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.

Google Book

Frankly, I was really hoping to see a court decision on this case which might provide a guideline on the fair use of digital copyright. As many critics are saying, Google seems to make a business decision to maintain its monopolistic position on the digital book market. I understand that is why US government agency is going to start antitrust investigation on this settlement. At a glance, Google book project is really cool and great benefit to the public and in some other sense it also could be profitable to authors as well because I do not think that the Google book actually give a serious impact on the printed book markets for the time being. Furthermore, under the settlement agreement, each book's author and/or publisher, whoever holds the copyright, retains the power to set the price on consumer access to the book, as well as the right to withdraw the book completely from the database. The antitrust concern also need to be balanced between the pro-competitive effect/consumer protection and the protection of right owner. I wonder how long the monopoly power of Google might be last in dynamic digital technology age.

Autod Admit Lawsuit & Legal Implications of On Line Discussion Boards

In light of the fact that our topic for Wednesday's class is the legal implications of social networking, etc., I wanted to pass along two links for recent articles about the Autoadmit lawsuit.

For those of you who don't know anything about it, the basic background to this lawsuit is that two female Yale Law students were the targets of some very nasty and vicious remarks by fellow students who posted their comments on a website called autoadmit.com. The website was originally intended to be a discussion board, a place where students could communicate with each other and provide honest feedback about what life is really like at an Ivy League school. The purpose was to share "inside information" on professors, classes, general student life, etc. The "autoadmit" title refers to the fact that the students who are admitted into these Ivy Leage schools have such high test scores, grades, and other qualifications that they are "automatically admitted" into the Ivy League schools.

The root of the lawsuit is that fellow students (whose identities were not known since they used on line names and not their real names)started posting such nasty remarks that the female students were professionally affected by the comments. The two law students took a leave of absence from the Yale Law School, and one of them believes that she lost job offers because of the comments. Eventually, the two students got together and sued one of the owners and operators of the site, who was himself a law student at an Ivy League law school (University of Pennsylvania).

Interestingly, the basis of the lawsuit is copyright infringement, since one of the posts on the site included an on line beauty pageant, in which people voted, and one of the pictures used for this contest was a Facebook photo of one of the two female students. The lawsuit has gained a lot of attention of late because the one of the owners of the suit (the UPENN law student) sued the two female law students as well, claiming that he lost a job offer from a Boston law firm due to their suit against him.The story was even featured on National Public Radio a few months ago.

Needless to say, this law suit and its origins indicate just how complicated and even messy the effects and consequences our on-line actions can be.
For further details, here are the two links:

www.yaledailynews.com/articles/view/28661

www.techliberation.com/2009/02/16/the-autoadmit-case-and-the-future-of-sec-230/

SL in near future

I have been playing Second Life (I have my home/land in SL) since 2006 and I participated to discuss how my company might utilize the "world" at the time many companies discussed on same topics. I think my company could introduce virtual musical instruments for marketing or promoting RL music lessons in SL but none of them was developed because of the characteristics of participants of the "world" at that time... But I foresee this kind of "world" will be more common in near future and the IP issue will be critical for developer to ensure certain exclusivity of IP in the "world". I believe it's much easier to restrict copy or identify infringement in the "world" so it could promote progress of science and arts more than in RL.

About second life's IP solution

From a legal viewpoint, I believe what second life did does make sense, since it's the way we used in real life. People who creates an image or scene or uploads his works should have the IP rights thereof.
My concern, however, is whether this is that important, since it cannot produce any real value. Maybe someone would use or buy it, but that does not change its virtual nature, or maybe it is good for some special businesses which have not been in my knowledge. Hope to know more on this week's class.

This Wednesday's Class

Hi Everyone,

At  Wednesday's class, we are going to be talking about some of the legal implications of a few  "novel" innovations at the intersection of technology and intellectual property, including virtual worlds and social networking.  Of course, each of these subject areas provides more than a semester's worth of material on its own, but we'll at least familiarize ourselves with the issues.

I'd like each of you to be prepared to discuss in class your opinions and ideas.  These are incredibly rich subject areas that provoke a wide range of reactions among lawyers.

Please visit www.secondlife.com.  Ideally, download the application and spend some time visiting different environments in Second Life.    Here's how to do it:

Start on the home page off www.secondlife.com.

Click "Explore".  

This will take you to a registration page.  You have to make up a name for your avatar.  Just pick a first name, and then it will give you a limited list of last names to choose from.

When you register, you have the option of "choosing a community" from which to start when you join.  I recommend you do this, especially if you are not a native English speaker.  You'll likely find a community (which is just an entry portal into Second Life) in your native language or originating from your home country.

Then download the application.

Once you download the application, you will have opportunities to easily navigate around Second Life by following links to different experiences.  You can also find these under "community".

We'll try to do this in class Wed. as well if we can maintain a stable Internet connection.

One of the interesting aspects of Second Life is that its creator, Linden Lab, allows individual users to own the intellectual property in any creations they make and upload to Second Life, which is quite unlike most websites or applications to which users contribute content.  Given the many issues we've been discussing this semester, the implications of this business and legal strategy are quite significant.  

This is the terms of service for Second Life.  Paragraph 3.2 contains the intellectual property clause.  http://secondlife.com//corporate/tos.php

This is the terms of service for Second Life.  Paragraph 3.2 contains the intellectual property clause.  http://secondlife.com//corporate/tos.php

And check out this counter-perspective on the intellectual property ownership strategy:  

http://nwn.blogs.com/nwn/2009/04/eff-and-sl.html

The following readings are optional.

Here is an interview of Prof.  Larry Lessig that occurred in Second Life regarding his opinions on some topics related to public policy, the Google Books case, intellectual property law, Creative Commons, the scope of copyright, and some other subjects we've discussed in class.    In addition, this is an interesting example in and of itself on the kinds of events that can and do occur within Second Life.   http://nwn.blogs.com/nwn/2006/01/the_second_life.html

We talked a bit about the Google Books case a few weeks ago.  This is one particularly lucid piece of commentary analyzing the case and the potential far-reaching implications on the settlement.  Of course, it's one perspective, so feel free to post your own or links to others that you find compelling or worth noting.

http://radar.oreilly.com/2009/04/legally-speaking-the-dead-soul.html

Let me know if you have questions.  Happy teleporting in the meantime, and I'll see you Wednesday.

Kelly Jo MacArthur

Some researchers use YouTube for study of animal brain

I found interesting article regarding YouTube.
Researchers use YouTube to study animal brain.
YouTube contributes animal science.

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2009154754_parrots01.html
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N7IZmRnAo6s

Viacom v Youtube

Personally, I really enjoy watching Youtube, yes as other classmates have said that they can reduce feeling of being far away from their home country. I am also have same feeling, when I watch free and interesting stuff on Youtube I feel like I am not too far away from my home.

Yes!!! it's hard to say that " well, ok Youtube is infringing other people's copyrighted works and then Youtube should be banned, things like that."

As my position "one user or customer" Youtube can provide a lot of interesting and yes!!! it's free!!!. That's why the user like me is addicted watching Youtube although some time I also wonder whether or not there is infringement occuring.

Moreover I think the main point that Youtube argued to Viacom that "because of customers' demand of using Youtube, it does not infringement Viacom's copyrighted works". In my opinion if Youtube did say other arguement not customers' demand, the user like me might not agree with Youtube. But !!!! because I as the customer and user want to enjoy the website like Youtube so I prefer Youtube's side. Sorry for Viacom - -"

Viacom vs. YouTube

If you can find the 34,000 clips titled “F*CK VIACOM!..oh and happy 4th of July!” or the 16,000 clips titled “VIACOM VS YOU= BOYCOTT”, you have no choice, but admit the new Internet or digital media age handled by huge number of end user all over the world.
Even though DMCA provisions are enforceable, many legal problems are still remaining at Copyright infringement issues in the Internet industry. However, legislators should consider about new technology and its risks related individuals such as privacy infringements, because legal issue based on human rights has to be primarily considered.
Nobody can stop to develop new technologies, then legislator and people need to always check the technology leading company’s trend, such as Google, and they should not hands-off from these issues.

