4 ms·

So someone records a video of their cat, music happens to be in the background, and the video happens to go viral and become a huge hit. If they are a Youtube

So someone records a video of their cat, music happens to be in the background, and the video happens to go viral and become a huge hit. If they are a Youtube partner, and make money off the videos, they would be subject to this law, even if the music in the video was largely irrelevant.

mattdeboard 15y ago
Doesn't fall under the purview of the law as written.
- pavel_lishin 15y ago
  I haven't read the law, but how does it now? You're streaming Lady Gaga's "Born This Way" while your cat is attacking a box, it gets 100 views within six months. Clearly the song is worth more than $5000.
  - mattdeboard 15y ago
    I have read the proposed law (it's literally like 200 words long, it modifies an already-existing law), and it's because you didn't set up the stream with the explicit intent to make it a commercial enterprise. http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/BILLS-112s978is/pdf/BILLS-112s978is.pdf http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/BILLS-112s978is/pdf/BILLS-112s9...
    - sorbus 15y ago
      There doesn't appear to be anything in that about intent. Hell, you don't even need to make money off of the stream - it applies if the cost to license whatever works are being used exceeds $5000.
  - hugh3 15y ago
    OK, how would you choose to rewrite the law, in order to only target the things that the law is actually trying to target? Many arguments about intellectual property get confusing, because the folks making arguments like "this law is aimed at targeting X but theoretically could be used to target Y and hence will result in the entire population being locked up" are folks who don't actually think X should be illegal either. In this case the real targets are the folks who are quite deliberately making websites that serve copyrighted material for profit. We all know that these exist -- just type "watch [your favourite tv show] online" and about a dozen of 'em will pop up. If we assume that we want to make this illegal (I know I sure as hell wouldn't want somebody else making money off my intellectual property without my permission) then how can we rewrite this law to do that, while protecting the theoretical case where the camera accidentally pans past a television while recording a cat?
- Calamitous 15y ago
  How so?

mattdeboard 15y ago

Doesn't fall under the purview of the law as written.

pavel_lishin 15y ago
I haven't read the law, but how does it now? You're streaming Lady Gaga's "Born This Way" while your cat is attacking a box, it gets 100 views within six months. Clearly the song is worth more than $5000.
- mattdeboard 15y ago
  I have read the proposed law (it's literally like 200 words long, it modifies an already-existing law), and it's because you didn't set up the stream with the explicit intent to make it a commercial enterprise. http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/BILLS-112s978is/pdf/BILLS-112s978is.pdf http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/BILLS-112s978is/pdf/BILLS-112s9...
  - sorbus 15y ago
    There doesn't appear to be anything in that about intent. Hell, you don't even need to make money off of the stream - it applies if the cost to license whatever works are being used exceeds $5000.
- hugh3 15y ago
  OK, how would you choose to rewrite the law, in order to only target the things that the law is actually trying to target? Many arguments about intellectual property get confusing, because the folks making arguments like "this law is aimed at targeting X but theoretically could be used to target Y and hence will result in the entire population being locked up" are folks who don't actually think X should be illegal either. In this case the real targets are the folks who are quite deliberately making websites that serve copyrighted material for profit. We all know that these exist -- just type "watch [your favourite tv show] online" and about a dozen of 'em will pop up. If we assume that we want to make this illegal (I know I sure as hell wouldn't want somebody else making money off my intellectual property without my permission) then how can we rewrite this law to do that, while protecting the theoretical case where the camera accidentally pans past a television while recording a cat?
Calamitous 15y ago
How so?