SOPA is at it again

[Nekojin]

Nekojin, damages are difficult to prove. that's why I suggest fines which are designed to punish. In other words, require (say) $1k per notice that is sent maliciously, and it'll cut down on some of the crap. Plus clarify what is meant by bad faith.

Prove malice. That's the bar that currently exists for bad-faith take-down notices. To the best of my knowledge, ZERO fines or penalties have been levied for such takedowns, not even for the most blatant and egregious examples.

$1k per offense is laughable. Even at a thousand bad takedown notices a day, even if they were caught and punished for every single one, that comes to a million a day. For companies that do business in the billions, that's the cost of doing business. And when they're not even held accountable for that, forget it.

Also note that DMCA takedown violations are a civil matter - the person aggressed against has to actually sue over it. No damages? Spend hundreds of dollars just to file the complaint, thousands or even hundreds of thousands to litigate, with no return and nothing more than a proverbial slap on the wrist for the company filing the DMCA takedowns?

Yeah, our proverbial company ZZ is laughing all the way to the bank.

[lordlundar]

Nekojin, damages are difficult to prove. that's why I suggest fines which are designed to punish. In other words, require (say) $1k per notice that is sent maliciously, and it'll cut down on some of the crap. Plus clarify what is meant by bad faith.

What you are suggesting is going to require a rewrite of both the DMCA and the PATRIOT Act. Both standing laws where the aspects benefit corporations at the expense of the public were written BY corporations (not lobbyists mind you. The politicians who put them forward contacted industry representatives directly) SPECIFICALLY for that purpose.

How likely do you think those corporations are going to let a bill go through that will diminish their power?

[Andara Bledin]

a) I'm not necessarily saying the effect is deletrious. I'm saying it's major.

But if it's not a bad effect, then why would you even want to touch it?

And you have no idea if it's major or not. You can't just handwave it, say "it's major" and then walk away as if that means anything. If it's not deleterious, then it's either a) completely irrelevant or b) something that you don't want to touch.

I've seen literally (and that's base definition, not being sardonic) hundreds of statements to the effect that "file sharing is bad, mkay" and a grand total of zero citations to back that up. On the flip side, I've seen dozens of reports about how the industry is making record profits year over year and casual surveys that show that, overall, people actually spend more money when they have the opportunity to try before they buy.

[HYHYBT]

What's the remedy here? The company is given the benefit of the doubt for having made a good-faith filing, and there's no way to prove otherwise. It's not worth the cost for the reviewer or the review site to file a lawsuit - even if they could prevail, it's hard to prove damages for this.

The penalty needs to be for *every* notice sent that turned out not to be a genuine violation, with harsher penalties in the rare cases malice could be proven.

I think it should be criminal with centrally administered fines rather than IP enforcement.

Making it criminal rather than civil runs into certain problems: there's a good bit of nuance and judgment in what is and is not a copyright violation unless you wish to dispense with fair use, and current law allows for copyright holders to be lenient if they wish, which they often are in cases where there's no harm to them and no profit to be made anyway. (For example, an example of someone playing the retired "Price is Right" game "Superball" on Youtube harms neither FremantleMedia nor CBS, and nobody would pay to see such a thing. They *could* get those taken down, but they don't generally bother. Many other shows *do* get removed, but those either are worth offering those episodes for sale or are owned by companies which choose to be strict for its own sake.)

And that leads back into availability. In the broadband age, there is NO excuse for a product to remain unavailable indefinitely. Holding new items until a set release date (so long as it actually arrives), fine. Rotating things in and out, as with the Disney Vault, not so great, but OK so long as they come around reasonably often. Things vanishing never to be seen again, no. Were I in charge, any revision to copyright law would include removal of copyright protections for all products withdrawn from sale (or from free use) more than x time (varying depending on the nature of the product) and... I'm not sure yet, but *something* to ensure that such availability could not be circumvented by tactics like only allowing content to be streamed. Nothing, once released, should effectively cease to exist, period.

[dkates]

And that leads back into availability. In the broadband age, there is NO excuse for a product to remain unavailable indefinitely. Holding new items until a set release date (so long as it actually arrives), fine. Rotating things in and out, as with the Disney Vault, not so great, but OK so long as they come around reasonably often. Things vanishing never to be seen again, no. Were I in charge, any revision to copyright law would include removal of copyright protections for all products withdrawn from sale (or from free use) more than x time (varying depending on the nature of the product) and... I'm not sure yet, but *something* to ensure that such availability could not be circumvented by tactics like only allowing content to be streamed. Nothing, once released, should effectively cease to exist, period.

Strongly agree with this point. I could probably name at least a dozen games, mostly from the 16-bit era, that I would gladly buy if they were still widely and reasonably available... but they aren't. Keep in mind that video games are a case where, even if re-releasing the original version doesn't make much business sense, re-releasing in a different form can and does work. (Re-releasing an SNES game as an SNES cartridge, for example, would be silly in 2013, but re-releasing on Virtual Console or the like, even without adding new content, has been shown to work, if I'm not mistaken.)

