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Pirated Courses on Udemy

701 points by petercooper 11y ago

yetyhfhjs433 11y ago
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greenyoda 11y ago
Filling out Udemy's "Report Abuse" form to report a "Copyright or Trademark Violation" probably doesn't create any legal obligation on their part to take any action. The author (copyright holder) should have filed an official DMCA takedown request, directed at Udemy's designated DMCA contact, whose e-mail and postal addresses can be found here: https://www.udemy.com/terms/copyright/ https://www.udemy.com/terms/copyright/
- CamperBob2 11y ago
  I'm confused. Why not just send a DMCA notice to their upstream provider?
  - biot 11y ago
    That's what you'd do if Udemy had no registered DMCA agent. Basically, if you wish to issue a DMCA takedown notice you need to follow the DMCA process.
- nerfhammer 11y ago
  Udemy must "not receive a financial benefit directly attributable to the infringing activity" in order for DCMA to be applicable. Since they're charging for the courses it's probably ordinary copyright infringement on their part. You should send them a Cease and Desist and then sue them.
  - TheOtherHobbes 11y ago
    How long before instructors file a class action? What will it cost Udemy if instructors start to register copyright and Udemy become liable for statutory damages?
nickjj 11y ago
Udemy really is one of the worst platforms imaginable for instructors. They will even brand your videos without your consent by adding Udemy logo watermarks to every video. If you guys want to hear another horror story about Udemy, take a skim through: http://blog.nickjanetakis.com/post/133482093993/less-than-24-hours-on-udemy-as-an-instructor-and http://blog.nickjanetakis.com/post/133482093993/less-than-24... (note: the above post is a few days old) Someone really needs to step up and create a more reasonable course hosting platform.
- gtirloni 11y ago
  There is edx, coursera, etc.
  - GFischer 11y ago
    But I think those are only for university-level courses.
    - nickjj 11y ago
      Yes I believe they are. Since then a number of people have posted a few alternatives: - https://teachable.com/ https://teachable.com/ - https://www.pluralsight.com/ https://www.pluralsight.com/ - http://02geek.com http://02geek.com - https://cloudacademy.com/ https://cloudacademy.com/ (for more specific types of courses) I'm definitely moving off Udemy. I plan to research the alternatives over the weekend and start moving my course when I make a decision.
- sapokedak 11y ago
  Wow. That was harrowing. The dangers and degradations that this poor man has lived through at the hands of Udemy! I'm amazed he survived.
pkaye 11y ago
Growth hacking?
- agumonkey 11y ago
  Hack growth.
ps4fanboy 11y ago
While I sympathize with the author its (edit)unreasonable to suggest that they should be validating each course. However it appears more should be done to ease the path to getting your content taken down. You would think the person selling the course would have payment information that could be used to track that individual down, the correct course of action is to sue. If the content isnt worth doing this then the content isnt actually that valuable to the author.
- GFK_of_xmaspast 11y ago
  > its dangerous to suggest that they should be validating each course. Why's that?
  - ps4fanboy 11y ago
    Because how would you even do that with any sort of accuracy, do you check the global content registry database? Surely people dont expect to export the burden of protecting your IP to other companies?
    - FussyZeus 11y ago
      If you're in the business of selling content you damn well ought to know who's content your selling. I'm not saying any system would be completely bulletproof, but you should at least look like you're TRYING.
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      - Spivak 11y ago
        So if I lease commercial land it's my responsibility to make sure my renter isn't laundering money? Whatever argument you make should also explain why the web hosting provider isn't also responsible for hosting and distributing pirated content. Certainly they should also look like they're trying to prevent copyright infringement on their network. > but you should at least look like you're TRYING. This kind of logic is how an automatic 'review' process gets implemented which just spins for a few minutes and then then accepts the video. The problem of detecting copyrighted content is so complex that without source level access you would never be able to prove definitively that their review process is just theater.
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- AlexeyBrin 11y ago
  > but udemy got videos off of pluralsight, uploaded them to their own servers, and are then selling them off as udemy's own courses. You are confusing things here. A Udemy user took some content from Pluralsight and published the content on Udemy. Where Udemy is in the wrong is in not taking the content down and banning the teacher from their platform.
  - FireBeyond 11y ago
    What would be intriguing is if Udemy is actually responsible, and just using ghost accounts...
    - brbsix 11y ago
      I certainly don't know enough about the site to say definitively one way or another, but I wouldn't be surprised. This sort of scenario reminds me of Airbnb taking customers from Craigslist [1] or Uber employing "ghosts" to fuck with competitors (cancel rides and poach drivers) [2]. Of course there's no evidence of Udemy doing anything this shady, it just wouldn't be outside the realm of what some tech companies have been up to lately. [1]: http://www.businessinsider.com/airbnb-harvested-craigslist-to-grow-its-listings-says-competitor-2011-5 http://www.businessinsider.com/airbnb-harvested-craigslist-t... [2:]
cdnsteve 11y ago
Maybe an approach could be to actually reach out to authors that are creating accounts and to verify identities more than just an email account rather than focus on contents of that said account. I would also imagine that certain geographic regions have higher reports of said activities. So extra checks should be added for them in the approval process. In the end if they don't shape up they are only hurting themsleves in the long run.
shawnwildermuth 11y ago
Scary that we'd get no response on this.
shawnwildermuth 11y ago
Scary that we'd get no response on this.
Cheyana 11y ago
Wow. Ironic... https://www.udemy.com/copyright-law-for-online-entrepreneurs/?utm_campaign=cision&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter https://www.udemy.com/copyright-law-for-online-entrepreneurs...
yarou 11y ago
The sad thing is that in this day and age, independent content creators don't have their copyrights respected, while megacorporations patent troll and abuse our broken intellectual property system. The only solution that comes to mind is for independent content creators to vigorously litigate and ensure that their DMCA claims are taken seriously.
lemevi 11y ago
Did he even try to contact Udemy support and get a response? It would seem like the thing to do before writing a hit piece. I interviewed at Udemy, but ended up taking a position somewhere else, yet they struck me as good people trying to make a good product. I don't like piracy and the author has been wronged, but this blog post is unfair.
- robconery 11y ago
  Yes, I did. As did Troy. No reponse (now as then). You entirely miss the point of the article - it's not about piracy, it's about a marketplace for pirated goods. That's what Udemy does. Sorry if I'm not nice about it.
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  - Falkon1313 11y ago
