Blender Foundation Video Taken Down On YouTube For Copyright Violation 306
An anonymous reader writes "As if the automated take downs on Youtube weren't already bad enough, today fans of the popular open source 3D software Blender were greeted by a copyright take down notice for their third open movie, Sintel, despite it being released under a Creative Commons license: 'This video contains content from Sony Pictures Movies & Shows, who has blocked it on copyright grounds.' It is believed that the takedown was a result of Sony Electronics adding Sintel to their official 4k demo pool."
Sony (Score:5, Insightful)
Nuff said.
Guilty until proven innocent. (Score:5, Insightful)
There needs to be a law against this. Sony should have to pay restitution to Blender.
Re:Guilty until proven innocent. (Score:2, Insightful)
Blender is nothing, a piece of dust in comparison to the Corporate Glory that is SONY CORP.
Re:Stop using Youtube (Score:3, Insightful)
YouTube was great until Google acquired them. Every "enhancement" and change they make drags it down further.
Of course, without Google, YouTube might not still be around otoh. But the point of YouTube was to decentralize video sharing and take it out of the hands of corporate media giants. Instead, the giants are increasing their stranglehold on YouTube and making it unfeasible for any old Joe to get a tiny kickback for content they upload, as well as crowding out all other competing content.
Meanwhile, Google mandates that people use YouTube with their real name and make it exceedingly difficult to manage multiple accounts.
Fuck em.
Re:Perjury? (Score:5, Insightful)
Someone with a million or two to just throw out the window and a lifetime of freetime to spend.
Re:Guilty until proven innocent. (Score:5, Insightful)
Sony should have to pay restitution to Blender.
This. I understand the need for corporations to be able to take down entire movie content et al from being served in public, as much as we would like things for free, movies do cost, there needs to be profit to get them funded etc.
However...
The pendulum is on the movie producers side right now, and they are shilling legitimate content etc as much as possible, and would rather have something by default taken down incorrectly than do their due diligence. The best way to solve this, is when an incorrect takedown notice has been issued without honest and reasonable proof that the correct steps have been taken to identify illegitimate content according to the laws, the party requesting the unlawful removal of content should become liable for any damages that occur from the takedown, and that those damages should be commensurate with the calculations used when movies are pirated, as obviously it is the same goods we are speaking of.
Re:Perjury? Well, fraud maybe... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Stop using Youtube (Score:5, Insightful)
YouTube was great until Google acquired them. Every "enhancement" and change they make drags it down further.
I don't agree with your opinion, but really this has little to do with the issue at hand.
It's the DMCA takedown laws that allow this.
Blender should take them to court (Score:5, Insightful)
and have Sony state under oath why they think the video is theirs. Seems Sony is excertising ownership right over the video, seems to me that's IP theft by Sony. After all according to the gove and media IP theft is the biggest danger to American way of life since the nuclear communist threat.
I would happily donate $$$ to this court case.
Re:Stop using Youtube (Score:2, Insightful)
But it's because the DMCA takedowns exist that these automated systems exist.
How about... (Score:5, Insightful)
"You wouldn't steal a handbag...
"You wouldn't steal a car...
"You wouldn't download a movie...
"But it's okay to claim someone else's IP as your own... if you're Sony!
MASSIVE BACKLASH AGAINST SONY (Score:1, Insightful)
AN UNINTENDED BUT DEADLY BACKLASH against Sony Pictures is underway in Italy at the moment with people in major electronics stores reportedly asking customers NOT TO BUY SONY PRODUCTS.
At least a couple of people injured in Rome as security guards wrestled a demonstrator which destroyed a Sony LCD TV.
It would probably be a good idea for Sony to immediately publicly act on the mess by chastising Google's mistake.
Re:Stop using Youtube (Score:2, Insightful)
This isn't a problem with Google this is a problem with you, your friend and his publisher. They added the video to the list of media they owned, did they do that because your friend told them they could? Did they do it without his knowlege? What does his contract with the publisher say, they very well may own the copyright to that video now. As far as Google is concerned one person owns that video and the publishing company is a more convincing argument than 'the guys who filmed and editied it for free.' Can the guy who did the mixing for the latest pop album claim that he owns the songs because he made it? Media production is not about what is right or wrong its about following the letter of the law through its nightmarish fractal itterations.
Re:Guilty until proven innocent. (Score:1, Insightful)
Blender is nothing, a piece of dust in comparison to the Corporate Glory that is SONY CORP.
So is the US Military compared to most of the worlds military. That doesn't mean you go around picking fights and acting like the fucking global polic...er, wait...
Well, fuck, that argument went down faster than the Hindenburg..
