9 ms·

As you might know, this is related to the disastrous EU copyright reform directive proposal that would mandate such filters put in place everywhere. Please don'

As you might know, this is related to the disastrous EU copyright reform directive proposal that would mandate such filters put in place everywhere. Please don't be complacent, it's very important to do something about this. At risk of repeating my comment[0] from 3 days ago, I'd like to appeal to you to contact the MEPs that will vote on Wednesday in the EU's JURI committee. This was the first time I called politicians' offices to voice my opinion. The assistants were shocked that a private person actually bothered to do so and seemed quite humbled - I could hear the change in the tone of their voice when they realised an ordinary citizen is calling. I think it's a lot more effective than the 1000s of e-mails piling up in their spam folders. Please help out to make sure this directive proposal is voted against on Wednesday by the majority of the JURI committee. List of Twitter handles of reportedly yet undecided MEPs: @jbergeronmep @1PavelSvoboda @FrancisZD @KaufmannSylvia @mcboutonnetfn @rohde_jens @marinhopintoeu @mady_delvaux @emil_radev [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17320122 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17320122

pitaj 8y ago
According to some, YouTube's copyright filters / markers aren't good enough to satisfy the EU directive. It's insane. The DMCA is bad enough already. Copyright should be loosened, not tightened. Then maybe we'd see some competition in video hosting.
- avs733 8y ago
  I've always felt like false assertion of copyright should cause the loss of copyright. Seems like a fair balance for me. And before someone gets on me...I realize that these are automated filters that are rarely asserted by the actual copyright holder.
  - ben_w 8y ago
    I agree with the sentiment, but I think in practice that would lead to something like patent trolls — organizations designed no face no threat from the normal consequences. Plain old money based fines should work. Even a tiny fixed fee of $50 per error might be enough, given the scale of the internet.
    - adjkant 8y ago
      I really like the per error idea - allows for large cases to have no barrier to contest but for the whole thing to not become like patent trolling. Maybe also some sort of threshold for mass cases, like a progressive taxation: If you're right 95% of the time, you get a discount. If you're wrong 50% of the time, you pay the full fee. Who would be in charge of setting these?
      - tylll 8y ago
        https://bit.ly/2JTdt8x https://bit.ly/2JTdt8x
      - glenneroo 8y ago
        Or what about a system like they use in Finland to deal with speeding tickets - the fine is based on your income. The local paper has a weekly list of top offenders, which is amusing to say the least.
        scroogly 8y ago
        Sorry to hijack the thread slightly, but is only to introduce some visibility to the fact that this particular issue is nothing to do with the EU, or content ID, or anything like that. Google is blackmailing the Blender foundation to try and get them to enable adverts. https://www.blender.org/media-exposure/youtube-blocks-blender-videos-worldwide/ https://www.blender.org/media-exposure/youtube-blocks-blende... edit - and Blender have now got https://video.blender.org/ https://video.blender.org/ in testing already. I didn't think they'd be the ideal people to issue ultimatums to on video hosting, given their technical specialities. A situation like this triggered the development of git, (after the licence to use bitkeeper was withdrawn from the linux kernel team) so I will be watching the fallout with interest.
        hknd 8y ago
        Apparently Blender had more than 2 years to sign an updated contract - a contract which every partner had to sign to comply with updated legal regulations. Their existing contract would not work anymore (legal reasons?). The Blender team never did that, and also never reacted to any youtube support mails.
  - larkeith 8y ago
    Or for a minimum starting point, the accusers should be obligated to compensate the victims for lost profits, as well as time cost. The current system of penalty-free reckless false assertions is insane.
  - taneq 8y ago
    > I've always felt like false assertion of copyright should cause the loss of copyright. Which copyright should be lost, if the assertion was false?
    - josephcooney 8y ago
      I'm guessing here, but if you claim that work Y infringes your copyright of X. If it turns out to be false you lose copyright of X.
    - colordrops 8y ago
      The one that is falsely being infringed upon.
  - garmaine 8y ago
    > I've always felt like false assertion of copyright should cause the loss of copyright. Seems like a fair balance for me. I don’t understand. I put out a takedown request for something I don’t have the copyrights to and as a result the real copyright holder loses their copyright? How is that fair?
    - avs733 8y ago