    So if a burglar steals a TV, sells it to someone else, and they list it on eBay, does that make eBay guilty of the burglary? If someone buys it using Paypal, do you consider Paypal to be the burglar? If the currency mode used was USD, do you consider the U.S. government to be the guilty burglar? I suppose if it was explicitly listed as 'Stolen 40" TV!' in the 'Stolen Goods' category of eBay you could say that they should have known, and if Paypal had special 'funds to buy stolen things' accounts and one of those was used to buy it, then you could put some blame to them, etc. But how far away do you project the blame from the actual criminal? If Udemy is responsible, then do you absolve the person who pirated and uploaded it of guilt? Or do you divide and dilute it? How long does the chain need to be before each participant's share of the guilt is so small as to be negligible and irrelevant? Why not instead blame the person who uploaded it to make money while knowing that they hadn't created it and didn't own the rights?
    - ps4fanboy 11y ago
      Because udemy has money and are easier to go after, if rob was to go after the person who actually stole his content they might be insolvent or in a country is too expensive to go after them.
citricsquid 11y ago
This happens fairly frequently to Jeffrey Way of Laracasts and there's a lot of money involved in stealing his material: Hey @udemy - For the third time this year, my content is being stolen and sold on your site. Don't use Udemy, folks. [1] So @udemy, 373 users signed up for that stolen series at $19 - or a total of $7,087. ... Update on the Udemy selling my stolen content issue: they finally responded, and will not reimburse me, unless there is a court ruling. Udemy do not care. https://twitter.com/jeffrey_way/status/649933605305774081 https://twitter.com/jeffrey_way/status/649933605305774081 https://twitter.com/jeffrey_way/status/649936961105432576 https://twitter.com/jeffrey_way/status/649936961105432576 https://twitter.com/jeffrey_way/status/649937073407979520 https://twitter.com/jeffrey_way/status/649937073407979520 https://twitter.com/jeffrey_way/status/651215238470090754 https://twitter.com/jeffrey_way/status/651215238470090754 https://twitter.com/jeffrey_way/status/651215565713870849 https://twitter.com/jeffrey_way/status/651215565713870849
- ps4fanboy 11y ago
  I couldnt tell from the tweets but did Udemy keep the money or did they refund the users once the content was taken down? If refunds are issued to users, it seems unreasonable for the author to claim that Udemy should be paying them 100% of any money transacted. Is Rob and Jeffrey suggesting that Udemy should pay $2 for every $1 involved in fraud? EDIT: People are making a lot of claims that Udemy are profiting from this but no one has linked to anything to indicate that when content is removed if the people who paid for it who can no longer access the content are issued refunds or not. Does anyone have any information to suggest that Udemy isnt refunding users?
  - rnovak 11y ago
    Thats not the way copyright works. If you think it is, please, let RIAA know you've stolen some records and let's see how much they charge you. Last time I checked, users are sued for thousands of dollars per infringing instance, held up in court. Why shouldn't that hold for a COMPANY doing it? Seems a little unreasonable to me. Edit: and for people down-voting, please explain why?
Animats 11y ago
You can go after Udemy. They're not just a hosting service. They claim ownership of the content. "Each of our 35,000+ courses is taught by an expert instructor". Many courses are paid. If Udemy charges for access to the course, they lose the DMCA safe harbor. Then they're liable for full copyright damages. This may even be criminal copyright infringment under 18 U.S. Code § 2319 (Criminal infringement of a copyright) if the total retail value exceeds $2500. Get a lawyer. This looks winnable.
- braum 11y ago
  Make sure you file copyright for each video before making it available on your own website. Having a copyright in place before any theft allows you to go after (by threat or course) statutory damages for each theft of your work. I learned this a few years ago from our own IP lawyer when someone was reusing some of our material. We now file the $35(or whatever it is) fee before posting the material online.
  - Coding_Cat 11y ago
    File for copyright? how do you mean: Copyright is implicit, unlike patents, upon creation of a work.
    - unavoidable 11y ago
      You can file a registration for copyright, which gives you certain presumptions and advantages in court (e.g. it serves as a presumption of ownership, which would be important in these kinds of cases). It also might serve as "notice" for potential infringers so that you can get higher damages.
    - bbq 11y ago
      >Registration is still required in the US for some benefits, such as awards of statutory damages. [1] >You must register your copyright with the U.S. Copyright Office before you are legally permitted to bring a lawsuit to enforce it. [2] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright_registration#Requirement_of_registration https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright_registration#Require... [2] http://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/copyright-registration-notice-enforcement-faq-29067.html http://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/copyright-registratio...
giarc 11y ago
>and Udemy not only let them do this, they’re encouraging others to do the same. Is there proof of this? Author went from providing examples and evidence, to pure speculation. Kind of lost me there.
soyiuz 11y ago
I feel like the OP highlights a problem common to the new breed of "marketplace" platforms like Uber, Airbnb, and Udemy. All of these substitute open, public, regulated markets (taxis, hotels, universities) with closed, private, unregulated markets. Once a near-monopoly is reached, the rules of the marketplace can be changed to benefit the marketplace owner (instead of the service provider).
- deleted 11y ago
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- brbsix 11y ago
  ^This. I cringe every time I hear someone say X is democratizing Y or that X is the "sharing economy". These are unregulated (near) monopoly markets. Craigslist was democratizing. "Freebie" mailing lists and swap meets are the "sharing economy". Services like AirBnB are doing everything they possibly can to disconnect people (and keep them disconnected). You aren't even permitted to screen your own clients, they are so concerned you'll cut them out prior to billing. At least when posting a flyer in your community or listing on CL, there is no false pretext about screening or due diligence being performed.
  - alex_hirner 11y ago
    So if platforms like udemy, app store, uber, etc. eventually gained monopolistic position (which makes business sense) and then adversely taking advantage from it in the long run, what is an alternative model? Transferring them to a blockain'esque infrastructure of public good? I'm seriously interested in a techno-organizational evolution of the platform model.
    - brbsix 11y ago
      I don't know. I've put a lot of thought into it, but this is a Herculean task (like David versus Goliath). Hopefully there are better minds out there who can come up with something. Blockchains and distributed platforms like Etherium look really promising. So does OpenBazaar [1]. There was also an article on the topic recently posted to HN [2]. It has a great quote, "Uber’s big bet is global monopoly or bust.". [1]: https://openbazaar.org/ https://openbazaar.org/ [2]: https://medium.com/dark-mountain/how-platform-coops-can-beat-death-stars-like-uber-to-create-a-real-sharing-economy-5a9752258d3c#.j56jlgwah https://medium.com/dark-mountain/how-platform-coops-can-beat...
xan92 11y ago
HAHA! I got myself into a wrong course and Udemy haven't refunded me till now. They say you can try it before you buy, But they don't give the money back once they have it. Nobody even answers your queries seemed very shady. Not surprised to see this now.
- brbsix 11y ago
  Wow that is scummy. Can't you do a chargeback?
wturner 11y ago