Re:Perjury? Well, fraud maybe... (Score:5, Insightful)
And who's going to stop them? Its one thing to say its illegal.. its quite another to enforce that claim, even if you're technically true. That's the whole problem with the current copyright system (and much of the legal system in general) -- money makes the laws and money enforces the laws. Justice gets to sit in a corner and sulk with the rest of us.
Re:Stop using Youtube (Score:2, Insightful)
Huh? How would that work in this case, exactly? Sony makes a false claim, and Sintel gets put in the public domain??
Re:Stop using Youtube (Score:4, Insightful)
This. The Content-ID thing. A travesty.
At the very least there should be an accountable human behind any DMCA takedown request (which even then would be terribly flawed for all the other arguments pointed out by others).
Re:Stop using Youtube (Score:4, Insightful)
Since Youtube was taken over by Google, server speed has increased immensely, they've moved to HD, they've removed time limits on videos, they've allowed live streaming of shows, they've given away hundreds of millions of dollars through the partnership program they introduced (including many shows that are simply vlogs)... Et cetera.
I have a rather more cynical view of that. Better latency, HD, longer videos and live streaming are basically all just effects of one good thing, better servers. That's probably the only good thing that Google has given to Youtube.
I don't count the partnership program as good. Basically it radically influences channel content for the worse. Either it introduces money, which ruins everything*, or it introduces legal protection from U.S. entities which makes for some pretty bland content**.
* I'm a viewer of some channels that thrive on the partnership program (Drive Network and TotalBiscuit for example) and they all do worse and worse the more money is involved. Instead of being fueled by passion they are fueled by ratings and money. Which is what utterly killed Hollywood and Television for me and got me into Youtube in the first place. Examples from the Drive Network: the three-minute car reviews, which are blatantly not at home on that channel, and the product placement (like Pirelli) / advertisement videos that pop up every once in a while. Examples from TB: where to even begin. Makes videos based solely on the highest ratings, to the point where it comes close to ruining his personal life. Adjusts video content and kills off series based on how much revenue they bring in and not based on what he enjoys playing/shooting, which blatantly shows in his commentary.
** Partnership channels are pretty strictly regulated in regards to what they can show in their videos. They are trying to dodge takedown requests like this one and copyright strikes which may stop their cash intake. So... anything remotely inflammatory or controversial that could be in any way interpreted as slander, copyright infringement, etc... just won't appear on a channel like this any more.
Also: the GP was right about the ridiculous "updates". They're almost all terrible. The layout changes, the default setting changes, the player changes... Just the facts that buffering still doesn't work, quality settings were broken for months, subscriptions break all the time, are all great examples of the incompetency of the devs or the misguided priorities over there. Youtube is constantly becoming more corporate, better at generating revenue, and worse for the users. And users hate it more all the time and only use it because hardly anyone could ever afford to make a better Youtube clone.
The greatest thing Youtube has introduced lately is HTML5 compatibility and I have complete confidence Youtube could've and would've implemented that without Google's "help".
Re:Perjury? (Score:5, Insightful)
What we need is a 3-strikes and you're out system - submit 3 false DMCA take-downs and any more take-downs become invalid.
Re:Perjury? Well, fraud maybe... (Score:5, Insightful)
http://www.forbes.com/2003/10/14/cz_dl_1014linksys.html - "Linux's Hit Men - ... So far, none of the Free Software Foundation’s targets have decided it is bad for the world and gone to court. This despite the fact that the foundation has $750,000 in the bank and one lawyer who works for free, part time, when he’s not teaching classes at Columbia University. "
That eleven year old article is written from the POV that the FSF is the bad guy for enforcing the GPL and that somehow forcing companies to comply goes against the very idea of free open source software. Forbes has concluded it is bad to attempt to enforce copyrights and license agreements when it would force a large corporation to actually do what the license requires because it would open them up to competition. It complete ignores the option to not use GPL code; except for a passing note about some poor company that estimated it lost $10 million because it they licensed code and then scrapped the project and went to a BSD license when they didn't like the terms of the original license.
It's really simple. If you don't want to share don't use GPL software. Use a BSD style license or develop proprietary code if you are worried about cloners. If your code is so integral to your product that releasing it would allow cloners to capture much of the market you probably shouldn't use the GPL or rethink your product. Apple probably chose the BSD license, in part, because it allowed them to develop an OS that had a stable core without having to open up their OS to cloners. They can share what they feel is appropriate and maintain MacOS unique to Apple. No one is stopping other companies from doing this; and Forbes' claim the FSF is demanding companies "burn down [their] house, or at the very least share it with cloners" is pure FUD. CISCO seemed to survive OK by complying with the GPL after FSF' lawsuit.