6 ms·

I am pretty sure this amounts to fraud on the part of Rumblefish.

andrewljohnson 15y ago
I - you the person, you the lawyer? pretty sure - just guessing, sure from some other knowledge, or just misusing words? fraud - like, they have committed a crime in some jurisdiction? I am pretty sure this amounts to uninformed speculation.
- ubernostrum 15y ago
  Well, "fraud" in non-legal English is generally taken to mean false or deceiving statements. And falsely claiming to hold rights one does not hold is, well, a false and/or deceiving statement. Though in the realm of copyright, "slander of title" might be the more appropriate phrase.
bo1024 15y ago
Not if it's anything like the Megaupload controversy recently. Here's the loophole. Your EULA with YouTube states that YouTube may take down your videos for any reason. YouTube also has a side deal with certain large rightsholders that they may take down videos at any time for any reason.[1] It is implied that these takedowns will be only for DMCA purposes, but since the companies never have to officially file a DMCA notice, there are never any legal repercussions for false takedowns. Nice, eh? [1] (Edit) Well, they are only supposed to take down videos for good reason, but we haven't seen YouTube enforce that. Either way, this is between YouTube and the rightsholders; the DMCA doesn't get involved.
- jemfinch 15y ago
  Do you have any links to substantiate your claims? I'd be interested in reading the background.
  - bo1024 15y ago
    Here's a few news articles. As I understand it, the only way UMG would be in legal trouble is if they violated their contract with YouTube -- that is, they promised YouTube to only take down stuff they had the rights to. So the only enforcement here is if YouTube decides to sue UMG for breach of contract. (Which I wouldn't hold my breath on.) Either way, the DMCA never gets involved because they never had to file a DMCA notice to take down YouTube content. http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/12/umg-we-have-the-right-to-block-or-remove-youtube-videos.ars http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/12/umg-we-have-... http://thenextweb.com/insider/2011/12/16/youtube-denies-that-universal-music-had-rights-to-attempt-removal-of-megauploads-video/ http://thenextweb.com/insider/2011/12/16/youtube-denies-that... http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20111216/01463417102/explanation-why-umg-may-be-right-that-it-can-pull-down-megauploads-video.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20111216/01463417102/explan... http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/thr-esq/megaupload-viral-music-video-youtube-274659 http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/thr-esq/megaupload-viral-mu...
    - reader5000 15y ago
      I'm not a lawyer but I know contract law does sometimes recognize third-party rights. Not sure if would be applicable here.
    - ubernostrum 15y ago
      Copyright law does have the tort of slander of title; if Rumblefish's actions are interpreted by a court as claiming rights Rumblefish does not have, that could be a quite serious issue separate from anything YouTube has in a contract or EULA.
      - bo1024 15y ago
        Ok, cool. How does that work? The original author sues in civil court? And what do we mean by "quite serious"?
        wtallis 15y ago
- pbhjpbhj 15y ago
  >Your EULA with YouTube states that YouTube may take down your videos for any reason. // Shouldn’t this prevent YouTube from relying on the common carrier defence - they're are clearly manipulating and policing the content [to benefit their commercial interests] and not acting as a common carrier. What troubles me more is that they're somehow allowed to deny individuals their copyrights - they're putting other peoples advertising next to your content presumably without waiting for it to be acceded to. They should surely, to keep lawful, take down dubious content until the ownership of rights has been resolved. In some jurisdictions I'd have thought that they couldn't add a EULA that would allow them to use third-party copyright material without explicit permission. That is when a corp claims your uploaded material and YouTube simply decide to add ads for that corp and send earnings to that same corp then this should (and I contend probably is in some places where YouTube are operating) be unlawful. In short: Google are actively infringing copyright. Is a EULA statement really sufficient to make this lawful?
epoxyhockey 15y ago