I don't want to derail this with a personal story but this might be useful. I wrote a JavaScript course that I was contracted by someone on Elance to do for very little ( relative to the amount of time I put into it ), he then sold it to another company, that company then put it on Udemy. For a small amount of time it was at the top of the list of beginner JavaScript courses and had over 10,000 students enrolled. I'm grateful my name wasn't on it as it was my first shot at a full on multi hour long course and there were some problems with it... but..... Lesson: If you create courses and sell them to people have stipulations regarding resale. :/ My story wasn't theft so it's not the same, but I figure it might have some utility to someone on hacker news.
- downandout 11y ago
  Sounds like you should create another and send it straight to Udemy or one of their competitors.
- andreasvc 11y ago
  I don't think you can do paid work and stipulate whether the they can later sell it to anyone. If you can learn something from this, it should be that next time you might be able to cut out the middle man.
  - nitrogen 11y ago
    You can contract just about any terms you like, including retention of copyright and limitations on the license granted. Don't just accept whatever terms someone predatory offers to you. (software consultant, not a lawyer)
    - unreal37 11y ago
      Accepting a contract on elance doesn't let you set these kind of terms. It's pure work for hire, or you wouldn't get the job.
    - andreasvc 11y ago
      You could try, but I was arguing you won't have much luck with that. Not many people will hire you if there are specific strings attached to what you produce.
joeyspn 11y ago
After reading the blog post and the comments here, I'm wondering what are the affected parties waiting for? they should organise a class action lawsuit and sue Udemy's ass...
xacaxulu 11y ago
I wonder how many people who wrote courses that are now being pirated on Udemy ever torrented music or movies illegally, used someone else's Netflix account, DRM stripped Kindle books etc. I don't agree with Udemy, but it's always crappier when it happens to you.
- such_a_casual 11y ago
  Let's play devil's advocate and say that you are right. All of these people have at some time downloaded a movie or used someone else's Netflix account. Your argument still wouldn't be valid. Udemy is making presumably 10s of thousands if not hundreds of thousands of dollars off of stolen content. This is the difference between shoplifting a dvd and opening up blockbusters all across the world with movies you stole. The difference is night and day. Not just logically or morally, but legally.
- FireBeyond 11y ago
  Not strictly analogous. How many of those people torrented music or movies -and then sold them, or resold access to someone else's Netflix, etc. Neither is correct. But Udemy isn't just pirating, but profiting.
- jnbiche 11y ago
  First, these are equivalent cases. If someone torrented music or movies, and then sold them, it would be. Second, let's be clear: you can strip DRM without violating copyright. You're violating the Kindle terms of use, but not copyright (that is only the case if you share your stripped books).
gosukiwi 11y ago
He sounds so mad. Writing something while angry is not wise. Still, I knew Udemy was bad but not THAT bad.
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aurizon 11y ago
where is udemy? is there a small claims court there? File for 100% of the money.
wieckse 11y ago
What is a good Udemy alternative?
- sotojuan 11y ago
  Anything realy. Udemy has a terrible signal to noise ratio, and they do scummy stuff like what's going on here. Read a respected book, try Udacity or Coursera, or ask the community what course is good.
  - wyclif 11y ago
    I don't know why kids these days are so down on programming ebooks. I have a ton of them in a Dropbox folder, and they're my main source of learning new programming languages. Sure, they date fast, can't be updated fast, and aren't interactive. They're old school now that we're in the era of MOOCs. But you can still learn a lot if you know what to look for, know how to skim, and know which books are good. Alternatively: maybe I'm just old.
    - samuell 11y ago
      I agree about ebooks, but I'd argue that they have a whole virtue of their own: Nothing beats the speed at what you can skim them, to quickly narrow down on the parts you're interested in, thus being exponentially more efficient than watching hours of video just to find out that it wasn't what you needed (yea, well, except physical books of course, which even ebooks can't beat.)
    - sotojuan 11y ago
      I'm 21. I've been teaching myself programming for about three years (outside of school). With a few notable exceptions, good old books have been the best learning materials.
    - maus42 11y ago
      >ebooks ...or old-style internet tutorials formatted as static mostly-HTML webpages. Or what about printed books. After reading that kind of internet tutorial I got K&R and some less memorable C++ book from the local library.
alain94040 11y ago
This post would benefit from providing more context. Did the author make those videos on behalf of a company? Did he post them somewhere online? Was there ever any kind of license (creative commons for instance) attached to them? My expectation is that at a minimum, Udemy would investigate the claim once it's reported to them. But you need to provide sufficient proof that you are the content owner. Just because your face is in the video is not enough, but it's a great start.
mapgrep 11y ago
Lol you people are really amazing. No sense of irony? Really? Hey guess what, Silicon Valley has been doing this for nearly 20 years to other people. Funny how the HN crowd gets riled up when it happens to programmers. Movies cost tens of millions to make and employ hundreds if not thousands. Tv shows are maybe an order of magnitude smaller, records maybe one more. Any of those media products blow these aggrieved programmers out of the water, impact wise. But the founders of YouTube -- who played this little copyright game like a fiddle -- are heroes in the Valley. So are the founders of Napster, one of whom helped get Facebook going. I guess "move fast and break things" is a great motto until it's your stuff getting broken.
- personjerry 11y ago
  Who is "you people"? People who pirate, or people in tech? What makes you think they're one and the same?
  - api 11y ago
    The parent is referring to the typical attitude that's normally on display here about piracy of music, books, movies, etc. It usually ranges from the dismissive to claims that it actually benefits artists to the occasional bit of "fuck the artists" truth. (That's more or less verbatim from one thread I saw.) You'll also hear a lot of libertarian and/or fluffy pseudo-socialist arguments for abolishing IP law when this stuff comes up. Information wants to be free, man! But when it pertains to a programmer, a developer, an academic, etc., I do often see a very different attitude on display. You can see it in this thread. One of the top replies right now is about how the OP probably has an actionable DMCA claim. I thought the DMCA was Satan...? I guess that's only if certain kinds of people use it. I think it boils down to a kind of classism or cultural/vocational tribalism. Programmers and academics are members of our class/tribe, and their works are worthy of protection and compensation. But writers, actors, producers, musicians, etc. are not and they can go busk on street corners. I don't think most people realize they're doing this, but they are. They've just never stopped to reflect on it or to unpack this nonsense. There are exceptions, but dig up any thread around here on Popcorn Time or The Pirate Bay and you will see what I mean. Variants of "IP law should not exist" or "fuck the artists" is 9:1 the dominant opinion, with people putting forward a different view often getting down voted to the lightest shades of grey. I say this as someone who used to believe this stuff until I reflected on it and thought about the implications and learned a bit more about how the world actually works. Abolishing copyright will only benefit the big content aggregators and vertically integrated delivery/streaming services, who will now be able to monetize everything in any way they want without paying anyone for it. Artists will starve. Most will leave the profession. Music usually comes up in these threads but musicians won't be the most fucked -- at least musicians can tour. The most fucked profession will be writing. When was the last time you attended a paid recital of a novel by its author?