Viacom v. Youtube

Copyright should be protected. However, it should be protected in the manner to promote creating activity not to hinder it. In view of the principle, should Google be liable? If not, should the users be liable? Is Viacom going too much to undermine developments?

We cannot deny the fact that the hosting providers like Youtube has been contributing for development of communication technology as well as creating activity. However, I believe that a big portion of the contents in Youtube would be from old media providers which are copyrighted. Are those different from “time shifting” which were allowed by Sony case? Is that so because the content is used by many people and deprive copyright-holders of chances to make profits? Then who takes the profits instead? Users are not interested in the benefits. That’s Google. In that sense, Google has been a free rider on the user’s contents to make money. Google is trying to hide behind DMCA Safe Harbor. However, I believe that it is for a good faith website owner not for Google who knew clearly that users would upload contents against copyrights.

Then, should we give up benefits of internet for free communication and Sharing information and expression? I think that Google has to pay for the way they make money and provide legitimate way for the users to share contents. As Google said, to achieve balance the rights of copyright-holders and the need to protect the internet as important new form of communication, Google has to give proper reward to copyright-holders. However, copyright-holders and old media providers cannot seek the traditional protection by prohibiting all the use of their contents. Recent development of communications does not allow it anymore. They will have to find a way to compete by providing better communication service. It will broaden the access for users to the contents and promote more creating activity.

Viacom v. Youtube

I really enjoy watching Japanese shows on Youtube. Almost every night I look for something interesting on Youtube. However, from the aspect of copyright holders, Youtube may be an annoying tool. Concerning Viacom v. Youtube, I thought at first that Viacom was trying to protect their content which are copyrighted and owned by Viacom. However, some articles stated that Viacom’s real aim may be to protect their new business, which is to work with “Joost”. (Viacom’ divisions, such as MTV networks, provide Joost with television programming, that users can view using the Joost platform.)
It seems that this lawsuit’s basis is how to protect their new business model in addition to the issues concerning how to promote the innovation of new technology and how to think about DMCA or fair use. I personally support Youtube, but I need to know the interest of other new business models also.

On the other hand, we actually see copyrighted material on Youtube, which are obviously beyond the scope of fair use but left as they are. Because of business strategy, the copyright holders may leave this kind of illegal usages without taking any legal action. Professor Tim Wu at Columbia University calls this usage “tolerated use”. These usages sometimes give the copyright holder benefits which may play a role as an advertisement of copyrighted works. Even if we admit such a usage, “tolerated use”, it is still difficult to keep balance between the copyright holders and innovators.

Thoughts on Viacom v. Google

The Viacom v. Google litigation has many interesting legal issues, but in the end, I believe the decision should be controlled largely by policy issues. There does not really appear to be any dispute as to whether copyrighted material can be found on the You Tube website. It is also not disputable whether Viacom owns a copyright in much of this material. According to the DMCA, You Tube should be policing the site and taking down copyrighted material. Although this is a daunting task, it is possible. Google currently polices the site and takes down offensive material, this it is not inconceivable that it is logistically possible to take down all copyrighted material. This amount of work would likely put the site out of business, but is likely the correct legal result.
Even thought the correct legal result would likely end in a victory for Viacom, I do not believe it is the correct result for policy reasons. Consider the Sony case for example. It was pretty clear (at least to me) that a major use of the VCR was for copyright infringement. Despite this, the court did not rule in favor of the movie studios. The eventual result of this arguably policy driven decision, was that the movie studios ended up with more business. The decision arguably spawned more creativity from artists as they saw another media to present their work.
I believe a similar result should be obtained in the current Viacom/Google litigation. You Tube has spawned a significant amount of creativity from artists that would not have existed without the new means to present their work. Furthermore, although Viacom claims to have losses amounting to $1 billion, has likely benefited from You Tube. Many users who see clips on You Tube may be prompted to view the whole content from a Viacom provider thus increasing Viacom's revenue. In a sense, You Tube is providing free advertising for Viacom.
If the court were to rule against Google, it would be cutting off a valuable new innovation for the advancement of the arts. One of the major purposes of our copyright laws is to promote the arts. Thus, although I believe Viacom has a valid legal argument, I think that the court should consider important policy considerations and rule in favor of Google. A different result could have a detrimental effect of the advancement of the arts and go against the very policies for which the laws were created.

Viacom v. Youtube

Youtube brings us great benefits.  No one wants to stop seeing Youtube.  In this situation, I feel it is extremely difficult for judicial power (even United States Supreme Court) to stop Youtube because no federal judges were selected by the citizen directly.  It’s the job for Congress, I feel.  But also congress cannot stop Youtube because Google now has great social power and many qualified voter don’t want to.  Accordingly, like Sony, the copyright holders (for example, Viacom) and Youtube finally will find and go into win-win relationship.  I feel some doubt about discussion about such matter spending long time now because here is law school, in which we study law, not study public-policy making way or business.

Comment on Safe Harbor

Under section 512 of the DMCA, Internet Service Provider (ISP) is not held liable for instances of copyright infringement as long as the ISPs satisfy some statutory requirements. ISPs does not have any obligations to watch for or block potential infringement before the materials are uploaded on their services.
However, it is not fair for only copyright owners to have responsibility to watch for infringement of their works on ISPs sevices. Today, it may be impossible for copyright owners to be aware of infringement of their works, because there exist may ISPs, and users using these ISPs are so huge. So, it is necessary for copyright owners and ISPs to share responsibility to watch for or block infringements related to the works uploaded. This approach may be possible, because filtering technology which prohibits unauthorized works from being uploaded on ISPs' services have existed.

Can You Tube be dreammaker or destroyer for artists?

From the perspective of professional content producer, I could find the fact that You Tube might achieve the tremendous successful result of the “grass roots democracy” especially in last year (2008).
I mean that Obama”s presidential- election campaign using “Obama Girl” in You Tube had the tremendous influential power for younger generation marketing to be successful. I could see the huge potential power as a media whether it might be good or bad.
I think it is the super victory of the media strategy.
An unknown beautiful girl was acting as the TV show character “Wonder Woman” (Super Woman) and music video artist in the You Tube. She was always attractive and charming. She could enthuse with people in the video. Surprisingly enough, Obama the said person appeared in the same scene. Furthermore, this beautiful l woman was dancing with Obama, punching George W. Bush in the digital editorial cutting content story like a MYV comical music video. It was super fun and wonderful for the alert person.
As we can see this case, an un known performer or artist can be a star in one night. On the other hand, the traditional or conventional establishment person may lose his or her prestige in a twinkle.
Whereas the true revolutionary strategist (Obama in this case) can accomplish the new wave that he is the true reformer like a Hollywood movie star.
I think it is a revolution.
In this context, if I were the successful artist, I want to reject You Tube because it can destroy my assets and the established achievements and reputation. There might be many violations and infringements in IP fields and in Privacy phase.
If I were the poor artist, You tube can be my dream maker.

Takahiro Kato

It's all about supply and demand, Viacom.

Why does Viacom want to sue YouTube? So far, YouTube is not a profitable business. What can Viacom get from this lawsuit? Order YouTube to prohibit users to put infringed files on YouTube? So what? Users will find alternative websites to upload the video they would like to share with other people. Therefore, before the lawsuit, maybe Viacom or other copyright owners should ask a question, whether this suit can stop general public to infringe our works?

People in this world always talk about economy. Economy 101, supply and demand, is the first thing copyright owners should think about. YouTube is only a platform to provide a space for users to share their files. The only reason that YouTube was established is the demand of general public, no matter they would like to use the space for copyrightable works or infringed works.

Therefore, will the suit alter internet users’ demand? I don’t think so.

