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A YouTube user has had enough with the service's flawed ContentID system for removing copyright-infringing material. Benjamin Ligeri has filed a lawsuit in Rhode Island against Google, Viacom, Lionsgate and another YouTube user:
Ligeri says that he has uploaded content to YouTube under the name BetterStream for purposes including "criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and/or research," but never in breach of copyright. Nevertheless, he claims to have fallen foul of YouTube's automated anti-piracy systems.
One complaint details a video uploaded by Ligeri which he says was a parody of the film The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo. It was present on YouTube for a year before a complaint was filed against it by a YouTube user called Egeda Pirateria. "Defendant Pirateria is not the rightful owner of the rights to The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, nor did the Plaintiff's critique of it amount to copying or distribution of the movie," Ligeri writes. However, much to his disappointment, YouTube issued a copyright "strike" against Ligeri's account and refused to remove the warning, even on appeal. "YouTube, although Defendants Pirateria or Lion's Gate lacked any legal claim to any copyright to The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, denied the Plaintiff's appeal pertaining to his account's copyright strike," the complaint reads. Ligeri says Viacom also got in on the action, filing a complaint against his "critique" of the 2014 remake of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.
"Content ID is an opaque and proprietary system where the accuser can serve as the judge, jury and executioner," Ligeri continues. "Content ID allows individuals, including Defendants other than Google, to steal ad revenue from YouTube video creators en masse, with some companies claiming content they don't own deliberately or not. The inability to understand context and parody regularly leads to fair use videos getting blocked, muted or monetized."
Noting that YouTube exercises absolute power through its take-it-or-leave-it user agreement, Ligeri says the agreement and Content ID combined result in non-compliance with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. Ligeri says that rather than acting as a neutral party, YouTube favors larger copyright holders using Content ID over smaller creators who do not. "This software and YouTube's terms of use circumvent DMCA by creating a private arbitration mechanism. Further, a party claiming copyright infringement has no burden of proof under this private arbitration mechanism," he notes.
Is this a pie-in-the-sky attempt to win over $1 million in damages while standing up for the rights of disgruntled YouTube uploaders, or a publicity stunt to promote channels with less than a thousand subscribers and a million views? This is not Ligeri's first legal action against YouTube.
(Score: 5, Informative) by VortexCortex on Friday May 15 2015, @04:51PM
Last time I checked, Google was a corporation, not a government, providing a service to individuals under terms of service that they get to decide. IANAL, but the pretty much all the claims in TFA seem specious to me when looked at in that light.
Yes. I fully agree, but only if you think we should strip Google of the Safe Harbour provisions that the DMCA provides hosters of user uploaded content ONLY if they do not editorialize that content. IMO, Google has created a system that does not comply with the DMCA's take down, and appeal process. Under the DMCA copyrighted content should be taken down in a timely manner if the rights holder files a complaint; This affords the hoster of legal culpability for copyright infringement. The uploader then has the right to claim the takedown notice is invalid, and the hosting site should make the content available again in a timely manner; The uploader then becomes liable for copyright infringement penalties if found to infringe. This process outlined in the DMCA is what provides Google its Safe Harbor that prevents Google from being lawsuits
Google is a Corporation, but they are taking advantage of the Safe Harbor indemnification without complying with the DMCA. So, YouTube should be stripped of all Safe Harbor provision protections and be liable itself for any content that is displayed that infringes copyright. They have built the automated Content ID system as a substitute for complying with the full DMCA take-down and restore procedure. Favoring rich entities copyright stakes over smaller, and discriminating against Parody (which is covered by Fair Use) is editorialized bias -- It's not even in the same vicinity as automated spam filtering. I could see Google's stance on videos flagged automatically by Content ID, but in the cases where the action is initiated via DMCA take-down requests coming from other YouTube account holders, then the full appeal and restore process should be implemented as well in order to comply with the DMCA and have Safe Harbor protections. The intent of the DMCA was to allow uncensored user uploads without burdening the hosting platform such to allow any site (including this one) to post user uploaded material without an expensive auditing system in place provided they simply follow the take down and restore processes outlined in the DMCA.
Look at it this way: Google retains Safe Harbor indemnity if they allow the user to protest the take-down notice and YouTube video available again immediately. So why not do so? Because it puts the onus on the complaining rights holder to then sue the infringer in a court of law if they want the content taken down. The DMCA's quick take-down process was created with the understanding that due process would be given those who had their videos taken down. Google's bias and subversion of DMCA due process allows the large content producers they partner with avoid involving the courts to get their way. Imagine if this were the case for ISPs, where a Content ID system censored the entire Internet and allowed no redress to protect 1st amendment rights (which the DMCA attempts to do).
DMCA Safe Harbor is similar to the Title II Common Carrier provisions, in that it allows a "dumb" service indemnity as long as they're not actively censoring content. Google is actively censoring content.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 15 2015, @06:14PM
The DMCA's quick take-down process was created with the understanding that due process would be given those who had their videos taken down.
Government-enforced censorship is never tolerable, and neither is skipping due process. The problem is that the content must be taken down before anyone *ever* goes to court, and that is nonsense. If copyright should exist at all, then copyright holders should be forced to go to court every single time they want something censored, and no one will be forced to censor anything before that. Safe harbor is a good idea while we have copyright, but not this DMCA notice idea. And we shouldn't sacrifice people's due process or liberties so copyright can be more easily enforced; that is not something any real free country would do. Rights don't vanish just to make it easier to catch 'Bad Guys'.
(Score: 2) by MrGuy on Friday May 15 2015, @08:49PM
You don't understand the DMCA (more specifically, Title II of the DMCA - the Online Copyright Infringement Liability Limitation Act), why it's there or who it's intended to protect.
The DMCA safe haven is set up to protect content HOSTING PARTIES from claims by COPYRIGHT HOLDERS. It's there so someone can't sue YouTube if someone posts copyrighted material as a secondary infringer. Or protect SoylentNews from responsibility if someone posted the full text of the new Harry Potter book here.
Following DMCA to the letter would be sufficient to make Google would be immune from legal threats by copyright holders. That's what the safe harbor means.
You're arguing...what, exactly? By being even MORE on the side of the copyright holders than they need to be, that Google ought to be LESS protected by the safe harbor from threats by copyright holders? It's not only not sensible, but it's also not the DMCA. As long as they follow AT LEAST the DMCA process, Google is immune from threats from copyright holders - they've done enough to not be liable.
You seem to be thinking that the DMCA takedown process is designed in some way to grant content CREATORS some rights with respect to their HOSTING providers - that it establishes some requirement that hosting providers must continue to host content UNLESS they receive a DMCA notice. That it's somehow unlawful for Google to take down user content absent DMCA, or that requires Google to follow the DMCA process before it ever takes anything down.
(Score: 2) by Hairyfeet on Friday May 15 2015, @09:59PM
Slander and defamation of character should be pretty damned easy to prove, they are claiming that he stole their property, if it isn't theirs? Well there ya go.
ACs are never seen so don't bother. Always ready to show SJWs for the racists they are.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 15 2015, @10:33PM
There is no property to steal.