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YouTube-dl has received a DMCA takedown from RIAA

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Re: YouTube-dl has received a DMCA takedown from RIAA

#541

Post by Udo »

jaspergilley wrote: post #33

You can download the most recent version of the YouTube-DL code from Wayback Machine here: https://web.archive.org/web/20201018144703/https://github.co... Fuck the RIAA

That doesn't matter. As development stops, youtube-dl will stop being able to download videos in a matter of months (at best). This is an extremely brittle system that relies on youtube-dl being one step ahead of Youtube at all times. Without further development, the next update to Youtube's site will break the tool.

It was really a matter of time. I'm sure most of us were already amazed it lasted this long - and it did because it remained a relatively obscure tool for years.

It's also the case that the development of subversive/illegal tools requires a certain amount of subterfuge and sneakiness that the youtube-dl developers apparently weren't ready to engage in. While this is understandable, it also underscores the fact that such tools live on borrowed time (as does, I would argue, general-purpose computing itself).

Re: YouTube-dl has received a DMCA takedown from RIAA

#542

Post by nullc »

slaymaker1907 wrote: post #531
nullc wrote: post #528

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Without the existence of youtube-dl, youtube itself is necessarily commuting copyright infringement over the a good portion of the CC-By-SA works uploaded to youtube. (not all of them, since the uploader grants youtube a license... but if the work has copyright holders who aren't the uploader, it applies)

I think in that case the copyright infringement would be the uploader rather than YouTube, but IANAL.

There are CC-By-SA works uploaded to youtube by google employees while at work.

Re: YouTube-dl has received a DMCA takedown from RIAA

#543

Post by Deely123123 »

black_puppydog wrote: post #295

Your weekly reminder that 1. You should not have your development process on a centralized platform, at least not if you're doing anything that smells of copyright issues 2. If you do host on a centralized platform, have regular, decentralized backups of code and issue tracking. 3. Also, avoid US-centric hosting for this kind of thing. But really, refer to 1.

Should we count country and government as 'centalized platform'?

Re: YouTube-dl has received a DMCA takedown from RIAA

#544

Post by ehaliewicz2 »

larrik wrote: post #273
Santosh83 wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No it doesn't follow at all, any more than had the repo owners included a couple of public domain recordings in the repo then the conclusion that the tool was clearly intended to download public domain recordings.

It's hard for a lot of techies to grapple with this, but courts and law are often decided by the intent of the offense. This shows intent, whereas public domain works would not. The difference, in court, is massive .

It's not that it's hard to grasp, we just think it's irrelevant, since plenty of people also have legitimate uses for this tool, and any other tool that allows them to do the same things is just as capable of downloading copyrighted youtube videos.

Re: YouTube-dl has received a DMCA takedown from RIAA

#545

Post by iameli »

Drdrdrq wrote: post #412
jordigh wrote: post #86

I'm very scared by this. youtube-dl needs somewhat frequent updates as Google moves the youtube codebase around. I'm worried that the RIAA's next move, now that it's starting to get inconvenient to get youtube-dl, will be to make Youtube change in some way to make existing copies of youtube-dl no longer work. youtube-dl has been my primary way of getting videos since I learned about it. If the RIAA manages to kill it…

I think you have it backwards. Google is very much on the same side as RIAA in this case. Youtube-dl is simply too convenient for avoiding the ads.

I dunno. Every Youtuber I know makes use of Youtube-dl (or related projects) extensively because many of them don't maintain archives of their own content and Youtube's built-in tools for downloading stuff back from them are terrible.

Re: YouTube-dl has received a DMCA takedown from RIAA

#548

Post by freshhawk »

adrianmonk wrote: post #197
crazygringo wrote: post #21

Curious if anyone with legal expertise knows if this has legs? They say: > The clear purpose of this source code is to (i) circumvent the technological protection measures used by authorized streaming services such as YouTube, and (ii) reproduce and distribute music videos and sound recordings owned by our member companies without authorization for such use. But the "circumventing" is still accessing a stream the use…

Also, does the fact that YouTube doesn't supply a download feature constitute a "technical protection measure"? From the RIAA's point of view, it works to their benefit that a download link doesn't exist, and it may be something they like, but that doesn't mean that's why. It could just as easily be that a download feature doesn't exist because YouTube wants you to keep returning to their site if you want to rewatch…

> Also, does the fact that YouTube doesn't supply a download feature constitute a "technical protection measure"?

My understanding is that basically anything at all, if it is in any way "technical" and shows intent, will be accepted as a "technical protection measure" if you go by what has worked so far.

Much more absurd and blatantly bad faith arguments have been accepted, "conspicuously not supplying the feature" is a very strong case in the absurd world of the DMCA cases.

Re: YouTube-dl has received a DMCA takedown from RIAA

#549

Post by vbezhenar »

rhino369 wrote: post #424
Nextgrid wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can't it be trivially reinstated then by removing any references to copyrighted content? youtube-dl has plenty of legitimate uses beyond just copyright infringement.

They can't fully un-ring that bell. The RIAA will always be able to argue infringement was the purpose since they used copyrighted examples.

What if another person will recreate this repository without history and offending links?
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