6 ms·

Hitler “Downfall Meme” gets taken down

49 points by borism 17y ago

slillibri 17y ago
This is actually pretty sad, since the director of "Downfall" approves of the usage. http://nymag.com/daily/entertainment/2010/01/the_director_of_downfall_on_al.html http://nymag.com/daily/entertainment/2010/01/the_director_of...
pavel_lishin 17y ago
Odd. I remember reading that the director was impressed with what people ended up making of his work, and laughed about it.
- noonespecial 17y ago
  The director probably has about as much to say about the use of the end product as the janitor. Witness OK Go.
- RevRal 17y ago
  Yeah. http://nymag.com/daily/entertainment/2010/01/the_director_of_downfall_on_al.html http://nymag.com/daily/entertainment/2010/01/the_director_of...
BigZaphod 17y ago
I don't think Hitler would take kindly to hearing this news... It's a shame we'll now not be able to see his reaction.
- timcederman 17y ago
  I think this is the third thread I've run across in the last few minutes where the top voted comment (by a lot) is some witty rejoinder, rather than an actual interesting comment or consideration. Not saying it should/shouldn't be like that, just making an observation (far be it from me to dictate to the community how it should act), and am surprised to see it on Hacker News.
  - volare 17y ago
    This is a reasonable comment. I'm further surprised to see you being down-voted.
    - chipsy 17y ago
      When I saw this appear in the queue early in the morning, I thought to myself, "God, I hope this doesn't get front paged, it'll probably be full of Reddit-style one-liners." Sigh.
  - apphacker 17y ago
    When I ever see such a witty statement, I chuckle, and then I downvote. I think our brains are somehow hardwired to click upvote buttons when something makes us laugh even though it contributes nothing else. I don't know if the upvotes of wit have done good things for fark, digg or reddit, but now I spend more time here than there so I downvote. I think that's how memes begin, and I'd hate to see memes on HN. This article is about the death of a meme, and I am glad to see it go.
    - jrockway 17y ago
      Whenever I see people say they downvote other people, I chuckle, and then I downvote.
- Keyframe 17y ago
  http://vimeo.com/11086952 http://vimeo.com/11086952
  - tvon 17y ago
    also http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kBO5dh9qrIQ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kBO5dh9qrIQ
CrazedGeek 17y ago
Just in case you haven't seen one of these, this one's a decent example: http://thatguywiththeglasses.com/videolinks/thatguywiththeglasses/sketches/16796-hitler-spoof http://thatguywiththeglasses.com/videolinks/thatguywiththegl...
protomyth 17y ago
Wonder how many people bought the actual DVD because of all those videos?
- antidaily 17y ago
  /raises hand. (well, rented)
  - cynicalkane 17y ago
    Bought a copy for my dad for Christmas because he was such a fan of the Hitler videos.
- splat 17y ago
  It's always seemed odd to me when the owners of the media from which some internet meme is based destroy the videos that made them popular in the first place, given that it would be completely unknown without the meme. The artist's biggest enemy is not piracy but obscurity.
  - LiveTheDream 17y ago
    The artist's biggest enemy is not piracy but obscurity.
  - RyanMcGreal 17y ago
    http://openp2p.com/pub/a/p2p/2002/12/11/piracy.html http://openp2p.com/pub/a/p2p/2002/12/11/piracy.html
- iaskwhy 17y ago
  I had the chance to see it at the theater on the release day long before all this parody videos were created. It's an amazing movie, the best featuring Hitler in my opinion. The theater was pretty crowded and lots of people cried during the movie. I'd say Bruno Ganz's performance shares a big part of the responsibility for that effect, one of the best actings I have ever seen. You should all watch it, really.
rit 17y ago
Isn't today his birthday? (Random factoid lodged in my brain)
- fbu 17y ago
  20 April 1889 Well done, Sir !
KirinDave 17y ago
Is the article trying to suggest this is fair use under parody, at the end? Seems like it wasn't really qualifying. Taking 5 minutes wholesale out of a movie and overlaying text is a tough sell for "parody", which typically involves shorter duration. I hope someone challenges this ruling. It'd be interesting to see if we can expand what parody is.
- smallblacksun 17y ago
  Artists like Weird Al use entire songs for parody, so I don't think a 5 minute clip would be too long.
  - InclinedPlane 17y ago
    Artists like Weird Al get permission from the original artists, they also don't use any original material, typically. For what it's worth.
    - ywgdana 17y ago
      Although they aren't legally required to. Al does it as a courtesy. He specifically gets permission from the artist now, because when he did Amish Paradise he'd received an okay from Coolio's label, but later learned Coolio himself was upset about the parody.
- hugh3 17y ago
  I think what prevents this from being "parody" is that the thing being copied is not the thing being parodied. A "Downfall" parody video about Star Trek isn't a parody of Downfall, it's a parody of Star Trek, or maybe a parody of Star Trek fans. Similarly, when Weird Al Yankovic ripped off Nirvana to make fun of Nirvana he didn't need to get permission to do so, but when he ripped off American Pie to make fun of Star Wars Episode 1 he did. (For the record, Weird Al nowadays always gets permission from the original artist anyway.)
- mikecane 17y ago
  See, the thing is, I don't know German, so how can it really be a theft of the movie if the original English subtitles aren't there for me to understand it? Doesn't comprehensibility figure into this at all?
joshu 17y ago
So this is basically the DMCA protecting us from an unfunny copypasta meme? Awesome.
shalmanese 17y ago
I always wonder what the hidden backstory is behind these kind of things. Is it: a) They were not aware of the downfall stuff on youtube until this point and, when they discovered it, they were horrified and promptly removed them b) They were aware from the beginning and hated it from the beginning and it's taken them 2 or 3 years to work through the process of taking them down c) They were aware from the beginning and they loved/tolerated it but something changed their mind recently and now they want them removed d) It's not actually the film company filing the notices but some elaborate 4chan troll e) something else There are no boring hypotheses that I can think of. Every hypothesis has something weird associated with it so I'm really curious which it ends up being.
- BoppreH 17y ago
  It seems the videos were removed automatically. Maybe only now Youtube's software caught that up and the producers forgot to tell that they want to keep the videos. But that's just a wild guess on how things work there.
  - arantius 17y ago
    http://www.google.com/support/youtube/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=83766 http://www.google.com/support/youtube/bin/answer.py?hl=en&#3... Specifically: What happens when Content ID identifies a match? If Content ID identifies a match between a user upload and material in the reference library, it applies the usage policy designated by the content owner. The usage policy tells the system what to do with the video. So, I'd highly suspect that just now the content owner set the policy. I can't believe that the filter is multiple years out of date, and just now catching up. They wouldn't all be flagged at once, if the processing was that slow.
deleted 17y ago
[deleted]
dacort 17y ago
Wonder how quickly somebody is going to create one about the downfall of the downfall meme...
- BoppreH 17y ago
  Bam. It's already here. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5fAQKa8rU_4 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5fAQKa8rU_4
metamemetics 17y ago
There are some copies of the popular ones with less views still up. This was the best one IMO: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lUjaW4ZtdN0 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lUjaW4ZtdN0
pw0ncakes 17y ago
Das ist ein nukular buttfail. The "meme" is a major advertisement for the film, and free for them. I know a lot of people who have rented or seen Der Untergang whose first exposure to the film's existence was the Hitler spoofs. It's not my fault that the media corporations can't figure out a way to make money off the new distribution mechanisms.