kkt262 11y ago
Besides piracy, udemy itself is just a terrible platform. Unless you agree to sell your course for $10, you'll pretty much never get promoted there organically. They want YOU to do all the work of promoting it to your list, etc. What's worse is that they close off their system as well, making it impossible for you to collect email addresses or send marketing messages. It's a much better idea to use your own platform.
bootload 11y ago
If Udemy is such a bad service, what are the hurdles to create a better, more ethical competitor? “It’s not like there’s a database of copyrighted content out there you know” Ahh so a database of copyright might work. cf https://twitter.com/robconery/status/670389852974657536 https://twitter.com/robconery/status/670389852974657536
codezero 11y ago
When I was at Quora, people posting Udemy courses were a major source of spam content. The system clearly has very broken incentive systems.
ps4fanboy 11y ago
Using DCMA is a good first step when trying to deal with these issues, posting an angry blog and defaming a company as being made explicitly to sell stolen content on twitter shouldn't be your first action. https://support.udemy.com/customer/en/portal/articles/1505776-how-do-i-report-a-udemy-course-infringing-my-copyright-?t=597588 https://support.udemy.com/customer/en/portal/articles/150577...
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jwarren 11y ago
I saw and reported some plagiarised content at Sitepoint. After what I assume was a fact-checking and research period, they got in touch and told me they were taking down the plagiarised material and banning that submitter. Not only that, but they put in place a peer review system for submitted content. That's how you handle this sort of thing, you take ownership of the problem.
sergiotapia 11y ago
Udemy is one of those sites that surprise me. No offense, but it looks and feels like a shitty wordpress themed site, with a crappy backend system tied to it. I've never bought anything from it just because of this intangible 'ick' factor. It seems my gut feeling was right on the money.
aracena 11y ago
We create content in spanish www.oja.la here in udemy https://www.udemy.com/u/pixelpro/ https://www.udemy.com/u/pixelpro/ it has been almost a year since I notified them
blazespin 11y ago
Doesn't Udemy lose safe haven when they start taking a cut?
- brbsix 11y ago
  Yes. It sure bit Grooveshark in the ass [1] though in their case it was revealed that they were aware of the presence of infringing material in addition to receiving a financial benefit directly attributable to the infringing activity. These people are crazy for not implementing any sort of review process. [1]: http://artlawjournal.com/grooveshark-protected-dmca-safe-harbor/ http://artlawjournal.com/grooveshark-protected-dmca-safe-har...
snorrah 11y ago
Udemy always seemed questionable with some of their course titles. Lots of 'How to make money easily doing X' and other extremely clickbait-y names. Now it's actually proven they don't give a shit what's happening on their 'platform' and have a frankly absurd response to copyright claims. Given how quickly Youtube will block a video given a content claim, it seems any sort of legal action against Udemy will bring their house of cards down extremely quickly.
kzrdude 11y ago
> But I had never seen a business actually profiting from piracy. Youtube? Facebook freebooting, too.
judk 11y ago
Is udemy just a scam site that trades ofd consumer confusion in with Udacity?
manigandham 11y ago
Udemy is just a ecommerce/merchant service that just happens to be tailored for hosting video series. This is no different than users stealing content and then uploading to youtube or selling it through a paypal/gumroad/stripe link. In every case the companies would be making a profit either through ads or transactions. The fault is with the user who uploaded the content and the most effective and realistic option for companies that host user provided content is the DMCA process. No matter how good the filtering process (and I do think Udemy needs to improve vastly here) it's never going to catch everything and this situation is all explained and handled by the DMCA. The real issue is how they're handling the takedown requests. If they are prompt and accurate with the takedowns and refunding customers then there should be no issue. How they get their own money back from the fraud user is their problem as well. If Udemy is not handling takedowns or refunding customers, then there definitely is a problem and that should be met with actual legal action, not just social/twitter justice. Edit - why the instant downvotes? haven't seen much other than emotional rants about how Udemy is profiteering but no evidence that the proper DMCA process was followed but denied.
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makecheck 11y ago
Perhaps they need to start periodically saying things like "just a reminder, this video is from <University of XYZ> and is copyright by us" and periodically scribble that on a whiteboard too. It may make the class sound a bit silly at times but we live in a world where plenty of people are just fine with making blatant copies of things. I am against DRM. I don't think it helps anyone to hide content behind buggy technologies, especially when they cause problems that have nothing to do with protection such as security holes. I think you just have to modify the content itself; make it "hard" to cleanse every last mention of the true copyright owner, and stop worrying if some loser actually wants to spend the time and effort it would take to strip all of those mentions out.
Halienja 11y ago
Not the first time I am hearing this. Udemy has no standards whatsoever!
vermooten 11y ago
Oh the delicious irony! https://mobile.twitter.com/udemy/status/670328744754573312 https://mobile.twitter.com/udemy/status/670328744754573312
briandear 11y ago
This is rich. There is a set of HN readers who are outraged over this while at the same time waiting for their next movie torrents to seed. Seems like a tiny bit of hypocrisy happening. The simple truth is that if you own a piece of content, you should have control of that content. Stealing movies, books or music is wrong no matter how much you may pontificate against the "evil" copyright owner. Copyright infringement is a disincentive to content creation.
- LoSboccacc 11y ago
  Could also it be two set of users orthogonally outraging. Just sain.
erikb 11y ago
The number of people who really want to live off of other people's work is much smaller than we often think. More often than not harm is done by people that are either incompetent or desperate. Should that stop us from getting a lawyer? Certainly not. Can we still believe in humans usually trying to do good? Yes.
gamekathu 11y ago
disgusting! either way I dont use Udemy because of the cost involved, now I am definitely not paying for someone else's stolen hard work
PiotrOwsiak 11y ago
To all who try to discuss the details of DCMA, copyright, etc. the bottom line is this part from the first comment "Udemy do not care.". THIS is the real issue.
jsilence 11y ago
I just deleted my account at udemy: "Dear Udemy Company, I read about your questionable practice of not fighting against pirated content on your platform and not rightfully reimbursing the original creators. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10638795 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10638795 I am not willing to support your stance on this topic and will delete my account within minutes. Good bye!"
VivisClone 11y ago
I really hope the programs that I've purchased aren't pirated, But Then again I just used the code that made anything 5 dollars. So... eh?