Copyright infringement is inevitable, and the existence of infringement should not be the reason to suffocate new technologies

Viacom case is another example presenting the conflict between the appearance of a new technology and the copyrighted works that would be affected by this new technology. Basically, I support any technology that helps to improve the distribution of knowledge, unless the sole or main purpose of the technology is for infringement, such as the technology implements circumvention of technical protection measures. I will not deny that all technologies could be used evilly; however, if it has substantial non-infringing use, then the development and distribution of new technologies are worth to be protected.

The distribution and expansion of knowledge is the ultimate purpose of copyright law, and new technology such as YouTube is an effective approach to achieve this goal. Although one of its side effects is the contribution of copyright infringement, it does not make sense to suffocate a technology useful for knowledge distribution only because it can be used evilly by some people.

As an attempt to mitigate the potential loss of copyright holders, I think the law such as DMCA does a good balance. “Notice and take down” is enough for copyright holders because they cannot expect a 100% protection by the provider of new technology. Society and economic activities are dynamic, and copyright can derive its economic value only from this dynamic mechanism. The economic rights of copyright holders are not the ultimate purpose of copyright law, and sometimes the copyright holders have to endure inevitable infringement if banning new technology is not the best solution for the general welfare.

Therefore, I think Google or YouTube should be held not liable for the infringing materials on YouTube if they have abided by the “notice and take down” requirement in DMCA.

Germ of New Technology

The Court saved germ of new technology – Sony Betamax. The result is the prosperity of the film industry. We should not nip a bud of new technology – YouTube unless irreparable harm occurs. I think that YouTube can coexist with Viacom if we find a good solution. To save new technology such as YouTube would bring an industrial growth or benefits for our society as the VTR recorder history told.

However, it is also important to remember that we have to take into account the benefits of the contents holders or IP rights holders such as Viacom. Efforts of the contents holders should be compensated while we protect new technology which uses their contents.

One of my proposed solutions for Viacom and YouTube to live together is that YouTube pays royalty to Viacom in accordance with the number of views of the contents. Instead, Viacom allows the users of YouTube to use Viacom’s contents. In addition, the user declares use of the Viacom’s content when he uploads it to YouTube to make it easier to calculate the royalty. Law can no longer stop the trend of video sharing website technology. We should try to co-exist with the new technology by Law.

Words: 200

Masashi Takeda

Why YOUTUBE case now reminds me of Napster case in Music?

About 10 years ago, in order to listen to one or two tracks, consumers should buy the CD with entire tracks. According to these needs, Napster had started to provide p2p services. Today, in order to watch the 2 or 3 minutes part of big star, consumers should buy the whole digital contents - music, television programs or movies.
In fact, these issues result from the lack of company’s business model which can meet consumer’s various preferences and needs. The related laws tend to follow the new business model with some time gap. Thus, unless and until the related laws are established, it is likely to be hot issue whether or not the new model is legitimate.
Like Napster and similar cases, YOUTUBE case is also likely to be in favor of the copyright holders, in that companies such as YouTube increasingly cannibalize the revenues of content creators like Viacom. However, since 1998, DMCA has enacted. Therefore, the new issue is whether or not YOUTUBE can be protected under the safe harbor of DMCA provision. The one thing that we can predict with substantial probability is that court cannot declare the YOUTUBE’s services illegal easily in pursuit of Napster or Grokster cases.

CC license

The copyright owner can license his/her copyrighted works to public people for a free under appropriate conditions in order to advance public welfare. However, even if the owner has such good intention, it is not easy for public people to discover whether any works are licensed, and under what conditions the works are licensed. Under this situation, Creative Common Licenses are introduced by Creative Commons. I think Creative Common License has contributed and will contribute to advancing public welfare.

Argument for Google under DMCA

The Congress enacted DMCA with the correct policy that to immunize legitimate services like YouTube from copyright liability to respond with the digital world. Viacom threatens the way hundreds of millions of people legitimately exchange information, news, entertainment, and political and artistic expression.
The DMCA does not require that site owners actively monitor content for potential infringement. Under the DMCA’s Safe Harbors Google cannot be held liable for infringing material posted by its users if it takes down the material once it is notified by the rights-holder. YouTube is covered under the DMCA Safe Harbors because it immediately responds to takedown notices.
Conditions for safe harbors: Performs a qualified storage or search function for internet users; Lack actual or imputed knowledge of the infringing activity; Receives no financial benefit directly from such activity in a case where he has the right and ability to control it; Acts promptly to remove or disable access to the material when his designated agent is notified that it is infringing; Adopts, reasonably implements publicizes policy of terminating repeat infringers; Accommodates and does not interfere with standard technical measures used by copyrighted owners to identify or protect copyrighted works.

Google has satisfied all of these conditions.

The benefits of CCL

Creative commons license (“CCL) may give many benefits to not only the users but also the copyright owners. First, the users using the copyrighted works can use such works without any fear of copyright infringement if they keep the rules under CCL. Second, the copyright owners can publish its copyrighted materials under their control because they can permit the conditions of such materials with their own discretion (For example, if copyright owner put some commercial options regarding the use of copyrighted works, she can obtain economic gain). In addition to this, under this CCL system, Internet Service Provider can provide copyrighted works relatively without any fear of copyright infringement. Considering for these benefits, this CCL may be a kind of options to compromise the disputes and problems between the copyright owners and its users and promote the development of IP culture.

Life will find its way! (Viacom v. YouTube due 4/28)

Let’s start form the Susan Boyle, where she really got the chance to be on the stage still was the TV show-British got Talent. Under the design of professional producer, the performance touched people. Can a singer videotaping her performance on YouTube make the same effect? I am not sure! As a creator, no matter how talent you are, you want others know! However, the power is still belongs to mass media. Nobody can stop the improvement of technology just like nobody can eliminate the desire to show your talent.
It’s just my suspicion that it’s part of Viacom’s strategy by utilizing this lawsuit to get a better negotiation position to Google as to using Viacom's copyrighted contents. Therefore, if I were Viacom, I would propose a settlement to make more profits with the help of YouTube. Content owners have the prevailing resources to create the incentive for Google or other web service providers to collaborate with them. Their real trail is to be creative enough to survive in the new technology era! Life will find its way, Content owners will find thier way as well!

Personal opinion regarding Viacom case

I enjoy surfing a lot of contents posted in YouTube and through those contents, I can lessen my stress arising from daily life. Therefore, for myself, I hope that YouTube will overcome this crisis by Viacom and its users including me share a lot of useful service provided by You-tube. However, I think that the YouTube provide its users with such amusements and benefits without any illegal acts like copyright infringement because I believe that it, ultimately, protects both copyright owners and users. In relation of this, Viacom alleges that YouTube is directly liable for, or contributorily and/or vicariously liable for copyright infringement and in contrast to those allegations by Viacom, YouTube defends that it is internet service provider (“ISP”) as defined by the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (“DMCA”) and as such ISP under DMCA, it took any reasonable measures under DMCA. At this stage, it is impossible to anticipate who will win this lawsuit but at least, if this case will be judged by the court, the court will guide a standard of measures which should be taken by ISP under DMCA clearly. As such, I really hope that the court hold that YouTube has no liable for any copyright infringement and even if YouTube lose this case, based on the standard confirmed by this case, other ISPs who keep such standard do their business without any fear regarding copyright infringement.

Viacom v. YouTube

Even if my main job relates to Intellectual Property, I don’t have any interest in various activities in cyber space. I have heard about YouTube, inter alia, a big deal that Google Has Acquired YouTube. However, I had not tried to find what YouTube is, what its main business is, and Why Google acquired YouTube, before this class began. However, I was surprised to found YouTube’s business. YouTube alleges that it, as an Internet Service Provider, allows users to share their data, and that such activities should be protected under safe harbor provision of DMCA. If Viacom had thought YouTube’s business meets safe harbor provision or limitation, Viacom could not have brought suit against YouTube. However, according to Viacom’s complaint submitted to the court, YouTube knows wide infringement activities on its site. Even if YouTube may take reasonable measures to prevent them, it is thought to be reluctant to do so. In addition, YouTube seems to use copies, which are uploaded by users on its site, knowing that such uploading is done without the permission of the copyrighted owners. If so, YouTube’s business can not meet safe harbor provision. In my opinion, YouTube’s main business uses the copyrighted works for a free.

