Film Studios Send Takedown Notices About Takedown Notices 197
another random user sends this excerpt from the BBC:
"Two film studios have asked Google to take down links to messages sent by them requesting the removal of links connected to film piracy. Google receives 20 million 'takedown' requests, officially known as DMCA (Digital Millennium Copyright Act) notices, every month. They are all published online. Recent submissions by Fox and Universal Studios include requests for the removal of previous takedown notices. ... By making the notices available, Google is unintentionally highlighting the location of allegedly pirated material, say some experts. 'It would only take one skilled coder to index the URLs from the DMCA notices in order to create one of the largest pirate search engines available,' wrote Torrent Freak editor Ernesto Van Der Sar on the site."
Confidentiality not lawful (Score:5, Interesting)
When you send a demand letter it is property of the recipient. They are free to publish it if they wish. A person receiving a DCMA take doewn notice is under no obligation, and in fact would be stupid to, agree to any confidentiality at all. The recipient is under no obligation to do so.
A more pressing area of legal disclosure is charges against otherwise innocent until proven guilty persons. Prosecutors do perp walks, and public news conferences, all the time despite the legal, and ethical, and moral, land mines.
JJ
An Easy Problem to Fix (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Sorry, the law doesn't work that way (Score:5, Interesting)
It is, as one commentator has recently put it, the bitter legacy of Mickey Mouse [theamerica...vative.com].
stupid robots (Score:4, Interesting)
Some day I'm going to write a page about a "boardwalk game where you manage an empire from your throne" just to see how fast it gets blocked from google search results. Oops, I probably blocked Slashdot just by typing that. The robots who send the notices are amazingly stupid and use leaps of logic that make your average creationist look like an evidence-user.
I'm not saying piracy isn't happening out there, but from what I've seen I bet over 90% of DMCA notices are bogus. If anyone is crawling chilling-effects looking for juicy links to yummy forbidden files, boy are they going to be disappointed. They'll learn that someone's CS101 web crawling assignment has been emailing google about every damn page it finds.
Anyway, since in this case, the content's provenance is systematically known, they can confidently ignore the DMCA notices, as though they virtually received a counter-notice from within their own organization. No need to take anything down. Non-story, other than highlighting how amazingly bad the robots are, and that the special legal obligation created by them, probably ought to be removed or else notice-senders should be held accountable. Congress, do something about that. Can't someone just anonymously slip it into the budget bill?
Critically important (Score:5, Interesting)
By making the notices available, Google is unintentionally highlighting the location of allegedly pirated material, say some experts. 'It would only take one skilled coder to index the URLs from the DMCA notices in order to create one of the largest pirate search engines available,' wrote Torrent Freak editor Ernesto Van Der Sar on the site."
I stumbled on one of these notices filed by the RIAA yesterday, and it seems not only reasonable but important for the notice to be posted, including the relevant URL; otherwise, how will I know that the site hosting the illegal material is doing so illegally? I looked at the site in question, and they most certainly didn't include any notice that downloading that particular song was a violation of copyright. But because of the notice that Google linked to, I knew that I shouldn't do it.
It seems to me that MPAA and RIAA want to have their cake and eat it, too.
Actually, meta-Streisand (Score:5, Interesting)
then the reverse Streisand (intentionally calling attention by demanding suppression of ostensibly unwanted but actually desired publicity),
and now comes the meta-Streisand (unintentionally calling attention to intentional demands that caused unintentional publicity of what you didn't want publicized.)
Re:Barbara Streisand effect... (Score:5, Interesting)
A bigger pity that Google will get down on their knees and deepthroat the MPAA like a good little whore.
Your perspective is skewed. Google isn't doing this because the *AA asks them to, they are doing it because it is the law.
If the *AA's get out of hand, Google could easily just buy the entire industry. Every single one of those companies. With cash. Several times over. You don't seem to understand the amount of money Google has. They aren't kowtowing to private corporate interests at this point, they are simply doing what the law requires them to do. If you get a take-down notice, you have to take it down. If the *AA's begin to make the world suck too bad for Google, they could just purchase them and eradicate all of it.
Re:stupid robots (Score:3, Interesting)
BTW, I looked at the notices, they include a large number of links that start with vk.com [slashdot.org], which is a Russian version of FB, the way FB should have been designed.
It has a much better, more intuitive user interface from stories I read on comparing FB vs VK (vk means "v kontakte", which may be translated as "in touch" for "staying in touch") and on that site anybody can host any image, song, video and text they like and it's very easy to search through them and find whatever you want.
It is actually a good advert for VK and they offer a large number of languages that you can access the site in.
Re:Barbara Streisand effect... (Score:4, Interesting)
Please actually pay attention to your house/senate candidates next election.
Goodluckwiddat. I think one of the problems is this message that getting out to vote is such a noble thing to do. It isn't. If you aren't educated about a decision you participate in, then why are you participating to begin with?
IMO end the "get out the vote" "rock the vote" "vote or die" campaigns.
Re:Barbara Streisand effect... (Score:2, Interesting)
Why doesn't Google just buy some copyright repealing legislation? That seems the most cost-effective strategy.