      I hold copyright on the song "I OWN THE COPYRIGHT ON THIS SONG" You use my song in a fair use way I claim you are infringing my copyright you challenge, I fail to prove my case I lose copyright on the song and it enters the public domain.
      - barrkel 8y ago
        No, that's not what's being argued will happen. I own the copyright on the song X. Person A uses the song X in a fair use way. Person B claims A is infringing. Person A challenges and wins. Then I lose my copyright, without any involvement?
        henrikeh 8y ago
        You are replying to the person who proposed the “lose copyright” idea.
        barrkel 8y ago
        That's exactly right. The person repeated the concept, in a comment dated later than the other replies to the original; I tried to clarify why it wouldn't work.
        detaro 8y ago
        Why would you lose your copyright in that case? Person B loses their (non-existent) copyright to the song. This would only fail if it'd be literally "all copyright on song X gets wiped, without looking at who owns it", which as you pointed out is obviously a non-workable interpretation of the proposal.
  - mrmr1993 8y ago
    The complexity here is that there are multiple parties involved: the copyright holder, who suspects there may have been an infringement; the uploader of the potentially infringing content; and the host, who wants as little to do with copyright claims as they can. The DMCA strikes a balance for the copyright holder and the host, by letting the host avoid any liability for the copyright infringement, as long as they enforce valid requests by no longer hosting the content. The new EU law builds on this principle, giving hosts more responsibility to check whether copyright might be being infringed. I'm strongle against the idea, but I can see the logic that the host is best-placed to actively monitor all uploaded content. A big issue I have, both with the DMCA and this new legislation, is that there's no balancing in the direction of the uploader. Aggressive solutions like your proposal do address this imbalance, but they don't do anything to address the actual concerns each side has. If we want more reasonable copyright laws in this arena going forward, we should also be pushing for an uploader's right to appeal, as a balance against the rights of and affordances for the other two parties: * There should be an 'appeals'/'counterclaim' process for content uploaders to take responsibility for the content. Presumably, to balance against the copyright holder's needs, they should submit their name and address when they claim that their content is non-infringing. * From the host's side, the uploader following this process should remove all responsibility for that content from them, so they have no concern about liability and can re-enable access to the content. * From the copyright holder's side, they need to be able to seek recourse if they still think the content is infringing. This can be done by taking the uploader to court, using the details they have provided. I desperately hope this new legislation fails, but I think you were spot-on about aiming for a 'fair balance', and even acheiving that would be a great improvement.
    - AlanSE 8y ago
      I don't think your proposal would do anything to reduce the rates of false negatives, because there's no incentive to avoid them. Many false negatives will never get identified in the first place, because if a side-project pedestrian creator wasn't going to make any money off a creative work, why would they expose themselves to a possible court summons?
      - 8y ago
  - stcredzero 8y ago
    I've always felt like false assertion of copyright should cause the loss of copyright. Seems like a fair balance for me. I'd say that a pattern of such behavior should trigger a penalty. It's not a single claim that's the problem. It's patterns of such claims en masse.
- catach 8y ago
  Video competition certainly exists already [0]. But I agree that copyright terms are trending in the wrong direction. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_video_hosting_services https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_video_hosting_services
- eulers__number 8y ago
  what are you talking about copy right needs to be abolished
- shados 8y ago
  Yeah, things like this will have similar effects as certain highly regulated sectors in the US, where software is 20 years behind the time and built for billions of dollars by huge contracting firms because it's so difficult/expensive to make anything compliant with the rules. No one can build filters that are good enough beyond the big tech cos. They can build these libraries and hopefully open source them for everyone to use...but if they don't...
  - vetinari 8y ago
    > No one can build filters that are good enough beyond the big tech cos. They can build these libraries and hopefully open source them for everyone to use...but if they don't... It is backwards: nothing but whatever can be build by big tech companies is good enough, because their lobbying and interests define what's good enough. It's also obvious, why it wouldn't get open-sourced then. Kicking the ladder and so on.