49 points by borism 17y ago

This is actually pretty sad, since the director of "Downfall" approves of the usage. http://nymag.com/daily/entertainment/2010/01/the_director_of_downfall_on_al.html http://nymag.com/daily/entertainment/2010/01/the_director_of...

pavel_lishin 17y ago

Odd. I remember reading that the director was impressed with what people ended up making of his work, and laughed about it.

noonespecial 17y ago
The director probably has about as much to say about the use of the end product as the janitor. Witness OK Go.
RevRal 17y ago
Yeah. http://nymag.com/daily/entertainment/2010/01/the_director_of_downfall_on_al.html http://nymag.com/daily/entertainment/2010/01/the_director_of...

BigZaphod 17y ago

I don't think Hitler would take kindly to hearing this news... It's a shame we'll now not be able to see his reaction.

timcederman 17y ago
I think this is the third thread I've run across in the last few minutes where the top voted comment (by a lot) is some witty rejoinder, rather than an actual interesting comment or consideration. Not saying it should/shouldn't be like that, just making an observation (far be it from me to dictate to the community how it should act), and am surprised to see it on Hacker News.
- volare 17y ago
  This is a reasonable comment. I'm further surprised to see you being down-voted.
  - chipsy 17y ago
    When I saw this appear in the queue early in the morning, I thought to myself, "God, I hope this doesn't get front paged, it'll probably be full of Reddit-style one-liners." Sigh.
- apphacker 17y ago
  When I ever see such a witty statement, I chuckle, and then I downvote. I think our brains are somehow hardwired to click upvote buttons when something makes us laugh even though it contributes nothing else. I don't know if the upvotes of wit have done good things for fark, digg or reddit, but now I spend more time here than there so I downvote. I think that's how memes begin, and I'd hate to see memes on HN. This article is about the death of a meme, and I am glad to see it go.
  - jrockway 17y ago
    Whenever I see people say they downvote other people, I chuckle, and then I downvote.
Keyframe 17y ago
http://vimeo.com/11086952 http://vimeo.com/11086952
- tvon 17y ago
  also http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kBO5dh9qrIQ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kBO5dh9qrIQ

CrazedGeek 17y ago

Just in case you haven't seen one of these, this one's a decent example: http://thatguywiththeglasses.com/videolinks/thatguywiththeglasses/sketches/16796-hitler-spoof http://thatguywiththeglasses.com/videolinks/thatguywiththegl...