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greenyoda 11y ago

Filling out Udemy's "Report Abuse" form to report a "Copyright or Trademark Violation" probably doesn't create any legal obligation on their part to take any action. The author (copyright holder) should have filed an official DMCA takedown request, directed at Udemy's designated DMCA contact, whose e-mail and postal addresses can be found here: https://www.udemy.com/terms/copyright/ https://www.udemy.com/terms/copyright/

CamperBob2 11y ago
I'm confused. Why not just send a DMCA notice to their upstream provider?
- biot 11y ago
  That's what you'd do if Udemy had no registered DMCA agent. Basically, if you wish to issue a DMCA takedown notice you need to follow the DMCA process.
nerfhammer 11y ago
Udemy must "not receive a financial benefit directly attributable to the infringing activity" in order for DCMA to be applicable. Since they're charging for the courses it's probably ordinary copyright infringement on their part. You should send them a Cease and Desist and then sue them.
- TheOtherHobbes 11y ago
  How long before instructors file a class action? What will it cost Udemy if instructors start to register copyright and Udemy become liable for statutory damages?

nickjj 11y ago

Udemy really is one of the worst platforms imaginable for instructors. They will even brand your videos without your consent by adding Udemy logo watermarks to every video. If you guys want to hear another horror story about Udemy, take a skim through: http://blog.nickjanetakis.com/post/133482093993/less-than-24-hours-on-udemy-as-an-instructor-and http://blog.nickjanetakis.com/post/133482093993/less-than-24... (note: the above post is a few days old) Someone really needs to step up and create a more reasonable course hosting platform.

gtirloni 11y ago
There is edx, coursera, etc.
- GFischer 11y ago
  But I think those are only for university-level courses.
  - nickjj 11y ago
    Yes I believe they are. Since then a number of people have posted a few alternatives: - https://teachable.com/ https://teachable.com/ - https://www.pluralsight.com/ https://www.pluralsight.com/ - http://02geek.com http://02geek.com - https://cloudacademy.com/ https://cloudacademy.com/ (for more specific types of courses) I'm definitely moving off Udemy. I plan to research the alternatives over the weekend and start moving my course when I make a decision.
sapokedak 11y ago
Wow. That was harrowing. The dangers and degradations that this poor man has lived through at the hands of Udemy! I'm amazed he survived.

pkaye 11y ago

Growth hacking?

agumonkey 11y ago
Hack growth.

ps4fanboy 11y ago

While I sympathize with the author its (edit)unreasonable to suggest that they should be validating each course. However it appears more should be done to ease the path to getting your content taken down. You would think the person selling the course would have payment information that could be used to track that individual down, the correct course of action is to sue. If the content isnt worth doing this then the content isnt actually that valuable to the author.

GFK_of_xmaspast 11y ago
> its dangerous to suggest that they should be validating each course. Why's that?
- ps4fanboy 11y ago
  Because how would you even do that with any sort of accuracy, do you check the global content registry database? Surely people dont expect to export the burden of protecting your IP to other companies?
  - FussyZeus 11y ago
    If you're in the business of selling content you damn well ought to know who's content your selling. I'm not saying any system would be completely bulletproof, but you should at least look like you're TRYING.
    - deleted 11y ago
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    - Spivak 11y ago
      So if I lease commercial land it's my responsibility to make sure my renter isn't laundering money? Whatever argument you make should also explain why the web hosting provider isn't also responsible for hosting and distributing pirated content. Certainly they should also look like they're trying to prevent copyright infringement on their network. > but you should at least look like you're TRYING. This kind of logic is how an automatic 'review' process gets implemented which just spins for a few minutes and then then accepts the video. The problem of detecting copyrighted content is so complex that without source level access you would never be able to prove definitively that their review process is just theater.

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AlexeyBrin 11y ago
> but udemy got videos off of pluralsight, uploaded them to their own servers, and are then selling them off as udemy's own courses. You are confusing things here. A Udemy user took some content from Pluralsight and published the content on Udemy. Where Udemy is in the wrong is in not taking the content down and banning the teacher from their platform.
- FireBeyond 11y ago
  What would be intriguing is if Udemy is actually responsible, and just using ghost accounts...
  - brbsix 11y ago
    I certainly don't know enough about the site to say definitively one way or another, but I wouldn't be surprised. This sort of scenario reminds me of Airbnb taking customers from Craigslist [1] or Uber employing "ghosts" to fuck with competitors (cancel rides and poach drivers) [2]. Of course there's no evidence of Udemy doing anything this shady, it just wouldn't be outside the realm of what some tech companies have been up to lately. [1]: http://www.businessinsider.com/airbnb-harvested-craigslist-to-grow-its-listings-says-competitor-2011-5 http://www.businessinsider.com/airbnb-harvested-craigslist-t... [2:]

cdnsteve 11y ago

Maybe an approach could be to actually reach out to authors that are creating accounts and to verify identities more than just an email account rather than focus on contents of that said account. I would also imagine that certain geographic regions have higher reports of said activities. So extra checks should be added for them in the approval process. In the end if they don't shape up they are only hurting themsleves in the long run.

shawnwildermuth 11y ago

Scary that we'd get no response on this.

shawnwildermuth 11y ago

Scary that we'd get no response on this.

Cheyana 11y ago

Wow. Ironic... https://www.udemy.com/copyright-law-for-online-entrepreneurs/?utm_campaign=cision&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter https://www.udemy.com/copyright-law-for-online-entrepreneurs...

yarou 11y ago

The sad thing is that in this day and age, independent content creators don't have their copyrights respected, while megacorporations patent troll and abuse our broken intellectual property system. The only solution that comes to mind is for independent content creators to vigorously litigate and ensure that their DMCA claims are taken seriously.

lemevi 11y ago

Did he even try to contact Udemy support and get a response? It would seem like the thing to do before writing a hit piece. I interviewed at Udemy, but ended up taking a position somewhere else, yet they struck me as good people trying to make a good product. I don't like piracy and the author has been wronged, but this blog post is unfair.