zyxzevn 8y ago
I hope Google & Youtube will troll the EU and block all official state content for a while, until they see that this law is not working.
- test6554 8y ago
  Google and YouTube have a more than $60 million solution in place that everyone hates. But that is more than potential competitors have. If it passes, they will surely benefit.
  - toomanybeersies 8y ago
    There's a parallel in the tobacco industry of how seemingly harmful policies are actually beneficial for certain parties. Philip Morris, the manufacturers of Marlboro cigarettes, lobbied in favour of laws restricting tobacco advertising. The logic behind this is that they have such strong brand name recognition, if tobacco advertising was banned they'd cement their position as the market leader, as there would be no way for other brands to gain market awareness.
    - ehecatl 8y ago
      I had never thought of that. That's cynical genius of the highest order. AND they get to play the moral high-ground card of "seriously, we're sorry! We're on your side-- look at what we're doing to help!"
      - Wofiel 8y ago
        When tobacco advertising was banned from TV, literally all tobacco companies profited. It was a classic example of game theory - If one of them advertised, they all needed to advertise to keep up, but if none of them do (or were unable to because of regulations), they all profit because people were still buying tobacco.
        golergka 8y ago
Tenoke 8y ago
Thanks for this - I wouldn't have gotten involved, but I believe I have a much higher chance to influence policy in this case than I've ever had after seeing Emil Radev's name, and I've now done everything in my power to sway him.
cowpig 8y ago
Would you mind linking to some information about what the proposal is, why it's bad, what the alternatives are, etc?
- rando444 8y ago
  https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2018/06/internet-luminaries-ring-alarm-eu-copyright-filtering-proposal https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2018/06/internet-luminaries-ri...
- QasimK 8y ago
  https://juliareda.eu/eu-copyright-reform/ https://juliareda.eu/eu-copyright-reform/
- dwheeler 8y ago
  Here are some additional links about it, esp. article 13. It demonstrates a dreadful lack of understanding of the follow-on consequences: https://boingboing.net/2018/06/07/thanks-axel-voss.html https://boingboing.net/2018/06/07/thanks-axel-voss.html http://www.wired.co.uk/article/eu-meme-war-article-13-regulation http://www.wired.co.uk/article/eu-meme-war-article-13-regula... http://melonfarmers.co.uk/eu.htm http://melonfarmers.co.uk/eu.htm http://www.alphr.com/politics/1009470/article-13-EU-what-is-it-copyright http://www.alphr.com/politics/1009470/article-13-EU-what-is-...
  - kartan 8y ago
    > The Article stipulates that platforms should “prevent the availability” of protected works, suggesting these ISSPs will need to adopt technology that can recognise and filter work created by someone other than the person uploading it. But there is no requirement that at the same time protects fair use. To remove content just in case has no negative consequences. > Article 13 is “incompatible with the guarantee of fundamental rights and freedoms and the obligation to strike a fair balance between all rights and freedoms involved” This looks like a one-sided law. It takes into account "authors rights", you can read it as big media conglomerates financial interests, over any other consideration. This is an example of a law that puts some companies profit over any social consideration and will impact EU socially and economically in a negative way.
piokoch 8y ago
That might help, however, for some reason I don't understand, this proposal hasn't created an outrage similar to the one we had seen before ACTA. EU "wisely" has chosen voting time to be in the middle of FIFA Soccer World Cup, so many people are just sitting watching matches. This is also almost the beginning of the holiday season and many people are just relaxing, travelling, etc. Apparently someone really needs that regulation to go through (hopefully it will not).
- TeMPOraL 8y ago
  SOPA / ACTA happened in parallel with FBI shutting down Megavideo - a place where a lot of "illicit" streaming services offloaded the content to. Basically, a lot of people lost the free TV they were used to. The events were unrelated, but I remember them being widely seen by regular people as the shape of things to come. Take away people's TV for some bullshit reason again, and they'll go to the streets.
akavel 8y ago
Thanks for your post and report; it made me think that my voice could actually make a difference and I just called, using the Mozilla tool! I got to speak with an actual person and in my native language. The guy seemed to know what's their stance and not to will discussing it, but he for sure mentioned taking note that they got some 6000 emails and also many phones. Anyway, I'm super happy I phoned, I talked with a real person, and the Mozilla website was super easy to use :)
tylll 8y ago
check link https://bit.ly/2JTdt8x https://bit.ly/2JTdt8x