I would love it if Google would revoke Rumblefish's earnings/account in the same fashion that they revoke mom & pop AdSense publishers, like: "Your account has been terminated. All of your earnings have been returned to the advertisers. There is no appeal. Goodbye." Seriously, Rumblefish's behavior reminds me of a certain CEO I used to work for. The guy would rip off just about anyone he could (including his employees) by exploiting loopholes. Some of the exploits worked, others didn't. But, he would hold out a carrot just far enough to avoid a critical mass of lawsuits.
- beedogs 15y ago
  This happened to a friend of mine with no warning and no explanation. He appealed and was soundly rejected, again with no explanation. He ran a nutrition blog and created all of the content himself. Google's business model seems to involve fucking over anyone who can't sue them.
  - brazzy 15y ago
    How does Google profit from return revenues to advertisers? Google's business model is reducing overheads in business processes in order to scale them down to the point where anyone can use them. This involves eliminating human participation from their side as much as possible.
    - davidw 15y ago
      > How does Google profit from return revenues to advertisers? "By keeping on their good side" would be my stab at that one. If the advertisers trust Google to take their side, they're more likely to spend money. Nothing particularly 'evil' about that or anything, just how it works.
  - mistercow 15y ago
    Something similar happened to me years ago. They accused me of "click fraud". All I can figure is that a disgruntled reader decided to click repeatedly on my ads to get me in trouble. There really isn't an appeal process. You email them asking for details, and they reply with form letters.
Alex3917 15y ago
Why? Birdsongs are actually copywritable music, and since they all sound fairly similar it's certainly possible that the software confused his recording with something from the Cornell lab of ornithology, which licenses their bird recordings to Hollywood, toy makers, musicians, etc.
- deleted 15y ago
  [deleted]
- sp332 15y ago
  since they all sound fairly similar That's not how copyright works. If you make an original work, it can be identical to a copyrighted work and not be infringing. It's only a problem if you make your work from the copyrighted one.
  - bigiain 15y ago
    I suspect Cornell do have mechanical copyright in some recordings of birdsongs - which'd allow them to charge royalties on anybody using copies of the recordings they made, but there'd be no composer or performer to own the actual "song". (Sort of like how you can't claim copyright in every photo of a sunrise just 'cause you took one, but you do have rights with regards to the particular sunrise photograph you shot.)
    - stwe 15y ago
      In GB the copyright definition apparently includes the mere idea of a photograph: http://www.amateurphotographer.co.uk/news/photographers_face_copyright_threat_after_shock_ruling__news_311191.html http://www.amateurphotographer.co.uk/news/photographers_face...
      - GFischer 15y ago
        In the U.S. as well. "Infringement of Copyrighted Photographs Under U.S. Copyright law, you violate the copyright owner's exclusive rights of copying and/or to create a derivative work by creating a work that is a copy of or "substantially similar" to another's. The courts determine whether the two works are substantially similar by comparing them and evaluating whether copyrightable elements have been used in the second work. A court is much more likely to find an infringement if the subject of the photo has been "set up" by the photographer and contains creative and original elements, compared to a photograph of subjects that already exist, such as in nature or a structure such as the Golden Gate Bridge." http://www.photoattorney.com/2008/11/does-derivative-work-violate-your.html http://www.photoattorney.com/2008/11/does-derivative-work-vi... The case you quote is not so easy, though. The tough decision is if New English Teas intended to violate copyright, and if the Red Bus photos were original enough to claim copyright. The judge decided that the Red Bus photos were original enough (creator claimed 80 hours of work), and New English Teas had used the original photos earlier on, and was made to remove them, so there was clearly intent to violate copyright. However, I'm not so sure if the Red Bus photos were original enough, or if there was intent to mislead buyers into thinking the New English Teas were Red Bus licensed.
nivloc 15y ago
Having seen the video (the ads are gone now, btw), it's pretty clear that no reasonable human watched it, because they'd certainly be misrepresenting ownership of the content. 'Misrepresentation of ownership causing damage to another party or benefit for oneself' is generally fraud (criminal too), but intent tends to be weighted far more than status. That said, the test is usually a good faith belief that one is the legitimate owner, and I don't know of many bots with that sort of discretion.