Actually, that brings up an interesting sub-point. I'd say that, as long as a re-release is sufficiently similar to its original/previous version, it should count for extending the copyright protections -- but "sufficiently similar" is a tricky term to define. How much, and what, can you change between original release and re-release and have it still count? I'm not sure, personally.

[s_stabeler]

But if it's not a bad effect, then why would you even want to touch it?

And you have no idea if it's major or not. You can't just handwave it, say "it's major" and then walk away as if that means anything. If it's not deleterious, then it's either a) completely irrelevant or b) something that you don't want to touch.

I've seen literally (and that's base definition, not being sardonic) hundreds of statements to the effect that "file sharing is bad, mkay" and a grand total of zero citations to back that up. On the flip side, I've seen dozens of reports about how the industry is making record profits year over year and casual surveys that show that, overall, people actually spend more money when they have the opportunity to try before they buy.

um, deletrious, to me, means the effect of piracy causes it to be impossible to make a profit. does it do that? No ( or at least, not yet) however, it DOES have a significant effect. Can that effect be proven scientifically? No.

oh, and your point about "try before you buy" is actually itself something of a fallacy, since there is no evidence that people are buying music (or games) after trying them. I happen to agree that a mechanism where you can play the game for X amount of time, then buy it if you like it, would be good. Piracy, however, is not that mechanism.

and those record profits? are indeed the case, but you need to look closer. I hate to say this, but a lot of stars sound pretty similar. That lack of diversity is a problem. Sure, record profits might be being earned, but that's because less risk is being taken. ( I know for a fact (though again, I have no proof off the top of my head) that budgets for finding new artists have been massively cut.)

[Nyoibo]

There is some evidence that people are buying music after downloading it, there have been a couple of instances of bands releasing track or even whole albums online for free and still making a profit from them buying the album

[s_stabeler]

true, although I haven't seen cases of people pirating music, then buying a legit copy. Certianly the majority don't.

[Andara Bledin]

Are you talking about pirates, the people who make copies of things to sell for profit off of other peoples' efforts?

Or are you talking about copyright infringers, the people who download stuff instead of or in addition to purchasing said material?

Because I've been a member of that second group many times, including downloading content I already own.

[crashhelmet]

Are you talking about pirates, the people who make copies of things to sell for profit off of other peoples' efforts?

Or are you talking about copyright infringers, the people who download stuff instead of or in addition to purchasing said material?

Because I've been a member of that second group many times, including downloading content I already own.

The MPAA, RIAA, and others see no difference between the two

[Nyoibo]

The MPAA, RIAA, and others see no difference between the two

There in lies the problem.

I own several hundred DVDs, also a shitload of videos, it's easier for me to download a series that I own rather than try and rip it and be able to fit my entire collection on an external HD than to carry my entire collection with me when I'm travelling.

[Duelist925]

The MPAA, RIAA, and others see no difference between the two

And this is a pretty big crux of the issues.

Treating outright pirates, and minor copyright infringers is like treating petty shoplifters like bank robbers.

[s_stabeler]

Are you talking about pirates, the people who make copies of things to sell for profit off of other peoples' efforts?

Or are you talking about copyright infringers, the people who download stuff instead of or in addition to purchasing said material?

Because I've been a member of that second group many times, including downloading content I already own.

people that upload stuff for anybody to download UNLESS they have permission OR the copyright owner doesn't care.

people that download? if they have a legit copy, i don't particuarly care. If it's instead of buying a legit copy, I'm a bit annoyed ( basically, if you download it to avoid paying for it, I'm inclined to lump you in with the people that upload it. If you are downloading it to try it out, or to watch it in a different format? I'm not too bothered)

[Duelist925]

people that upload stuff for anybody to download UNLESS they have permission OR the copyright owner doesn't care.

people that download? if they have a legit copy, i don't particuarly care. If it's instead of buying a legit copy, I'm a bit annoyed ( basically, if you download it to avoid paying for it, I'm inclined to lump you in with the people that upload it. If you are downloading it to try it out, or to watch it in a different format? I'm not too bothered)

See, this is a rational, reasonable view to have. While I may not agree with it completely (I'd stick just downloaders on a lower tier than pirates--ones petty theft, the others akin to bootlegging), its nuanced, and shows thought.

What makes shit like SOPA, and other bills the MPAA and RIAA lobby for so nuts is that they treat EVERYONE like an out and out pirate. It shows no nuance what soever, and gives the aforementioned lobbying groups WAY too much power.

Power which can and will be abused.

[s_stabeler]

As I said, I only lump the people who are simply dodging paying for it in with the uploaders. My reasoning is it's akin to shoplifting, if you think about it.