robconery 11y ago
Yes, I did. As did Troy. No reponse (now as then). You entirely miss the point of the article - it's not about piracy, it's about a marketplace for pirated goods. That's what Udemy does. Sorry if I'm not nice about it.
- deleted 11y ago
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- Falkon1313 11y ago
  So if a burglar steals a TV, sells it to someone else, and they list it on eBay, does that make eBay guilty of the burglary? If someone buys it using Paypal, do you consider Paypal to be the burglar? If the currency mode used was USD, do you consider the U.S. government to be the guilty burglar? I suppose if it was explicitly listed as 'Stolen 40" TV!' in the 'Stolen Goods' category of eBay you could say that they should have known, and if Paypal had special 'funds to buy stolen things' accounts and one of those was used to buy it, then you could put some blame to them, etc. But how far away do you project the blame from the actual criminal? If Udemy is responsible, then do you absolve the person who pirated and uploaded it of guilt? Or do you divide and dilute it? How long does the chain need to be before each participant's share of the guilt is so small as to be negligible and irrelevant? Why not instead blame the person who uploaded it to make money while knowing that they hadn't created it and didn't own the rights?
  - ps4fanboy 11y ago
    Because udemy has money and are easier to go after, if rob was to go after the person who actually stole his content they might be insolvent or in a country is too expensive to go after them.

citricsquid 11y ago

This happens fairly frequently to Jeffrey Way of Laracasts and there's a lot of money involved in stealing his material: Hey @udemy - For the third time this year, my content is being stolen and sold on your site. Don't use Udemy, folks. [1] So @udemy, 373 users signed up for that stolen series at $19 - or a total of $7,087. ... Update on the Udemy selling my stolen content issue: they finally responded, and will not reimburse me, unless there is a court ruling. Udemy do not care. https://twitter.com/jeffrey_way/status/649933605305774081 https://twitter.com/jeffrey_way/status/649933605305774081 https://twitter.com/jeffrey_way/status/649936961105432576 https://twitter.com/jeffrey_way/status/649936961105432576 https://twitter.com/jeffrey_way/status/649937073407979520 https://twitter.com/jeffrey_way/status/649937073407979520 https://twitter.com/jeffrey_way/status/651215238470090754 https://twitter.com/jeffrey_way/status/651215238470090754 https://twitter.com/jeffrey_way/status/651215565713870849 https://twitter.com/jeffrey_way/status/651215565713870849

ps4fanboy 11y ago
I couldnt tell from the tweets but did Udemy keep the money or did they refund the users once the content was taken down? If refunds are issued to users, it seems unreasonable for the author to claim that Udemy should be paying them 100% of any money transacted. Is Rob and Jeffrey suggesting that Udemy should pay $2 for every $1 involved in fraud? EDIT: People are making a lot of claims that Udemy are profiting from this but no one has linked to anything to indicate that when content is removed if the people who paid for it who can no longer access the content are issued refunds or not. Does anyone have any information to suggest that Udemy isnt refunding users?
- rnovak 11y ago
  Thats not the way copyright works. If you think it is, please, let RIAA know you've stolen some records and let's see how much they charge you. Last time I checked, users are sued for thousands of dollars per infringing instance, held up in court. Why shouldn't that hold for a COMPANY doing it? Seems a little unreasonable to me. Edit: and for people down-voting, please explain why?

Animats 11y ago

You can go after Udemy. They're not just a hosting service. They claim ownership of the content. "Each of our 35,000+ courses is taught by an expert instructor". Many courses are paid. If Udemy charges for access to the course, they lose the DMCA safe harbor. Then they're liable for full copyright damages. This may even be criminal copyright infringment under 18 U.S. Code § 2319 (Criminal infringement of a copyright) if the total retail value exceeds $2500. Get a lawyer. This looks winnable.

braum 11y ago
Make sure you file copyright for each video before making it available on your own website. Having a copyright in place before any theft allows you to go after (by threat or course) statutory damages for each theft of your work. I learned this a few years ago from our own IP lawyer when someone was reusing some of our material. We now file the $35(or whatever it is) fee before posting the material online.
- Coding_Cat 11y ago
  File for copyright? how do you mean: Copyright is implicit, unlike patents, upon creation of a work.
  - unavoidable 11y ago
    You can file a registration for copyright, which gives you certain presumptions and advantages in court (e.g. it serves as a presumption of ownership, which would be important in these kinds of cases). It also might serve as "notice" for potential infringers so that you can get higher damages.
  - bbq 11y ago
    >Registration is still required in the US for some benefits, such as awards of statutory damages. [1] >You must register your copyright with the U.S. Copyright Office before you are legally permitted to bring a lawsuit to enforce it. [2] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright_registration#Requirement_of_registration https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright_registration#Require... [2] http://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/copyright-registration-notice-enforcement-faq-29067.html http://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/copyright-registratio...

giarc 11y ago

>and Udemy not only let them do this, they’re encouraging others to do the same. Is there proof of this? Author went from providing examples and evidence, to pure speculation. Kind of lost me there.

soyiuz 11y ago

I feel like the OP highlights a problem common to the new breed of "marketplace" platforms like Uber, Airbnb, and Udemy. All of these substitute open, public, regulated markets (taxis, hotels, universities) with closed, private, unregulated markets. Once a near-monopoly is reached, the rules of the marketplace can be changed to benefit the marketplace owner (instead of the service provider).

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brbsix 11y ago
^This. I cringe every time I hear someone say X is democratizing Y or that X is the "sharing economy". These are unregulated (near) monopoly markets. Craigslist was democratizing. "Freebie" mailing lists and swap meets are the "sharing economy". Services like AirBnB are doing everything they possibly can to disconnect people (and keep them disconnected). You aren't even permitted to screen your own clients, they are so concerned you'll cut them out prior to billing. At least when posting a flyer in your community or listing on CL, there is no false pretext about screening or due diligence being performed.
- alex_hirner 11y ago
  So if platforms like udemy, app store, uber, etc. eventually gained monopolistic position (which makes business sense) and then adversely taking advantage from it in the long run, what is an alternative model? Transferring them to a blockain'esque infrastructure of public good? I'm seriously interested in a techno-organizational evolution of the platform model.
  - brbsix 11y ago
    I don't know. I've put a lot of thought into it, but this is a Herculean task (like David versus Goliath). Hopefully there are better minds out there who can come up with something. Blockchains and distributed platforms like Etherium look really promising. So does OpenBazaar [1]. There was also an article on the topic recently posted to HN [2]. It has a great quote, "Uber’s big bet is global monopoly or bust.". [1]: https://openbazaar.org/ https://openbazaar.org/ [2]: https://medium.com/dark-mountain/how-platform-coops-can-beat-death-stars-like-uber-to-create-a-real-sharing-economy-5a9752258d3c#.j56jlgwah https://medium.com/dark-mountain/how-platform-coops-can-beat...

xan92 11y ago

HAHA! I got myself into a wrong course and Udemy haven't refunded me till now. They say you can try it before you buy, But they don't give the money back once they have it. Nobody even answers your queries seemed very shady. Not surprised to see this now.

brbsix 11y ago
Wow that is scummy. Can't you do a chargeback?