CC License and its goal

Creative Commons was started in 2001 with the goal of introducing the equal balance between innovation and protection. The group proclaims that its ends "are cooperative and community-minded, but its means are voluntary and libertarian." The group has developed a Web application that assists people in dedicating their works to the public domain or allows them to retain their copyrights while licensing them for no charge for specified purposes based on certain conditions. I think it does appear that Creative Commons is offering the flexible copyright options it envisioned at the beginning. In addition, the recent explosive growth of Creative Commons licenses seems to be successful.
However, as always, time will tell whether it will inspire and bring the equal balance between them as stated above. Moreover, I think we do need more time to observe and evaluate it.

CC

I found successful example of cc: Creative Commons make perfect rational sense for the public TV stations to use to fulfill their mission.

http://www.thewavingcat.com/2008/04/08/creative-commons-for-german-public-tv-could-save-costs-archives/

CC license

When I first heard the concept of CC a couple of years ago, I thought it would be helpful to promote dissemination of creative contents. However, at least in my country, Korea, it hasn’t been successful so far. While Naver, the most dominant web portal (www.naver.com) whose market share is more than 70% in Korea, started encouraging use of “CC” very strongly when uploading or posting since very beginning of year 2008 and many influencing bloggers and heavy uploaders are still posting their “CC” license, general public does not care much about this newly introduced instrument. I am afraid that the concept of CC is too complicated for general public which may include young elementary school students. In addition, it seems to me that many users in my country don’t care much about how their contents are distributed; rather they do more care about whether or not to block all kinds of duplication of their contents.

Viacom v. Youtube

I am not a big fan of Youtube, and I personally believe that the protection of copyright in cyberspace should be reinforced, but I can’t agree to the Viacom’s methodology. As far as I know, many countries which have internet service providers allowing data-sharing had shared the notion that service providers just acting as a conduit to convey the contents generated by end users should be exempted from the secondary liability, and this has led enactment of safe harbor provision or limitation clauses of liability in their national copyright acts. Reviewing the conducts performed by Youtube, I still believe Youtube should be protected by the notion that the legislators and interested parties in this country agreed to, because most video clips I rely on were just user created fun stuffs. While it may be true that you can find some infringing contents in Youtube, but I believe this situation should be resolved by less strict ways, such as working on “adaptive” filtering technology, or establishing efficient system to watch and pull out the infringing stuffs, rather than sending cease and desist letters to internet service providers. I do not believe that things get to the point where they provide the infringing material so much so that have to be shutdown for good. I think the notion the legislators and interested parties agreed on is still valid, and most people and users are happily enjoying that, so I hope Youtube could win this case.

Viacom vs Youtube biased opinion

You tube has so many fans worldwide. Personally, I love you tube, too, because I can enjoy various kinds of funny contents created by individuals, which is great!! To my eyes, most of them do not seem to infringe third party's copyright contents. Without you tube community where individual users can feel free to share his/her own masterpiece, it exert a harmful influence on the development of culture. Yes, it might be true that some of contents in you tube infringes copyright of others as viacom insists. However, you tube take the necessary measures to prevent it in accordance with DMCA. I believe that viacom may change its business model which adjust these modern days. Technology will develop and never goes back. Rather than using its energy, time and money for attacking you tube using current technology, it is beneficial for viacom to change its business model completely for its future business. Furthermore, if viacom attacks you tube too much, and you tube user will suffer from inconvenience who are not using viacom contents through you tube, I am afraid that viacom might make enemies of a lot of you tube user people.....

Youtube but also.. Veoh

We talk a lot about the Youtube’s failure to prevent the uploading of copyrighted material. It is true that Youtube does not view videos before they are posted online. It is also true that Youtube only implements a control a posteriori of the videos, when the copyright holders issue to the Company a notice of violation. However, if we compare Youtube’s policies regarding unauthorized clips or movies with the policies of some of its serious competitors, it seems that Youtube seriously tries to ensure that its online content adheres to the laws of copyright. I especially think about Veoh and Megaupload. Veoh is a company that provides almost the same services as Youtube. Megaupload works a little differently since it is based on an online storage website. However, as Youtube, it also proposes its clients to upload videos on their personal website. According to my personal experience, the control of unauthorized content by these websites is quasi inexistent. While I observe that the copyright material does not stay more than 2 days on Youtube before being removed anymore, the same material is freely available on Veoh or Megaupload for weeks or even months. Because these companies seem to be less careful, the uploaders of copyrighted material seems to have withdrawn from Youtube and adopted the services proposed by its competitors. However, these companies are also threatened to be sued by companies like Universal Music on the same basis argued against Youtube. About this question, it is interesting to notice that by contrast with Youtube, Veoh did not wait to be sued. Veoh decided to fight back and went before a Court to ask for a declaratory judgment that its services are perfectly legal under the DMCA safe harbor provisions. The most interesting fact is that for the moment, the pending lawsuit seems to be at Veoh’s advantage : Lastly, the request made by Universal Music to include Veoh’s investor as part of the lawsuit was dismissed by the judge (which I think is quite logical since we could not include the investor arguing that they “actively encouraged” the copyright violation before establishing that Veoh is infringing). The issue in this law suit will surely have important consequences for the lawsuit between Youtube and Viacom.

Copyright Infringement Suits: On the right road? (Viacom v. YouTube Due 4/28)

History repeats itself. The battle between media companies and Silicon Valley cutting-edge technology entrepreneurs continued. First is Sony Betamax, second as several generations of p2p file sharing websites, now as the user-generated sites, such as YouTube.

In Sony Betamax case, the media companies worried about the recording technology would destroy the content industry. Although the media companies lost the litigation, the history approved that they gained huge profits through selling and renting video tapes. That is, the controversy finds its way out of the business models rather than copyright infringement lawsuits. Regarding Viacom v. YouTube, it seems that the media companies might probably achieve initial success based on secondary liabilities of copyright infringement.

However, are Viacom and other media companies still on the right road? In my opinion, media companies should learn from history. The development of modern copyright protection witnessed the confrontation of “content” and “technology” developers. Ironically, the content providers often turn out to be the beneficiaries of technology once they learn how to embrace them. Therefore, I believe content and technology should not be on a collision course. It is the market, not the courts or governments, which will ultimately decide what will be for our future.
(Word Count: 200)

Hope YouTube will win

Just as a user of YouTube, I hope Google win the lawsuit Viacom v. YouTube. Not only me, but wide range of people, even over 70 years old my grandmother often enjoy the YouTube as a part of entertainment life.

YouTube alleges that Google is liable for direct copyright infringement (public performance, public display, reproduction and distribution) as well as indirect copyright infringement (inducement, contributory and vicarious Liability). However, I think Google will successfully allege DMCA defense. If DMCA defense would not be granted, it would mean ignorance of the Congress’ intention: The policy underlain in DMCA is to immunize ISP from copyright liability. In addition, fair use defense will work for YouTube. Its uses are newsworthy and transformative: Posted works are short, low resolution video clips and then embed those clips into blogs for commentary and criticism.

However, just my expectation though, this case may be settled for some reasons. First, both parties may be willing to settle since issues are so complicated including not only copyright infringement but privacy. Second, like Google book case, Google may be in favor of settlement as a part of business strategy. Anyway, I hope we can continue to use YouTube.

Does Viacom just want to maintain their power?

YouTube is becoming almost the biggest power in the media world. At my first glance, Viacom cannot change their business model. CBS, Warner Music and BBC have collaborated with YouTube. They say that YouTube has contributed to their business. Actually, Viacom has invested on monitoring YouTube website in order to remove their contents. It appears to me that Viacom should invest on changing their business model to use YouTube.
Surprisingly, while Viacom sues YouTube for copyright infringement, Viacom also owns video sharing website, “iFilm”, and continues infringing other’s copyrights like YouTube does. Many people attack Viacom’s double standard attitude. I do not know details about Viacom's copyright infringement, however, I cannot imagine Viacom's goal.