I - you the person, you the lawyer? pretty sure - just guessing, sure from some other knowledge, or just misusing words? fraud - like, they have committed a crime in some jurisdiction? I am pretty sure this amounts to uninformed speculation.

ubernostrum 15y ago
Well, "fraud" in non-legal English is generally taken to mean false or deceiving statements. And falsely claiming to hold rights one does not hold is, well, a false and/or deceiving statement. Though in the realm of copyright, "slander of title" might be the more appropriate phrase.

bo1024 15y ago

Not if it's anything like the Megaupload controversy recently. Here's the loophole. Your EULA with YouTube states that YouTube may take down your videos for any reason. YouTube also has a side deal with certain large rightsholders that they may take down videos at any time for any reason.[1] It is implied that these takedowns will be only for DMCA purposes, but since the companies never have to officially file a DMCA notice, there are never any legal repercussions for false takedowns. Nice, eh? [1] (Edit) Well, they are only supposed to take down videos for good reason, but we haven't seen YouTube enforce that. Either way, this is between YouTube and the rightsholders; the DMCA doesn't get involved.

jemfinch 15y ago
Do you have any links to substantiate your claims? I'd be interested in reading the background.
- bo1024 15y ago
  Here's a few news articles. As I understand it, the only way UMG would be in legal trouble is if they violated their contract with YouTube -- that is, they promised YouTube to only take down stuff they had the rights to. So the only enforcement here is if YouTube decides to sue UMG for breach of contract. (Which I wouldn't hold my breath on.) Either way, the DMCA never gets involved because they never had to file a DMCA notice to take down YouTube content. http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/12/umg-we-have-the-right-to-block-or-remove-youtube-videos.ars http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/12/umg-we-have-... http://thenextweb.com/insider/2011/12/16/youtube-denies-that-universal-music-had-rights-to-attempt-removal-of-megauploads-video/ http://thenextweb.com/insider/2011/12/16/youtube-denies-that... http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20111216/01463417102/explanation-why-umg-may-be-right-that-it-can-pull-down-megauploads-video.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20111216/01463417102/explan... http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/thr-esq/megaupload-viral-music-video-youtube-274659 http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/thr-esq/megaupload-viral-mu...
  - reader5000 15y ago
    I'm not a lawyer but I know contract law does sometimes recognize third-party rights. Not sure if would be applicable here.
  - ubernostrum 15y ago
    Copyright law does have the tort of slander of title; if Rumblefish's actions are interpreted by a court as claiming rights Rumblefish does not have, that could be a quite serious issue separate from anything YouTube has in a contract or EULA.
    - bo1024 15y ago
      Ok, cool. How does that work? The original author sues in civil court? And what do we mean by "quite serious"?
      - wtallis 15y ago
pbhjpbhj 15y ago
>Your EULA with YouTube states that YouTube may take down your videos for any reason. // Shouldn’t this prevent YouTube from relying on the common carrier defence - they're are clearly manipulating and policing the content [to benefit their commercial interests] and not acting as a common carrier. What troubles me more is that they're somehow allowed to deny individuals their copyrights - they're putting other peoples advertising next to your content presumably without waiting for it to be acceded to. They should surely, to keep lawful, take down dubious content until the ownership of rights has been resolved. In some jurisdictions I'd have thought that they couldn't add a EULA that would allow them to use third-party copyright material without explicit permission. That is when a corp claims your uploaded material and YouTube simply decide to add ads for that corp and send earnings to that same corp then this should (and I contend probably is in some places where YouTube are operating) be unlawful. In short: Google are actively infringing copyright. Is a EULA statement really sufficient to make this lawful?

