5 ms·

If 1000 big youtubers put $100/month toward an association or union of some kind, they could afford a $100,000/month legal team to combat this. Obviously, ther

If 1000 big youtubers put $100/month toward an association or union of some kind, they could afford a $100,000/month legal team to combat this. Obviously, there are more than 1000 big youtubers. The fee could be reduced and the budget increased by growing the union.

thr0wawayf00 4y ago
All it would take is Youtube randomly banning a few of said big Youtubers to really cut morale into an organized effort like this. That's precisely what makes them so powerful, they can cut you off at any moment without a legitimate excuse.
- drdrey 4y ago
  How is that in Youtube’s interest?
  - thr0wawayf00 4y ago
    Preventing their talent from organizing? Squashing unions and labor movements is as old as labor itself. Think about it: does Amazon really stand to lose everything if a warehouse full of minimum wage workers demand healthcare? No. Then why does Amazon fight it? For control, plain and simple.
    - ALittleLight 4y ago
      But YouTube is actually just hurt by the copyright trolls. YouTube's best interest would be for the trolls to be excised so real creators wouldn't get burned out and driven off.
      - thr0wawayf00 4y ago
        If this were true, they would do something about the trolls. But they're not.
        krapp 4y ago
        The only "real creators" Youtube cares about are big media companies that provide licensed first-party content and high-value professional accounts. Everyone else is at best inconsequential and at worst net negatives to the platform, as far as Google is concerned.
      - leksak 4y ago
        Yes, but if they organize around this issue they might organize around others which is easier if they're already organized.
Ansil849 4y ago
> If 1000 big youtubers put $100/month toward an association or union of some kind, they could afford a $100,000/month legal team to combat this. Millionaire youtubers can already afford high-priced lawyers if they want to, I'm not worried about that. Who I am worried about are regular people who create content but don't have large followers and don't make to it to the frontpage of HN, but still get hit by copyright trolls.
- thr0wawayf00 4y ago
  Seriously, how many versions of this very video get made that don't ever reach a broad audience? That is truly some Black Mirror s*** right there.
- PostOnce 4y ago
  Stronger men can carrier bigger guns, but no one man is stronger than an army. The rich still benefit from organization. Also, an organization may have legal standing where an individual does not, and can then deploy their lawyer-army. Where an individual has to wait for an issue to personally affect them, the organization will almost always have at least one affected member and can therefore keep up the pressure constantly, and eventually perhaps make the internet a better place.
  - xwdv 4y ago
    Guerrilla viet congs obliterated the powerful United States Army so never underestimate small arms.
    - pc86 4y ago
      What is your point? They're saying that individual, successful/rich/"powerful" YouTubers can defend themselves against these spurious claims already, but that by organizing they would be even more well equipped, at less personal cost, and also make it possible for smaller creators to also defend themselves (with even less cost). None of that has anything to do with any Vietcong analogy I can think of.
    - 4y ago
rolph 4y ago
could 100k a month be better spent on the infrastructure and tech stacking for a videohosting site?
- majormajor 4y ago
  Your new site would get hit with the same sort of claims. You're still gonna need the lawyers.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- nomel 4y ago
  Absolutely not. You should be aware that youtube wasn't profitable for over a decade. Content creators don't use youtube for its video hosting. There are dozens of video hosting sites, many objectively better. Content creators use youtube because that's where the eyeballs and advertisers are, which also means that's where the money is. And, 100k won't be enough to pay for one developer, let alone a herd of reviewers/lawyers to handle all of the DMCA noticed that will flood in, regardless. I don't see how this doesn't get solved without amendments to the DMCA, which is probably where the money should be put.
  - mlyle 4y ago
    > And, 100k won't be enough to pay for one developer, I mostly agree with you. But $100k/month will definitely pay for a developer.
    - nomel 4y ago
      Oh, my bad. I misread that as year. But still, competing with youtube would require much more than $1.2 million/year.
- amalcon 4y ago
  A few versions of that exist; Nebula is probably the biggest. There's a reason you may not have heard of it, though.
qbasic_forever 4y ago
Or Youtube could front this money. They have a requirement from the DMCA safe harbor to allow people to make these copyright claims. But that doesn't mean they have to make them easy or cost effective for trolls to abuse the system. Youtube could have a legal fund for creators to get assistance with unfair claims, and not be violating anything in the DMCA safe harbor.
brigandish 4y ago
Unions are always going to be the answer to this sort of problem. Sadly, they get a bad press because of the (seemingly) inevitable takeover by socialists. If there was some way to inoculate a collective against dogmatic collectivism, that would be great, but I'm not sure it's possible.