pitaj 8y ago

According to some, YouTube's copyright filters / markers aren't good enough to satisfy the EU directive. It's insane. The DMCA is bad enough already. Copyright should be loosened, not tightened. Then maybe we'd see some competition in video hosting.

avs733 8y ago
I've always felt like false assertion of copyright should cause the loss of copyright. Seems like a fair balance for me. And before someone gets on me...I realize that these are automated filters that are rarely asserted by the actual copyright holder.
- ben_w 8y ago
  I agree with the sentiment, but I think in practice that would lead to something like patent trolls — organizations designed no face no threat from the normal consequences. Plain old money based fines should work. Even a tiny fixed fee of $50 per error might be enough, given the scale of the internet.
  - adjkant 8y ago
    I really like the per error idea - allows for large cases to have no barrier to contest but for the whole thing to not become like patent trolling. Maybe also some sort of threshold for mass cases, like a progressive taxation: If you're right 95% of the time, you get a discount. If you're wrong 50% of the time, you pay the full fee. Who would be in charge of setting these?
    - tylll 8y ago
      https://bit.ly/2JTdt8x https://bit.ly/2JTdt8x
    - glenneroo 8y ago
      Or what about a system like they use in Finland to deal with speeding tickets - the fine is based on your income. The local paper has a weekly list of top offenders, which is amusing to say the least.
      - scroogly 8y ago
        Sorry to hijack the thread slightly, but is only to introduce some visibility to the fact that this particular issue is nothing to do with the EU, or content ID, or anything like that. Google is blackmailing the Blender foundation to try and get them to enable adverts. https://www.blender.org/media-exposure/youtube-blocks-blender-videos-worldwide/ https://www.blender.org/media-exposure/youtube-blocks-blende... edit - and Blender have now got https://video.blender.org/ https://video.blender.org/ in testing already. I didn't think they'd be the ideal people to issue ultimatums to on video hosting, given their technical specialities. A situation like this triggered the development of git, (after the licence to use bitkeeper was withdrawn from the linux kernel team) so I will be watching the fallout with interest.
        hknd 8y ago
        Apparently Blender had more than 2 years to sign an updated contract - a contract which every partner had to sign to comply with updated legal regulations. Their existing contract would not work anymore (legal reasons?). The Blender team never did that, and also never reacted to any youtube support mails.
- larkeith 8y ago
  Or for a minimum starting point, the accusers should be obligated to compensate the victims for lost profits, as well as time cost. The current system of penalty-free reckless false assertions is insane.
- taneq 8y ago
  > I've always felt like false assertion of copyright should cause the loss of copyright. Which copyright should be lost, if the assertion was false?
  - josephcooney 8y ago
    I'm guessing here, but if you claim that work Y infringes your copyright of X. If it turns out to be false you lose copyright of X.
  - colordrops 8y ago
    The one that is falsely being infringed upon.
- garmaine 8y ago
  > I've always felt like false assertion of copyright should cause the loss of copyright. Seems like a fair balance for me. I don’t understand. I put out a takedown request for something I don’t have the copyrights to and as a result the real copyright holder loses their copyright? How is that fair?
  - avs733 8y ago
    I hold copyright on the song "I OWN THE COPYRIGHT ON THIS SONG" You use my song in a fair use way I claim you are infringing my copyright you challenge, I fail to prove my case I lose copyright on the song and it enters the public domain.
    - barrkel 8y ago
      No, that's not what's being argued will happen. I own the copyright on the song X. Person A uses the song X in a fair use way. Person B claims A is infringing. Person A challenges and wins. Then I lose my copyright, without any involvement?
      - henrikeh 8y ago
        You are replying to the person who proposed the “lose copyright” idea.
        barrkel 8y ago
        That's exactly right. The person repeated the concept, in a comment dated later than the other replies to the original; I tried to clarify why it wouldn't work.