epoxyhockey 15y ago

I would love it if Google would revoke Rumblefish's earnings/account in the same fashion that they revoke mom & pop AdSense publishers, like: "Your account has been terminated. All of your earnings have been returned to the advertisers. There is no appeal. Goodbye." Seriously, Rumblefish's behavior reminds me of a certain CEO I used to work for. The guy would rip off just about anyone he could (including his employees) by exploiting loopholes. Some of the exploits worked, others didn't. But, he would hold out a carrot just far enough to avoid a critical mass of lawsuits.

beedogs 15y ago
This happened to a friend of mine with no warning and no explanation. He appealed and was soundly rejected, again with no explanation. He ran a nutrition blog and created all of the content himself. Google's business model seems to involve fucking over anyone who can't sue them.
- brazzy 15y ago
  How does Google profit from return revenues to advertisers? Google's business model is reducing overheads in business processes in order to scale them down to the point where anyone can use them. This involves eliminating human participation from their side as much as possible.
  - davidw 15y ago
    > How does Google profit from return revenues to advertisers? "By keeping on their good side" would be my stab at that one. If the advertisers trust Google to take their side, they're more likely to spend money. Nothing particularly 'evil' about that or anything, just how it works.
- mistercow 15y ago
  Something similar happened to me years ago. They accused me of "click fraud". All I can figure is that a disgruntled reader decided to click repeatedly on my ads to get me in trouble. There really isn't an appeal process. You email them asking for details, and they reply with form letters.

Alex3917 15y ago

Why? Birdsongs are actually copywritable music, and since they all sound fairly similar it's certainly possible that the software confused his recording with something from the Cornell lab of ornithology, which licenses their bird recordings to Hollywood, toy makers, musicians, etc.

deleted 15y ago
[deleted]
sp332 15y ago
since they all sound fairly similar That's not how copyright works. If you make an original work, it can be identical to a copyrighted work and not be infringing. It's only a problem if you make your work from the copyrighted one.
- bigiain 15y ago
  I suspect Cornell do have mechanical copyright in some recordings of birdsongs - which'd allow them to charge royalties on anybody using copies of the recordings they made, but there'd be no composer or performer to own the actual "song". (Sort of like how you can't claim copyright in every photo of a sunrise just 'cause you took one, but you do have rights with regards to the particular sunrise photograph you shot.)
  - stwe 15y ago
    In GB the copyright definition apparently includes the mere idea of a photograph: http://www.amateurphotographer.co.uk/news/photographers_face_copyright_threat_after_shock_ruling__news_311191.html http://www.amateurphotographer.co.uk/news/photographers_face...
    - GFischer 15y ago
      In the U.S. as well. "Infringement of Copyrighted Photographs Under U.S. Copyright law, you violate the copyright owner's exclusive rights of copying and/or to create a derivative work by creating a work that is a copy of or "substantially similar" to another's. The courts determine whether the two works are substantially similar by comparing them and evaluating whether copyrightable elements have been used in the second work. A court is much more likely to find an infringement if the subject of the photo has been "set up" by the photographer and contains creative and original elements, compared to a photograph of subjects that already exist, such as in nature or a structure such as the Golden Gate Bridge." http://www.photoattorney.com/2008/11/does-derivative-work-violate-your.html http://www.photoattorney.com/2008/11/does-derivative-work-vi... The case you quote is not so easy, though. The tough decision is if New English Teas intended to violate copyright, and if the Red Bus photos were original enough to claim copyright. The judge decided that the Red Bus photos were original enough (creator claimed 80 hours of work), and New English Teas had used the original photos earlier on, and was made to remove them, so there was clearly intent to violate copyright. However, I'm not so sure if the Red Bus photos were original enough, or if there was intent to mislead buyers into thinking the New English Teas were Red Bus licensed.

nivloc 15y ago

Having seen the video (the ads are gone now, btw), it's pretty clear that no reasonable human watched it, because they'd certainly be misrepresenting ownership of the content. 'Misrepresentation of ownership causing damage to another party or benefit for oneself' is generally fraud (criminal too), but intent tends to be weighted far more than status. That said, the test is usually a good faith belief that one is the legitimate owner, and I don't know of many bots with that sort of discretion.