wturner 11y ago

I don't want to derail this with a personal story but this might be useful. I wrote a JavaScript course that I was contracted by someone on Elance to do for very little ( relative to the amount of time I put into it ), he then sold it to another company, that company then put it on Udemy. For a small amount of time it was at the top of the list of beginner JavaScript courses and had over 10,000 students enrolled. I'm grateful my name wasn't on it as it was my first shot at a full on multi hour long course and there were some problems with it... but..... Lesson: If you create courses and sell them to people have stipulations regarding resale. :/ My story wasn't theft so it's not the same, but I figure it might have some utility to someone on hacker news.

downandout 11y ago
Sounds like you should create another and send it straight to Udemy or one of their competitors.
andreasvc 11y ago
I don't think you can do paid work and stipulate whether the they can later sell it to anyone. If you can learn something from this, it should be that next time you might be able to cut out the middle man.
- nitrogen 11y ago
  You can contract just about any terms you like, including retention of copyright and limitations on the license granted. Don't just accept whatever terms someone predatory offers to you. (software consultant, not a lawyer)
  - unreal37 11y ago
    Accepting a contract on elance doesn't let you set these kind of terms. It's pure work for hire, or you wouldn't get the job.
  - andreasvc 11y ago
    You could try, but I was arguing you won't have much luck with that. Not many people will hire you if there are specific strings attached to what you produce.

joeyspn 11y ago

After reading the blog post and the comments here, I'm wondering what are the affected parties waiting for? they should organise a class action lawsuit and sue Udemy's ass...

xacaxulu 11y ago

I wonder how many people who wrote courses that are now being pirated on Udemy ever torrented music or movies illegally, used someone else's Netflix account, DRM stripped Kindle books etc. I don't agree with Udemy, but it's always crappier when it happens to you.

such_a_casual 11y ago
Let's play devil's advocate and say that you are right. All of these people have at some time downloaded a movie or used someone else's Netflix account. Your argument still wouldn't be valid. Udemy is making presumably 10s of thousands if not hundreds of thousands of dollars off of stolen content. This is the difference between shoplifting a dvd and opening up blockbusters all across the world with movies you stole. The difference is night and day. Not just logically or morally, but legally.
FireBeyond 11y ago
Not strictly analogous. How many of those people torrented music or movies -and then sold them, or resold access to someone else's Netflix, etc. Neither is correct. But Udemy isn't just pirating, but profiting.
jnbiche 11y ago
First, these are equivalent cases. If someone torrented music or movies, and then sold them, it would be. Second, let's be clear: you can strip DRM without violating copyright. You're violating the Kindle terms of use, but not copyright (that is only the case if you share your stripped books).

gosukiwi 11y ago

He sounds so mad. Writing something while angry is not wise. Still, I knew Udemy was bad but not THAT bad.

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aurizon 11y ago

where is udemy? is there a small claims court there? File for 100% of the money.

wieckse 11y ago

What is a good Udemy alternative?

sotojuan 11y ago
Anything realy. Udemy has a terrible signal to noise ratio, and they do scummy stuff like what's going on here. Read a respected book, try Udacity or Coursera, or ask the community what course is good.
- wyclif 11y ago
  I don't know why kids these days are so down on programming ebooks. I have a ton of them in a Dropbox folder, and they're my main source of learning new programming languages. Sure, they date fast, can't be updated fast, and aren't interactive. They're old school now that we're in the era of MOOCs. But you can still learn a lot if you know what to look for, know how to skim, and know which books are good. Alternatively: maybe I'm just old.
  - samuell 11y ago
    I agree about ebooks, but I'd argue that they have a whole virtue of their own: Nothing beats the speed at what you can skim them, to quickly narrow down on the parts you're interested in, thus being exponentially more efficient than watching hours of video just to find out that it wasn't what you needed (yea, well, except physical books of course, which even ebooks can't beat.)
  - sotojuan 11y ago
    I'm 21. I've been teaching myself programming for about three years (outside of school). With a few notable exceptions, good old books have been the best learning materials.
  - maus42 11y ago
    >ebooks ...or old-style internet tutorials formatted as static mostly-HTML webpages. Or what about printed books. After reading that kind of internet tutorial I got K&R and some less memorable C++ book from the local library.

alain94040 11y ago

This post would benefit from providing more context. Did the author make those videos on behalf of a company? Did he post them somewhere online? Was there ever any kind of license (creative commons for instance) attached to them? My expectation is that at a minimum, Udemy would investigate the claim once it's reported to them. But you need to provide sufficient proof that you are the content owner. Just because your face is in the video is not enough, but it's a great start.

mapgrep 11y ago

Lol you people are really amazing. No sense of irony? Really? Hey guess what, Silicon Valley has been doing this for nearly 20 years to other people. Funny how the HN crowd gets riled up when it happens to programmers. Movies cost tens of millions to make and employ hundreds if not thousands. Tv shows are maybe an order of magnitude smaller, records maybe one more. Any of those media products blow these aggrieved programmers out of the water, impact wise. But the founders of YouTube -- who played this little copyright game like a fiddle -- are heroes in the Valley. So are the founders of Napster, one of whom helped get Facebook going. I guess "move fast and break things" is a great motto until it's your stuff getting broken.

personjerry 11y ago
Who is "you people"? People who pirate, or people in tech? What makes you think they're one and the same?
- api 11y ago
  The parent is referring to the typical attitude that's normally on display here about piracy of music, books, movies, etc. It usually ranges from the dismissive to claims that it actually benefits artists to the occasional bit of "fuck the artists" truth. (That's more or less verbatim from one thread I saw.) You'll also hear a lot of libertarian and/or fluffy pseudo-socialist arguments for abolishing IP law when this stuff comes up. Information wants to be free, man! But when it pertains to a programmer, a developer, an academic, etc., I do often see a very different attitude on display. You can see it in this thread. One of the top replies right now is about how the OP probably has an actionable DMCA claim. I thought the DMCA was Satan...? I guess that's only if certain kinds of people use it. I think it boils down to a kind of classism or cultural/vocational tribalism. Programmers and academics are members of our class/tribe, and their works are worthy of protection and compensation. But writers, actors, producers, musicians, etc. are not and they can go busk on street corners. I don't think most people realize they're doing this, but they are. They've just never stopped to reflect on it or to unpack this nonsense. There are exceptions, but dig up any thread around here on Popcorn Time or The Pirate Bay and you will see what I mean. Variants of "IP law should not exist" or "fuck the artists" is 9:1 the dominant opinion, with people putting forward a different view often getting down voted to the lightest shades of grey. I say this as someone who used to believe this stuff until I reflected on it and thought about the implications and learned a bit more about how the world actually works. Abolishing copyright will only benefit the big content aggregators and vertically integrated delivery/streaming services, who will now be able to monetize everything in any way they want without paying anyone for it. Artists will starve. Most will leave the profession. Music usually comes up in these threads but musicians won't be the most fucked -- at least musicians can tour. The most fucked profession will be writing. When was the last time you attended a paid recital of a novel by its author?