      - detaro 8y ago
        Why would you lose your copyright in that case? Person B loses their (non-existent) copyright to the song. This would only fail if it'd be literally "all copyright on song X gets wiped, without looking at who owns it", which as you pointed out is obviously a non-workable interpretation of the proposal.
- mrmr1993 8y ago
  The complexity here is that there are multiple parties involved: the copyright holder, who suspects there may have been an infringement; the uploader of the potentially infringing content; and the host, who wants as little to do with copyright claims as they can. The DMCA strikes a balance for the copyright holder and the host, by letting the host avoid any liability for the copyright infringement, as long as they enforce valid requests by no longer hosting the content. The new EU law builds on this principle, giving hosts more responsibility to check whether copyright might be being infringed. I'm strongle against the idea, but I can see the logic that the host is best-placed to actively monitor all uploaded content. A big issue I have, both with the DMCA and this new legislation, is that there's no balancing in the direction of the uploader. Aggressive solutions like your proposal do address this imbalance, but they don't do anything to address the actual concerns each side has. If we want more reasonable copyright laws in this arena going forward, we should also be pushing for an uploader's right to appeal, as a balance against the rights of and affordances for the other two parties: * There should be an 'appeals'/'counterclaim' process for content uploaders to take responsibility for the content. Presumably, to balance against the copyright holder's needs, they should submit their name and address when they claim that their content is non-infringing. * From the host's side, the uploader following this process should remove all responsibility for that content from them, so they have no concern about liability and can re-enable access to the content. * From the copyright holder's side, they need to be able to seek recourse if they still think the content is infringing. This can be done by taking the uploader to court, using the details they have provided. I desperately hope this new legislation fails, but I think you were spot-on about aiming for a 'fair balance', and even acheiving that would be a great improvement.
  - AlanSE 8y ago
    I don't think your proposal would do anything to reduce the rates of false negatives, because there's no incentive to avoid them. Many false negatives will never get identified in the first place, because if a side-project pedestrian creator wasn't going to make any money off a creative work, why would they expose themselves to a possible court summons?
    - 8y ago
- stcredzero 8y ago
  I've always felt like false assertion of copyright should cause the loss of copyright. Seems like a fair balance for me. I'd say that a pattern of such behavior should trigger a penalty. It's not a single claim that's the problem. It's patterns of such claims en masse.
catach 8y ago
Video competition certainly exists already [0]. But I agree that copyright terms are trending in the wrong direction. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_video_hosting_services https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_video_hosting_services
eulers__number 8y ago
what are you talking about copy right needs to be abolished
shados 8y ago
Yeah, things like this will have similar effects as certain highly regulated sectors in the US, where software is 20 years behind the time and built for billions of dollars by huge contracting firms because it's so difficult/expensive to make anything compliant with the rules. No one can build filters that are good enough beyond the big tech cos. They can build these libraries and hopefully open source them for everyone to use...but if they don't...
- vetinari 8y ago
  > No one can build filters that are good enough beyond the big tech cos. They can build these libraries and hopefully open source them for everyone to use...but if they don't... It is backwards: nothing but whatever can be build by big tech companies is good enough, because their lobbying and interests define what's good enough. It's also obvious, why it wouldn't get open-sourced then. Kicking the ladder and so on.

zyxzevn 8y ago

I hope Google & Youtube will troll the EU and block all official state content for a while, until they see that this law is not working.