thr0wawayf00 4y ago

All it would take is Youtube randomly banning a few of said big Youtubers to really cut morale into an organized effort like this. That's precisely what makes them so powerful, they can cut you off at any moment without a legitimate excuse.

drdrey 4y ago
How is that in Youtube’s interest?
- thr0wawayf00 4y ago
  Preventing their talent from organizing? Squashing unions and labor movements is as old as labor itself. Think about it: does Amazon really stand to lose everything if a warehouse full of minimum wage workers demand healthcare? No. Then why does Amazon fight it? For control, plain and simple.
  - ALittleLight 4y ago
    But YouTube is actually just hurt by the copyright trolls. YouTube's best interest would be for the trolls to be excised so real creators wouldn't get burned out and driven off.
    - thr0wawayf00 4y ago
      If this were true, they would do something about the trolls. But they're not.
      - krapp 4y ago
        The only "real creators" Youtube cares about are big media companies that provide licensed first-party content and high-value professional accounts. Everyone else is at best inconsequential and at worst net negatives to the platform, as far as Google is concerned.
    - leksak 4y ago
      Yes, but if they organize around this issue they might organize around others which is easier if they're already organized.

Ansil849 4y ago

> If 1000 big youtubers put $100/month toward an association or union of some kind, they could afford a $100,000/month legal team to combat this. Millionaire youtubers can already afford high-priced lawyers if they want to, I'm not worried about that. Who I am worried about are regular people who create content but don't have large followers and don't make to it to the frontpage of HN, but still get hit by copyright trolls.

thr0wawayf00 4y ago
Seriously, how many versions of this very video get made that don't ever reach a broad audience? That is truly some Black Mirror s*** right there.
PostOnce 4y ago
Stronger men can carrier bigger guns, but no one man is stronger than an army. The rich still benefit from organization. Also, an organization may have legal standing where an individual does not, and can then deploy their lawyer-army. Where an individual has to wait for an issue to personally affect them, the organization will almost always have at least one affected member and can therefore keep up the pressure constantly, and eventually perhaps make the internet a better place.
- xwdv 4y ago
  Guerrilla viet congs obliterated the powerful United States Army so never underestimate small arms.
  - pc86 4y ago
    What is your point? They're saying that individual, successful/rich/"powerful" YouTubers can defend themselves against these spurious claims already, but that by organizing they would be even more well equipped, at less personal cost, and also make it possible for smaller creators to also defend themselves (with even less cost). None of that has anything to do with any Vietcong analogy I can think of.
  - 4y ago

rolph 4y ago

could 100k a month be better spent on the infrastructure and tech stacking for a videohosting site?

majormajor 4y ago
Your new site would get hit with the same sort of claims. You're still gonna need the lawyers.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
nomel 4y ago
Absolutely not. You should be aware that youtube wasn't profitable for over a decade. Content creators don't use youtube for its video hosting. There are dozens of video hosting sites, many objectively better. Content creators use youtube because that's where the eyeballs and advertisers are, which also means that's where the money is. And, 100k won't be enough to pay for one developer, let alone a herd of reviewers/lawyers to handle all of the DMCA noticed that will flood in, regardless. I don't see how this doesn't get solved without amendments to the DMCA, which is probably where the money should be put.
- mlyle 4y ago
  > And, 100k won't be enough to pay for one developer, I mostly agree with you. But $100k/month will definitely pay for a developer.
  - nomel 4y ago
    Oh, my bad. I misread that as year. But still, competing with youtube would require much more than $1.2 million/year.
amalcon 4y ago
A few versions of that exist; Nebula is probably the biggest. There's a reason you may not have heard of it, though.

qbasic_forever 4y ago

Or Youtube could front this money. They have a requirement from the DMCA safe harbor to allow people to make these copyright claims. But that doesn't mean they have to make them easy or cost effective for trolls to abuse the system. Youtube could have a legal fund for creators to get assistance with unfair claims, and not be violating anything in the DMCA safe harbor.

brigandish 4y ago

Unions are always going to be the answer to this sort of problem. Sadly, they get a bad press because of the (seemingly) inevitable takeover by socialists. If there was some way to inoculate a collective against dogmatic collectivism, that would be great, but I'm not sure it's possible.