kkt262 11y ago

Besides piracy, udemy itself is just a terrible platform. Unless you agree to sell your course for $10, you'll pretty much never get promoted there organically. They want YOU to do all the work of promoting it to your list, etc. What's worse is that they close off their system as well, making it impossible for you to collect email addresses or send marketing messages. It's a much better idea to use your own platform.

bootload 11y ago

If Udemy is such a bad service, what are the hurdles to create a better, more ethical competitor? “It’s not like there’s a database of copyrighted content out there you know” Ahh so a database of copyright might work. cf https://twitter.com/robconery/status/670389852974657536 https://twitter.com/robconery/status/670389852974657536

codezero 11y ago

When I was at Quora, people posting Udemy courses were a major source of spam content. The system clearly has very broken incentive systems.

ps4fanboy 11y ago

Using DCMA is a good first step when trying to deal with these issues, posting an angry blog and defaming a company as being made explicitly to sell stolen content on twitter shouldn't be your first action. https://support.udemy.com/customer/en/portal/articles/1505776-how-do-i-report-a-udemy-course-infringing-my-copyright-?t=597588 https://support.udemy.com/customer/en/portal/articles/150577...

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jwarren 11y ago

I saw and reported some plagiarised content at Sitepoint. After what I assume was a fact-checking and research period, they got in touch and told me they were taking down the plagiarised material and banning that submitter. Not only that, but they put in place a peer review system for submitted content. That's how you handle this sort of thing, you take ownership of the problem.

sergiotapia 11y ago

Udemy is one of those sites that surprise me. No offense, but it looks and feels like a shitty wordpress themed site, with a crappy backend system tied to it. I've never bought anything from it just because of this intangible 'ick' factor. It seems my gut feeling was right on the money.

aracena 11y ago

We create content in spanish www.oja.la here in udemy https://www.udemy.com/u/pixelpro/ https://www.udemy.com/u/pixelpro/ it has been almost a year since I notified them

blazespin 11y ago

Doesn't Udemy lose safe haven when they start taking a cut?

brbsix 11y ago
Yes. It sure bit Grooveshark in the ass [1] though in their case it was revealed that they were aware of the presence of infringing material in addition to receiving a financial benefit directly attributable to the infringing activity. These people are crazy for not implementing any sort of review process. [1]: http://artlawjournal.com/grooveshark-protected-dmca-safe-harbor/ http://artlawjournal.com/grooveshark-protected-dmca-safe-har...

snorrah 11y ago

Udemy always seemed questionable with some of their course titles. Lots of 'How to make money easily doing X' and other extremely clickbait-y names. Now it's actually proven they don't give a shit what's happening on their 'platform' and have a frankly absurd response to copyright claims. Given how quickly Youtube will block a video given a content claim, it seems any sort of legal action against Udemy will bring their house of cards down extremely quickly.

kzrdude 11y ago

> But I had never seen a business actually profiting from piracy. Youtube? Facebook freebooting, too.

judk 11y ago

Is udemy just a scam site that trades ofd consumer confusion in with Udacity?

manigandham 11y ago

Udemy is just a ecommerce/merchant service that just happens to be tailored for hosting video series. This is no different than users stealing content and then uploading to youtube or selling it through a paypal/gumroad/stripe link. In every case the companies would be making a profit either through ads or transactions. The fault is with the user who uploaded the content and the most effective and realistic option for companies that host user provided content is the DMCA process. No matter how good the filtering process (and I do think Udemy needs to improve vastly here) it's never going to catch everything and this situation is all explained and handled by the DMCA. The real issue is how they're handling the takedown requests. If they are prompt and accurate with the takedowns and refunding customers then there should be no issue. How they get their own money back from the fraud user is their problem as well. If Udemy is not handling takedowns or refunding customers, then there definitely is a problem and that should be met with actual legal action, not just social/twitter justice. Edit - why the instant downvotes? haven't seen much other than emotional rants about how Udemy is profiteering but no evidence that the proper DMCA process was followed but denied.

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]

makecheck 11y ago

Perhaps they need to start periodically saying things like "just a reminder, this video is from <University of XYZ> and is copyright by us" and periodically scribble that on a whiteboard too. It may make the class sound a bit silly at times but we live in a world where plenty of people are just fine with making blatant copies of things. I am against DRM. I don't think it helps anyone to hide content behind buggy technologies, especially when they cause problems that have nothing to do with protection such as security holes. I think you just have to modify the content itself; make it "hard" to cleanse every last mention of the true copyright owner, and stop worrying if some loser actually wants to spend the time and effort it would take to strip all of those mentions out.

Halienja 11y ago

Not the first time I am hearing this. Udemy has no standards whatsoever!

vermooten 11y ago

Oh the delicious irony! https://mobile.twitter.com/udemy/status/670328744754573312 https://mobile.twitter.com/udemy/status/670328744754573312

briandear 11y ago

This is rich. There is a set of HN readers who are outraged over this while at the same time waiting for their next movie torrents to seed. Seems like a tiny bit of hypocrisy happening. The simple truth is that if you own a piece of content, you should have control of that content. Stealing movies, books or music is wrong no matter how much you may pontificate against the "evil" copyright owner. Copyright infringement is a disincentive to content creation.

LoSboccacc 11y ago
Could also it be two set of users orthogonally outraging. Just sain.

erikb 11y ago

The number of people who really want to live off of other people's work is much smaller than we often think. More often than not harm is done by people that are either incompetent or desperate. Should that stop us from getting a lawyer? Certainly not. Can we still believe in humans usually trying to do good? Yes.

gamekathu 11y ago

disgusting! either way I dont use Udemy because of the cost involved, now I am definitely not paying for someone else's stolen hard work

PiotrOwsiak 11y ago

To all who try to discuss the details of DCMA, copyright, etc. the bottom line is this part from the first comment "Udemy do not care.". THIS is the real issue.

jsilence 11y ago

I just deleted my account at udemy: "Dear Udemy Company, I read about your questionable practice of not fighting against pirated content on your platform and not rightfully reimbursing the original creators. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10638795 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10638795 I am not willing to support your stance on this topic and will delete my account within minutes. Good bye!"

VivisClone 11y ago

I really hope the programs that I've purchased aren't pirated, But Then again I just used the code that made anything 5 dollars. So... eh?