose). After much struggle, the video has been posted on my facebook profile. It is accessible to my friends, friends of friends and the UW network. I assume that most of you would be in one of those situations and could get access to it... You can check it out before class on Wednesday if you would like. See you on Wednesday!

Update on TM case re discussed in class v. Second Life

Yesterday I mentioned that a lawsuit had been filed against Linden Lab, maker of Second Life, regarding trademark infringement. We also talked about "who to sue" in cases such as this. So there has been a development in the case against Linden Lab - the plaintiff has dropped the case. Why? What do you think?

A noteworthy blog

I am passing along this blog, without expressing my opinion about the author's views and perspective. Tt contains so many timely articles about things we've been discussing. Also and especially it provides a terrific list of links to other blogs and websites of interest. Several of you asked me for links to good places to do some research, and I think you'll find something of use in his list of links. Cheers!

For those who did not know second life a lot

I find this 5 minute introductory video of second life, it is helpful to know what is going on in the Second Life.
http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=2496361n

Viacom v. Y-Tube

Law is just law even though it may be not fair. Under the Statute of DMCA safe harbor provision, YouTube is not liable if it takes down the infringing materials immediately after receiving a notice from right owner. Viacom is arguing that YouTube has to have more actions to prevent copyright infringement which are not required by law, maybe required by fairness principle which is not law. Furthermore, there are huge amount of non-infringing uses and possible fair uses in YouTube which will strongly support the public benefit. As we all agree, YouTube has moved the video market forward faster than any other player. Viacom has not made any innovation and just fears loss of control, particularly of the distribution channel, which will just stifle further innovation in the market. However, I am afraid but it seems to me that Google also might have a very strong business incentive to settle this case, like a Google book case.