Is the balance appropriate? (YouTube v. Viacom)

Actually YouTube is a great tool for advertising – for instance, Susan Boyle became a well-known woman in the world only in short period through YouTube. A lot of websites following the similar business model to YouTube have appeared in Korea, China, and other countries.
Even though tons of users, including me, support and make use of it for their own amusements, I think that it has been losing the balance between service providers - YouTube - and contents owners – Viacom. I partially agree with Viacom’s argument. Contents, regardless of copyrighted or not, are essential and crucial components for YouTube’s business scheme. YouTube might say that DMCA exempts You-Tube from monitoring its service and seeking contents that is potentially infringing other’s copyrights. However, YouTube appears to neglect their rights by overlooking the fact that contents might infringing copyright, and by substantially imposing to copyright owners a burden of removing their works. I don’t mean to accuse You-Tube’s business model, which potentially causes a paradigm shift in the Internet business, and gives us a gift. I hope that Court and Congress seek the point of compromise where both service providers and contents owners peacefully co-exist.

Good approach, but . . . (about CC)

I also think, though it cannot solve all problems as to distribution of copyrighted work in the Internet era for now, CC is one of good approaches, and I agree to its ultimate goal.
If I created something and want other people to know that I am willing to share it, I can choose to publish them under a Creative Commons license. But I still feel slightly uneasy – that is, I wonder if the other internet users respect a CC license, and whether my work is used by other internet users in the manner that I have thought. It depends on, not me, but rather the users’ intention and morality.
On the other hand, if I were a creator and just were looking for contents that I can freely and legally use, the pool of CC-licensed works would be the appropriate place to search for. There are millions of works – from drawings and songs to academic and scientific content – that I can use under the terms of CC license. But do all of potential users of CC-licensed works read and understand the terms? I don’t think so. More grass-rooted activities and education are necessary to diffuse CC’s concept to the extent that individuals can be aware that he or she can freely use the contents and can become a “creator” in the Internet era.
I think that CC can be good movement to build a de facto standard that facilitates communication via the Internet among not some limited communities but “ordinary” people.

What is the potential business model under CC?

I like the idea of Creative Commons, but I am wondering if CC will be as successful as GPL? In my perspective, IP rights are the interest allocation of stakeholders. Free software movement (Open source) supplied another choice for other companies (ex: IBM) to refuse binary use software ( typically called proprietary or commercial software). Therefore, it established a new business model. I can image, like other successful internet website, as long as CC gathers enough supporters and builds a uniform standard, something magic may happen. But there should be a potential business model to support this great idea. Since I don’t know much about how CC works around the world, this class and blog give me the flavor of CC. I will keep my eye on this interesting CC copyright issue.
http://money.cnn.com/magazines/business2/business2_archive/2004/05/01/368240/index.htm
This is an article in 2004, five years later, sharing become more pervasive but where is the new multibillion-dollar industry?

Thoughts after reading Michael Fricklas's arguments

Viacom's general counsel Michael Fricklas said "Does YouTube have "knowledge" of copyrighted material on its site? Does it have the "right and ability to control" the content? Yes and yes. If the public knows what's there, then YouTube's management surely does."

After reading this, I think a flip side of this argument is If the public knows what's there, then Viacom's management surely does. So, Viacom can easily notify Youtube the infringing videos, and Youtube can remove them without causing any damages to both Viacom and Youtube.

A cartoon introducing CC

Hey guys,

Check out this 5:48 long cartoon introducing CC on Creative Commons Australia:
http://creativecommons.org.au/learn
and its Chinese version:
http://creativecommons.org.tw/ (drag down to the bottom of this page)

Coexist (due 4/28)

Unlike Napster, most files uploaded on YouTube are added some creativities, and considering great usefulness of YouTube, it is not realistic to drive YouTube out of business. On the other side, old media and TV network companies have made and provided great creations, most of which are the underlying works of the second market, such as Google. Decline of old media companies would mean decline of the second market too. Therefore, Google and Viacom, and also Congress should find a way to coexist. The main issue would be money due mainly to copyright infringement.

Although Google and Google-like companies can ban users to upload copyright infringing files, since it is almost impossible to find out and eliminate files that infringe copyright of old media companies, it would be much more constructive way to pay flat fees in order for doing them business. This approach might be achieved by agreement of the parties, but it is not sure whether consensus is obtained, or whether it is one-sided agreement due to a bargaining power. The Congress, therefore, should encourage and promote this approach, for example stipulating to pay fees to media companies for doing Google-like businesses in proportion to their size. (199 words)

Creative Commons License: A great suggestion for individual creators

I think Creative Commons License is a good idea. Basically, it is a proposed template of copyright licensing agreement for creators which is featured “some rights reserved” instead of traditional “all rights reserved.” It helps a creator such as a blogger to adopt a concise copyright license very easily through the “license your work” function provided for free on its website. If Creative Commons License is widely adopted among the creators who hesitate to consult a copyright lawyer but are eager to clarify his/her rights and obligations to their works, I think a sound common sense regarding copyright can be established more easily, and ultimately, it will improve the use and spread of human knowledge.

Assignment for April 29, 2009

Assignment for April 29, 2009

Policy Issues for Online Content….and the Court of Public Opinion

• Review the executive summary of a Congressional Research Service report on Internet Policies – while dated it gives an overview of the range of policy issues that need to continually be addressed:
o http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/report/crs/43369.pdf

• Take a look at the issues and underlying Briefing Books prepared for 2008 Conference for the Congressional Internet Caucus – both the overall agenda and as a resource on specific issues:
o http://netcaucus.org/conference/2008

• As for op-eds on Viacom v. Google/YouTube, read:
o http://online.wsj.com/article/SB117392637770937728.html
o http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/03/23/AR2007032301451.html

• For some commentaries by fellow/former LLM students, see:
o http://creativity2dot0.blogspot.com/2008/01/my-impression-of-viacom-v-youtube.html

IF YOU HAVE NOT ALREADY POSTED YOUR OWN COMMENTARIES REGARDING ONLINE CONTENT, VIACOM V GOOGLE, CREATIVE COMMONS, GOOGLE BOOKS, OR OTHER RELATED TOPICS, PLEASE DO SO ON BLOG.

IF YOU ALREADY HAVE POSTED SOMETHING, FEEL FREE TO CONTRIBUTE MORE!

We will spend half of the class discussing some policy questions and the role of public opinion, then half of the class working on your projects/presentations in Stakeholder Teams.

It’s just tubes

We use internet as a media, rather than a product itself. If someone makes 100 phone calls to 100 different people with dirty words, should these telephone companies be liable? Certainly not, because internet and telephone are just “tubes”.
Should we monitor them? Certainly yes, anything has two sides. If internet is wrongfully used, it could cause damages. Then who should be liable for these damages? Wrongdoer should be. However, if the media already burden reasonable obligations to monitor, it does nothing wrong. Like the rational behind DMCA, as long as the ISPs remove the contents on its website diligently and monitor these diligently, it is simply wrong to render them liable.
Many people would question whether what Youtube has done is enough. Maybe not, someone would say Youtube developed this technology to disseminate videos while failing to develop a counterpart technology to monitor whether each video infringes others’ copyright. However, first, under the current law, Youtube has done more than what the law requires; second, I doubt it is reasonable to require Youtube to develop a counterpart monitoring technology, since it seems copyright holder should bear more burden to protect their own rights, others which provide service with substantial non-infringing use have a little burden on this.
Anyway, it’s just tubes. To give more control on the source would be better than just to break up or block tubes.

Does YouTube hate copyright infringement? (Due 4/28)

I have been used YouTube to upload my private video which recorded our family’s ordinary life.  To be more exact, I have uploaded my 2 years daughter’s life in the U.S.  Who does watch that? Of course, her grandparents in Japan have watched the videos and shared our life.  Actually, YouTube have a bunch of non-infringing use.  A music band uses YouTube as a promotion for their music.  Someone use it for broadcasting their original programs such as short movie, news show or product review.  These uses are useful not only for those who upload videos but also for those who watch it.  Based on these facts, basically YouTube should be able to continue their business. 