test6554 8y ago
Google and YouTube have a more than $60 million solution in place that everyone hates. But that is more than potential competitors have. If it passes, they will surely benefit.
- toomanybeersies 8y ago
  There's a parallel in the tobacco industry of how seemingly harmful policies are actually beneficial for certain parties. Philip Morris, the manufacturers of Marlboro cigarettes, lobbied in favour of laws restricting tobacco advertising. The logic behind this is that they have such strong brand name recognition, if tobacco advertising was banned they'd cement their position as the market leader, as there would be no way for other brands to gain market awareness.
  - ehecatl 8y ago
    I had never thought of that. That's cynical genius of the highest order. AND they get to play the moral high-ground card of "seriously, we're sorry! We're on your side-- look at what we're doing to help!"
    - Wofiel 8y ago
      When tobacco advertising was banned from TV, literally all tobacco companies profited. It was a classic example of game theory - If one of them advertised, they all needed to advertise to keep up, but if none of them do (or were unable to because of regulations), they all profit because people were still buying tobacco.
      - golergka 8y ago

Tenoke 8y ago

Thanks for this - I wouldn't have gotten involved, but I believe I have a much higher chance to influence policy in this case than I've ever had after seeing Emil Radev's name, and I've now done everything in my power to sway him.

cowpig 8y ago

Would you mind linking to some information about what the proposal is, why it's bad, what the alternatives are, etc?

rando444 8y ago
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2018/06/internet-luminaries-ring-alarm-eu-copyright-filtering-proposal https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2018/06/internet-luminaries-ri...
QasimK 8y ago
https://juliareda.eu/eu-copyright-reform/ https://juliareda.eu/eu-copyright-reform/
dwheeler 8y ago
Here are some additional links about it, esp. article 13. It demonstrates a dreadful lack of understanding of the follow-on consequences: https://boingboing.net/2018/06/07/thanks-axel-voss.html https://boingboing.net/2018/06/07/thanks-axel-voss.html http://www.wired.co.uk/article/eu-meme-war-article-13-regulation http://www.wired.co.uk/article/eu-meme-war-article-13-regula... http://melonfarmers.co.uk/eu.htm http://melonfarmers.co.uk/eu.htm http://www.alphr.com/politics/1009470/article-13-EU-what-is-it-copyright http://www.alphr.com/politics/1009470/article-13-EU-what-is-...
- kartan 8y ago
  > The Article stipulates that platforms should “prevent the availability” of protected works, suggesting these ISSPs will need to adopt technology that can recognise and filter work created by someone other than the person uploading it. But there is no requirement that at the same time protects fair use. To remove content just in case has no negative consequences. > Article 13 is “incompatible with the guarantee of fundamental rights and freedoms and the obligation to strike a fair balance between all rights and freedoms involved” This looks like a one-sided law. It takes into account "authors rights", you can read it as big media conglomerates financial interests, over any other consideration. This is an example of a law that puts some companies profit over any social consideration and will impact EU socially and economically in a negative way.

piokoch 8y ago

That might help, however, for some reason I don't understand, this proposal hasn't created an outrage similar to the one we had seen before ACTA. EU "wisely" has chosen voting time to be in the middle of FIFA Soccer World Cup, so many people are just sitting watching matches. This is also almost the beginning of the holiday season and many people are just relaxing, travelling, etc. Apparently someone really needs that regulation to go through (hopefully it will not).

TeMPOraL 8y ago
SOPA / ACTA happened in parallel with FBI shutting down Megavideo - a place where a lot of "illicit" streaming services offloaded the content to. Basically, a lot of people lost the free TV they were used to. The events were unrelated, but I remember them being widely seen by regular people as the shape of things to come. Take away people's TV for some bullshit reason again, and they'll go to the streets.

akavel 8y ago

Thanks for your post and report; it made me think that my voice could actually make a difference and I just called, using the Mozilla tool! I got to speak with an actual person and in my native language. The guy seemed to know what's their stance and not to will discussing it, but he for sure mentioned taking note that they got some 6000 emails and also many phones. Anyway, I'm super happy I phoned, I talked with a real person, and the Mozilla website was super easy to use :)

tylll 8y ago

check link https://bit.ly/2JTdt8x https://bit.ly/2JTdt8x