July 26th, 2007
EFF Sues RIAA Member Over “Fair Use”
By Michael Santo
Executive Editor, RealTechNews
This falls into the “Give me a break” category … not the lawsuit, but what brought on the lawsuit. While most people are against piracy, most are also pro-“fair use”. Many have also viewed the RIAA’s enforcement of what it feels is perceived copyright infringement to be heavy-handed, to say the least. In this case the RIAA (or rather, RIAA member Universal Music Publishing Group) forced a YouTube video to be taken down, because it contained 18-month-old Holden Lenz dancing to Prince’s “Let’s Get Crazy” for a whole 29 seconds.
The video features 18-month-old Holden Lenz dancing to Prince’s “Let’s Get Crazy” and runs for a total of 29 seconds. Following Universal’s complaint, the video was removed by YouTube and remained offline until recently.
The EFF points out that, “Under federal copyright law, a mere allegation of copyright infringement can result in the removal of content from the Internet.” This legal framework mandates that services take down material that may actually be completely lawful or protected under fair use, and this situation is the impetus for the suit. Source: News.com
We Say: Anyone got any videos of their wedding on Youtube? Better take ‘em down, because if there is any music being played by the DJ … well, you get my drift. Pulling down a baby dancing … or even wedding video or other such footage … is definitely overkill, and that’s an understatement.
Nasty Old Geezer says:
Lawyers, like fire and money, are good servants and poor masters. Too many so-called “intellectual property” companies — entertainment and software mostly — have surrendered control to lawyers who have no sense, only education.
July 26th, 2007 at 6:16 am
NOGIClueless says:
Hey geezer, the lawyers do not call the shots on these things. But a mindless attack on lawyers is always good fun.
And actually it’s the EFF lawsuit that is questionable. A suit about what? Complaining that the use by UMPG of the DMCA take-down provision wasn’t in good faith because they knew or should have known there might be an affirmative defense of good faith? Yeh, right. Good luck with that one. The EFF doesn’t even have standing let alone a substantive case.
July 26th, 2007 at 10:38 am
Michael Santo says:
I think what we’re appealing to here is common sense. There’s no reason to believe the clip was using the music in an infringing manner. And, extrapolating from the original takedown order, you can see all manner of videos being forced to be taken down simply because music was in the background … if, of course, they wanted to try to force them to. Simply stated, this is overkill.
July 26th, 2007 at 11:10 am