However, in order to continue their business without any conflicts with copyright owners, YouTube should clearly express their intention to exclude infringing use and do some effective actions with copyright owners.  In my point of view, if YouTube's business substantially depends on infringing use, YouTube should be banned.  Though YouTube take some actions to exclude infringing use, for example, they have adopted restriction for uploading that videos must be within 10 minutes, it is not sufficient to show their hatefulness against copyright infringement. (200 words)

Manabu Niki

Balance is important (Assignment due April 28)

From objective viewpoints, it seems to me that Viacom’s claims have good reasons that YouTube infringes Viacom’s copyrights in terms of current copyright law. Even if Google can successfully argue safe harbor provision, it probably reproduces Viacom’s works other than fair use. However, the balance between benefits of copyright owners and the public should be considered.

At first, rights of copyright owners are too strong in comparison with offering to the public. Although we should respect hard work of authors, it is about time to consider restriction of the rights. Second, we should consider the impact on the result of Viacom v Google. For the public, YouTube has come to be common and convenient tools to access TV program, music, or something like that. Although I don’t mean to argue courts should allow conducts of YouTube just because it is common, we should consider this circumstance. Since the public wants to access to the contents, we might as well allow them by any way to keep balance.

In short, in my opinion, we should allow conducts of YouTube by any way, such as enlarging fair use or licensing, to keep the balance.

Hidekazu Kamiya (Word Count: 192)

Thought on YouTube

YouTube is very convenient. I can watch many kinds of Japanese drama while staying the U.S. and listen to many music. I almost can’t live without YouTube. However, it is clear that this dreamy environment is supported by a vast amount of copyright infringement, and copyright owners are incurred damages on. In this view, stronger restriction should be applied to YouTube. However, the extent of restriction should be dependent on the nature of copyrighted works. For example, once music video is uploaded to YouTube, it is easy to expect that the sales of CD containing the music will be reduced. Furthermore, it is easy to access the music even when the music is not uploaded to YouTube. Restriction for uploading such copyrighted works as music should be strong. On the other hand, even when news programs are uploaded to YouTube, broadcaster virtually receives no damages, because they generally do not expect to get further profit from already-broadcast news programs. Furthermore, if the news programs are not uploaded to YouTube, it is difficult for the general public to access the news programs. Restriction for uploading such copyrighted works as news programs should be weak, and such copyrighted works should be promoted to be readily accessible for anyone.

The YouTube controversy, evolution or revolution?

In an intervention during a symposium for UNESCO in 2003, Jean Martin, a Professor of Law in Paris said that “evolutions have often been perceived as revolutions at the time.”

It seems like the Internet, although brand new innovation, took us back to the old times and the practice of paying good artists and kicking bad ones out of the stage by throwing tomatoes at them. YouTube represents just the same idea in the sense that acclaimed artists could generate a lot of money from advertisement through a partnership with Google for each viewing of their work on YouTube. The fact that in the absence of an agreement with Google the work would be posted anyway, stealing the right of distribution from artists is not new. Cases of large scale copying and distribution have been observed for illustrations in ancient manuscripts. This obviously did not eradicate creation...

One can claim that artists lose control over their work. However, such control rarely exists in the current state of the industry for artists oftentimes have to give up their rights and agree upon major distributing corporations' methods to get their work published. To come back to a more present scheme, artists do not have much control over their work anyway due to the existing exceptions to copyright infringement such as parody.

The clergy was unhappy to lose their monopoly when Guttenberg commercialized the printing press. The written press claimed they would be eradicated from the emergence of television. We always perceive evolutions as revolutions when they occur.

I do not have an answer to the copyright issues that the Viacom case raises but I beleive that the industry should work it out without resort to the judicial system. I strongly agree with Jean Martin's conclusion that “philosophical thinking is crucial. . . . There are choices to be made which should not be left to the jurists, and even less to law, for they represent decisions on the structure of society and law should only reflect the changes.”

Can youtube survive? (Assignment due April 28)

As a consumer I like youtube, and obviously there is a great demand for such a website. It is probably one of the most popular websites there is. And as we talked about in class, there is not only copyrighted works out there, but also user generated content. People post videos of their kids, home-made music videos, stand-up; you name it. Youtube is an online amusement center. If taken down, there will pop up another similar site. That was the reality after Napster.

However, I perfectly understand the fury of copyright holders. Youtube is a great threat to them and seems uncontrollable. Copyrighted work gets posted every day, without authorization from the owners and without any of the profits going back to them. This cannot go on.

Maybe I am naive (!), but is it possible to create a solution where youtube can survive, but that copyrighted material is far more restricted? I guess that is the big question… Also, “if you can’t beat them, join them”. Maybe some kind of co-operation is possible? Such solutions would display less copyrighted works, but might also create more goodwill from copyright holders to give permission to display their work? I have no answers, just asking.. It will be interesting to see the outcome of the case!

About CC

I think the idea was good to create a site for artists to realize values of their works as an intellectual properties. On the other hand, as I mentioned in the class today, I wonder one company can manage or deal with many license agreements as like a goverment office. If the company wants to sell the internet service, who can maintain the site. Who own the whole rights and data to assemble from the world? Human rights should not be monopolized by one company. In addition, who can authorize the data is correct or not. Without such an suthorization, I do not want to use CC for my copyrightable work with the site, which just my first impression by the site and class discussion.

It's cool~ but,

It is cool that CCL allow copyright owner to choose the scope of using her copyrighted digital contents. It may be helpful to reduce the risk of making contents users the potential copyright infringer with the traditional gross copyright system on the Internet. Generally, it seems to be sure that CCL may contribute more open and well-regulated web environment and better opportunities both for contents providers and contents users.

However, what a many types in CCL! The more types of CCL may be good for contents developer by accommodating to their various specific needs. But, the complex variety may deter the understanding of the usual lay persons and lower the practical effectiveness of the well-designed regulation.
One example. In Korea, one of the IT powerhouses in the world, quite a many web users uses the “copyright” or “CCL” marks on contents in the wrong way. Those who misunderstanding the proper usage attach those marks without any hesitation as they do with “emoticon.” It is not difficult to find blogs where the copied newspaper articles are accompanied with the “CCL” mark. (Despite the blogger does not have any little right over the articles…)

The issue is how to narrow the gap between ideal and reality.

The following article comments on bloggers and CCL.
http://icommons.org/articles/why-bloggers-should-use-creative-commons-licences

About CC

I'm not so familiar with CC license, but I think it is a very good idea for promoting creative activities.
However, I'm wondering that who checks whether the CC license is observed or not. I'm not sure, but actually it seems to be almost impossible to observe. So if there is no system of checking at all, nobody might rely upon CC. Therefore, I think some kinds of system for checking would be required in the near future.
Also I think about sublicense. If someone uses a copyrightable work under CC, can others who want to use the work find out that the work is licensed under CC? If not, the owner of the copyrightable work can not express "Some Rights Reserved" anymore other than licensees.
Since basically I agree with the concept of CC, I hope that CC is used in the way that "Some Rights Reserved."

"Creative Commons Is Bad For Photography"

Here is an article wrote by someone else.
http://www.pdnpulse.com/2007/07/creative-common.html

About Creative Commons

Before taking this class, I did not know much about creative commons ("CC") . I think the basic idea of CC is good for ordinary people, like me. Unlike other IP rights such as patents or trademarks, copyright is familiar to ordinary people because we create something even if unwittingly, every single day, and we can obtain copyright anyhow without any registration. If we wish to protect our works, it is a nice idea to use CC licensing scheme rather than make a complicated license agreement, because it is simple and easy. Therefore, CC has a meaning for ordinary people. However, I have a little concern about CC. For not ordinary people, such as big companies who have already obtained copyright and would like to get profit from it, CC might not look attractive, because CC has no incentive for them. CC looks promoting free licensing without scheme collecting profit from contents users. Although big companies have a lot of copyrighted contents, maybe they will not join CC scheme because of this. Therefore, CC users will be limited to ordinary people. For further development of CC, it might be useful to think how to get contents holders into this scheme.