protomyth 17y ago

Wonder how many people bought the actual DVD because of all those videos?

antidaily 17y ago
/raises hand. (well, rented)
- cynicalkane 17y ago
  Bought a copy for my dad for Christmas because he was such a fan of the Hitler videos.
splat 17y ago
It's always seemed odd to me when the owners of the media from which some internet meme is based destroy the videos that made them popular in the first place, given that it would be completely unknown without the meme. The artist's biggest enemy is not piracy but obscurity.
- LiveTheDream 17y ago
  The artist's biggest enemy is not piracy but obscurity.
- RyanMcGreal 17y ago
  http://openp2p.com/pub/a/p2p/2002/12/11/piracy.html http://openp2p.com/pub/a/p2p/2002/12/11/piracy.html
iaskwhy 17y ago
I had the chance to see it at the theater on the release day long before all this parody videos were created. It's an amazing movie, the best featuring Hitler in my opinion. The theater was pretty crowded and lots of people cried during the movie. I'd say Bruno Ganz's performance shares a big part of the responsibility for that effect, one of the best actings I have ever seen. You should all watch it, really.

rit 17y ago

Isn't today his birthday? (Random factoid lodged in my brain)

fbu 17y ago
20 April 1889 Well done, Sir !

KirinDave 17y ago

Is the article trying to suggest this is fair use under parody, at the end? Seems like it wasn't really qualifying. Taking 5 minutes wholesale out of a movie and overlaying text is a tough sell for "parody", which typically involves shorter duration. I hope someone challenges this ruling. It'd be interesting to see if we can expand what parody is.

smallblacksun 17y ago
Artists like Weird Al use entire songs for parody, so I don't think a 5 minute clip would be too long.
- InclinedPlane 17y ago
  Artists like Weird Al get permission from the original artists, they also don't use any original material, typically. For what it's worth.
  - ywgdana 17y ago
    Although they aren't legally required to. Al does it as a courtesy. He specifically gets permission from the artist now, because when he did Amish Paradise he'd received an okay from Coolio's label, but later learned Coolio himself was upset about the parody.
hugh3 17y ago
I think what prevents this from being "parody" is that the thing being copied is not the thing being parodied. A "Downfall" parody video about Star Trek isn't a parody of Downfall, it's a parody of Star Trek, or maybe a parody of Star Trek fans. Similarly, when Weird Al Yankovic ripped off Nirvana to make fun of Nirvana he didn't need to get permission to do so, but when he ripped off American Pie to make fun of Star Wars Episode 1 he did. (For the record, Weird Al nowadays always gets permission from the original artist anyway.)
mikecane 17y ago
See, the thing is, I don't know German, so how can it really be a theft of the movie if the original English subtitles aren't there for me to understand it? Doesn't comprehensibility figure into this at all?

joshu 17y ago

So this is basically the DMCA protecting us from an unfunny copypasta meme? Awesome.

shalmanese 17y ago

I always wonder what the hidden backstory is behind these kind of things. Is it: a) They were not aware of the downfall stuff on youtube until this point and, when they discovered it, they were horrified and promptly removed them b) They were aware from the beginning and hated it from the beginning and it's taken them 2 or 3 years to work through the process of taking them down c) They were aware from the beginning and they loved/tolerated it but something changed their mind recently and now they want them removed d) It's not actually the film company filing the notices but some elaborate 4chan troll e) something else There are no boring hypotheses that I can think of. Every hypothesis has something weird associated with it so I'm really curious which it ends up being.

BoppreH 17y ago
It seems the videos were removed automatically. Maybe only now Youtube's software caught that up and the producers forgot to tell that they want to keep the videos. But that's just a wild guess on how things work there.
- arantius 17y ago
  http://www.google.com/support/youtube/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=83766 http://www.google.com/support/youtube/bin/answer.py?hl=en&#3... Specifically: What happens when Content ID identifies a match? If Content ID identifies a match between a user upload and material in the reference library, it applies the usage policy designated by the content owner. The usage policy tells the system what to do with the video. So, I'd highly suspect that just now the content owner set the policy. I can't believe that the filter is multiple years out of date, and just now catching up. They wouldn't all be flagged at once, if the processing was that slow.

deleted 17y ago

[deleted]

dacort 17y ago

Wonder how quickly somebody is going to create one about the downfall of the downfall meme...

BoppreH 17y ago
Bam. It's already here. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5fAQKa8rU_4 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5fAQKa8rU_4

metamemetics 17y ago

There are some copies of the popular ones with less views still up. This was the best one IMO: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lUjaW4ZtdN0 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lUjaW4ZtdN0

pw0ncakes 17y ago

Das ist ein nukular buttfail. The "meme" is a major advertisement for the film, and free for them. I know a lot of people who have rented or seen Der Untergang whose first exposure to the film's existence was the Hitler spoofs. It's not my fault that the media corporations can't figure out a way to make money off the new distribution mechanisms.