It's not only Google's right, but also society's right

Besides the legal disputes, from the viewpoint of development of our society, it's not only Google's right, but also society's right to have an online library.

Books, which were already there for thousands of years, remain the most constant way of recording people's ideas and disseminating knowledge. However, accompanying with the development of computer, internet, we are in information age which is fulfilled by massive information. When we want to search sth, do we really need to browse every relevant book? Technology also provides us incredible convenience to access the information what we exactly want as quick as possible, why can't we search books with an online library?

There are many ways to protect copyright holder's right, but simply prohibiting the application of new technology into traditional form of copyright carrier should not be one of them.

Google Library --> Fantastic.

I am fully on board with Google’s online library initiatives.

At the risk of insulting the readers here but for the purpose of emphasizing its importance – copyright law gives authors legal rights to exclude others. This parallel's other property rights such as the right to exclude third parties from trespassing on your property. For example, if a third person decides to walk across a farm-owners property, the farm-owner can choose whether or not to hold the third person liable for trespass. Copyright law says the rightholder may exclude others – it does NOT say that others may not copy, distribute, etc. Unfortunately, it appears that some potentially influential people fail to remember this fundamental aspect of copyright law. The following quotes are illustrative:

"Google's procedure shifts the responsibility for preventing infringement to the copyright owner rather than the user, turning every principle of copyright law on its ear," said Mrs. Schroeder – President and CEO of the Association of American Publishers (AAP).

"In my view, Google has chosen the wrong path for the longer term, because it systematically violates copyright," said Mr. Rubin, Microsoft's associate general counsel for copyright, trademark and trade secrets.

Apparently, Mrs. Schroeder believes that it’s the burden of everybody except for the copyright holder to refrain from acting; however, it is the right – and thus the burden – of the rightsholder to decide whether or not to enforce their right to exclude others. Mr. Rubin’s comments suggest similar misguided beliefs.

Accordingly, in my opinion, Google is fully within their legal rights to do actions (such as creating an online library) which others may ALLEGE to be infringing. Notably, actions are not considered infringing until a court finds the actions infringing and all avenues of appeal have been exhausted. To the extent that rightsholders consider Google’s actions infringing, they may file their complaint with a court of law.

Notably, Google’s actions are also likely more economically efficient than other proposals – other proposals being Google finding content owners and entering into license agreements with each and every content owner before electronically reproducing their work. Indeed, as articulated by Peter Hirtle, IP officer for Cornell University Library, "[i]t's too expensive to try to secure the permission of copyright owners, who in many cases can't be identified or located."

B.

Doubt on creative commons licenses

I am sorry for posting my opinion later due to technical problems, but basically I agree with Brad's opinion which said creative commons is entirely unnecessary based on the following reasons.

1. Like the case mentioned on http://www.lessig.org/blog/2007/09/on_the_texas_suit_against_virg.html, the meaning of these licenses are unclear to laypersons, even to many legal professionals, who always dispute about the meaning of what is "copy" "use" "display" "performance"... and "commercial use", "fair use". Is it reasonable for those even without any knowledge of copyright to give a license which he did not understand and as a result of which he give up his right?

2. If the individual wants to give up some of his rights, he can easily choose not to sue the person who infringes it. A benefit of definitely giving up a right is someone else who wants to use the work can use it without any concern, but another question is arised which is what if the work being given up involves some other copyright issues or even if someone else mistakenly gives up right of another's work.

So, basically creative commons licenses burden the copyright holder a lot through a legal document, but only reserve some rights he already had. In addition, through this way, many new disputes will occur, which further impedes copyright protection since it makes problem more complicated.

Notes from Class Today

Here are some brief references to a few of the things we talked about in class today:

Google Books:

Authors, Publishers, and Google Reach Landmark Settlement

Copyright Accord Would Make Millions More Books Available Online

NEW YORK, NY (October 28, 2008) – The Authors Guild, the Association of American Publishers (AAP), and Google today announced a groundbreaking settlement agreement on behalf of a broad class of authors and publishers worldwide that would expand online access to millions of in-copyright books and other written materials in the U.S. from the collections of a number of major U.S. libraries participating in Google Book Search. The agreement, reached after two years of negotiations, would resolve a class-action lawsuit brought by book authors and the Authors Guild, as well as a separate lawsuit filed by five large publishers as representatives of the AAP’s membership. The class action is subject to approval by the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York.  See for more details ---   http://www.google.com/intl/en/press/pressrel/20081027_booksearchagreement.html

http://books.google.com/googlebooks/agreement/

There is a May 5 deadline for the public to comment to the court on the proposed settlement.  Motions to intervene in the case have been filed by several groups, ranging from the American Library Association, to a group of Harvard Law professors, and group of University of Chicago Law professors, and others concerned with issues ranging from fair use, to antitrust

http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/04/17/opposition-to-google-books-settlement/?em

A few other alternative (to traditional copyright enforcement) licensing models:

A compulsory copyright license is an exception to copyright law that is usually philosophically justified as an attempt by the government to correct a market failure. As an exception to copyright, another party can exercise one or more of the copyright's exclusive rights without having to obtain the copyright holder's permission (hence "compulsory") but will have to pay a licensing fee.

Some compulsory licenses protect those who wish to use a work for educational or non-commercial purposes. In cases when it is judged too burdensome for scattered or small-scale buyers and sellers to find one another and negotiate a price, governments sometimes issue a compulsory license for the use so that the relative difficulty of obtaining permission for it does not extinguish it.

There are several different compulsory license provisions in United States copyright law. There are compulsory licenses for nondramatic musical compositions, public broadcasting, retransmission by cable systems, subscription digital audio transmission, and nonsubscription digital audio transmission such as Internet radio.

The most commonly known compulsory license is for nondramatic musical compositions. This provision of the Copyright Act allows a person to make a new sound recording of a musical work, if that has been previously distributed to the public, by or under the authority of the copyright owner. There is no requirement that the new recording be identical to the previous work, as the compulsory license includes the privilege of rearranging the work to conform it to the recording artist's interpretation. This does not allow the artist to change the basic melody or fundamental character of the work.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation and other advocacy groups have suggested forms of compulsory licensing as one possible solution to the legal conflicts surrounding file sharing. In a typical scenario, those who hold the copyrights for the music traded between network users would be legally barred from suing the infringers. In return, the government would extract payments from listeners, perhaps electronic pay-per-song fees or perhaps sales taxes on peer-to-peer file-sharing software, blank storage media, or even Internet access itself. Assisted by some form of P2P "charts," music industry groups would theoretically distribute these royalties to the rights holders. Others have also suggested that a Compulsory Sampling License would alleviate many of the issues of digital music production that often relies on sampling techniques.  See Wikipedia on compulsory licensing.

See also Free Software Foundation for example of approaches to allow users to use, share and modify software without all the usual copyright impediments:

http://www.fsf.org/

http://www.fsf.org/campaigns/

And chew on this statement from the Free Software Foundation which attempts to promote the ability of users to use, share and modify third parties' software and certain other original creations for free, without worrying about many of the impediments of copyright:

The FSF holds copyright on a large proportion of the GNU operating system, and other free software. We hold these assets to defend free software from efforts to turn free software proprietary. Every year we collect thousands of copyright assignments from individual software developers and corporations working on free software. We register these copyrights with the US copyright office and enforce the license under which we distribute free software - typically the GNU General Public License. We do this to ensure that free software distributors respect their obligations to pass on the freedom to all users, to share, study and modify the code.

Sample free content sites:

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Main_Page

http://www.thenewsroom.com/

http://www.flickr.com/

http://www.archive.org/details/opensource_audio

http://www.hulu.com/

http://www.articlesbase.com/

http://www.sxc.hu/

http://www.publicdomain4u.com/

Follow up from this week's class:

If you have not signed in to use the blog, please do so or contact Steve or me this week to help you.

We will be posting reading assignments and information for next week within the next few days.

For fun:

Go Susan Boyle!  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxPZh4AnWyk

Viacom v. Google - Initial Thoughts

After the discussion in the last class I began to wonder whether settling this case might be a valuable option for Google. Folowing the settlement in another major lawsuit related to Google books this option in Viacom v. Google will also allow Google to stay ahaed of its competitors. As a legal professional I understand that litigating this suit will help to clarify fair use exception in copyright infringement cases and the scope of DCMA protection, especially the definition of internet-service providers. However, from the business standpoint, it is best for Google to pay and settle the case.

Personnaly, I do not use YouTube very often, but I can understand that for consumers it is very convenient to be able to access a lot of information.

Are warranties reasonable within creative commons world?

Are warranties reasonable within creative commons world?
Although CC is a great way to find compromise between copyright and individual website, do website owners know exact warranty matters? Are they liable for licensee’s copyright infringement? Do Licensees care about third party copyright?

Viacom International, Inc., et. al. v. YouTube, Inc. et. al.

My view about this lawsuit is that finally someone gets the things stright. If we have no complaints about the current copyright law, which governs the world we live, then it is a right thing to do: file a lawsuit against priracy and people who help to make the evil. It is obvious and undeniable that lots of illegal stuff exist on YouTube; the lawsuit is a wake-up call for website hoster.


The responsibility of website owners/operators is keeping shift between strick liability and negligence. The conclusion nobody can deny is that there is some degree of liability of these website owner/operator owede to copyright owners. The question is how the line drawed?


On the other hand, "free-copy" is the super high way for a work to take off rapidly. Without free-copy (so called: fair use), a work will not easily get much attention or appreciation because of the cost issue.


So the meaning of this lawsuit to me seems become a battle of fair use definition. (DMCA may provide a safe harbor to ISP, but ultimately is not a workable solution because of the operation or manageable problem. If copyright owner (Viacom) sends out notice for every illegal copy, according to the complaint, YouTub/Google willl need to hire more service representitives than innovative engineers to handle the notification in order to substain the save harbor defense).

Although fair-use seems to have some objective standards, but most likely is subject to the Court discretion or choice to pick up one of the fair-use defense.

Assignment1 my first thinking about the case

Honestly speaking, I enjoy “YouTube” as an internet user. Especially after coming here, I have watched Japanese TV programs which someone had recorded. Without “YouTube,” I have to pay for cable TV or to use the “location free” service. In addition, even if I pay the money or buy the set for such services, I cannot watch enough TV programs because of my schedule and problems with the speed of sending data from Japan. On the other hand, YouTube users have uploaded main scenes for other users. Thus, I can watch them without wasting time.

However, as a student of the IP LL.M program, I see lots of problems in these services. Copyright holders are supposed to assert their rights against infringing the distributions. One of my friends, who is a TV director in Japan, asked me if I would please study the issues for him. Not only that, like me, we can use the service in the world. The meaning is that it is difficult to determine whether the copyright infringement has occurred and where is the jurisdiction to bring an enforcement action in court. Thus, these issues are not only a problem within a country but also a problem for harmonization in the world.

CC license - entirely unnecessary

In my opinion, I think CC licenses are unnecessary.

Copyright, as everyone knows, provides copyright holders rights to exclude others from performing particular activities - such copying, distributing, etc. CC licenses, according to Wikipedia, "allow creators to communicate which rights they reserve, and which rights they waive for the benefit of recipients or other creators." In other words, CC licenses allow a copyright holder to waive some of their rights.

Assumably, a copyright holder uses a CC license as a mechanism to license away their right to exclude others from doing x, y, or z. However, the copyright holder needs not enter into a license to achieve this goal. Rather, the copyright holder can achieve this goal by simply not enforcing their rights when others do x, y, or z.

The only value I see in CC licenses is in their notification characteristic. In particular, they notify third parties that a copyright holder has given up particular rights. However, this assumes that the third parties recognize what the CC symbol represents. I am not so confident that many people yet understand exactly what the CC symbol – and thus a CC license – actually entails. Accordingly, CC licenses likely cause more detriment than benefit due to consumer confusion.

In the case that a copyright holder seeks to license away their rights, the easiest and most efficient mechanism I see is for the copyright holder to simply not enforce their rights. For those consumers that are sophisticated enough to seek guarantees from suit, they may enter into license agreements (whether it’s deemed “CC” or something else is irrelevant) with the copyright holder to suit their needs.

Gilbert Gill, Creative Commons in Brazil

Gilberto Gil is one of my favorite Grammy Award-winning Brazilian singer, musician, and s Brazil’s Minister of Culture in the administration of President Luiz Inacio Lula de Silva (2003-2008). After becoming Minister, Gil began a partnership between Brazil and Creative Commons. He said, “You’ve now got young people who are becoming designers, who are making it into media and being use more and more television and samba schools and revitalizing degraded neighborhoods. It is a different version of the role of government, a new role.” He has expressed that will establish an Internet repository of freely downloadable Brazilian music. Since Gil’s appointment, the department’s expenditure has increased by over 50 percent.

Like him, few people who has a talent and a political influence goes to the front in the country. That’s all the more reason why Brazil is a advancing country that is not developed their economy, Gil might be able to keep going to CC activity. I believe that his partnership activity with CC is truly admirable endeavor in order to improve the new society, which is no gap between rich and poor, no border between counters.

Originally, the root of music must have been prayer or human nature, not must have been monetary substitute goods. I believe that the CC activity should spread over in the world, and the spread of excessive commercialism should be stopped by them.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0SoQJzMEmA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rQJ0M3PDlcM

Great system

I'm not familiar with Creative Commons. It seems an excellent activity. Without Creative Commons, most people just display "All rights reserved" on their website without thinking much.
Creative Commons can change the mindset of creators. Creators will consider which protection they really want and choose one of license conditions suggested by Creative Commons, instead of just displaying "All rights reserved." So, Creative Commons promote use of copyrighted works, while protecting creators' copyright.

Class Today: Creator's Rights in the Digital Age

Good posts on Creative Commons.  Keep them coming!

I am posting here some links to just a few things we'll be discussing in class today.  No need to view this advance - we'll talk about them and class and if you're interested in digging deeper, you can refer to them again later.

Creative Commons:

http://www.creativecommons.org

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AWxyx5iYdvI

http://www.flickr.com/creativecommons/

Wikimedia:  Creative Commons or GPDL license debate:

http://blog.wikimedia.org/2009/04/14/vote-on-wikimedia-licensing-update-underway/

http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Licensing_update/License_comparison

http://creativecommons.org/weblog/entry/13967

Just for fun:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f99PcP0aFNE

My Two Cents Worth on Creative Commons

Overall I think the creative commons is a good idea with respect to promoting the dissemination of the creative arts. It allows authors who wish to disseminate their works a forum to do so. It also provides these authors with the ability to legally provide a license to the end users. In this sense, many copyrighted works that would not be available without the creative commons are made available to the public, thus promoting the dissemination of the creative arts.
I do think there are a few problems to consider though. First, although the creative commons does provide licenses for copyrighted works, I wonder what happens when an unauthorized copyrighted work is put into the creative commons. This would result in the public believing they have a legal license to use the copyrighted work when in fact they do not. This requires policing efforts on the part of the creative commons sites to ensure that all posters actaully have rights to the works that they post. Second, although valuable works are available in the creative commons, I wonder if there is not really any incentive for authors to make really valuable works available. Without real compensation for their efforts, there is not incentive to create valuable works. In this sense, the creative commons may not be incentivising high quality works in the same way the patent system does for technical inventions. Finally, I was a bit concerned with how the creative commons site almost seems to be handing out legal advice. Athough there are many disclaimers, the FAQs section might be seen by users as dispensing legal advice. This could lead to some trouble for both the user and the website.
I found the following website interesting with regard to a creative commons lawsuit: http://www.niemanlab.org/2009/01/how-creative-commons-complicates-the-gatehouse-linking-case/