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Players to sue for hundreds of millions over use of their statistics

theathletic.com

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Re: Players to sue for hundreds of millions over use of their statistics

#51

Post by Animats »

ukoki wrote: post #40
matsemann wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> and all of those rights must be purchased this have been tried for Chess, and deemed not applicable. Others are allowed to do live coverage of the moves without purchasing any rights. The organizers control the live footage, can ban them from entering the premises to interview players etc., so most will adhere to some form of contract. But if you have no ties there's nothing stopping you from making your own conten…

Interesting. Makes me wonder if you could train a machine learning model to take one or more football match video streams as input and turn them into a live 3d model. You then argue that the model simply documents the facts of the game, so does not infringe on the copyright of the original source streams. Then you sell live footage of the model (perhaps with slightly different camera angles)

Makes me wonder if you could train a machine learning model to take one or more football match video streams as input and turn them into a live 3d model.

It's been done.[1] Not for American football, for soccer.

[1] https://grail.cs.washington.edu/projects/soccer/soccer_on_yo...

Re: Players to sue for hundreds of millions over use of their statistics

#52

Post by pmoriarty »

javajosh wrote: post #23
haubey wrote: post #7

I'm not a lawyer, and I'm especially not a British lawyer, but I do have an Athletic subscription. The article discusses a lawsuit on behalf of Primer League and mostly lower league soccer players in England around their "personal data." > More than 400 current and former players have signed up to pursue gaming, betting and data-processing companies who utilise their personal statistics without consent or compensatio…

I think another argument is that the game is enjoyed in many forms, over radio, over television, streamed over the internet - and all of those rights must be purchased, etc. If the game statistics are another form of enjoyment, then it is another form, and should be subject to the same ownership issues as the other channels. OTOH, I think the argument is very weak. First, precedent is strongly against the players her…

"in any argument I tend to side with the underdog. I think it would be great if Athletic voluntarily shared some of their revenue with players!"

The underdogs here are the consumers, who ultimately wind up paying all those hundreds of millions.

Re: Players to sue for hundreds of millions over use of their statistics

#53

Post by pmoriarty »

exo762 wrote: post #2

IANAL. Statistics sound like a compilation of facts. Facts are not copyrightable by themselves. Compilations are, but compilation were not authored by players, but by someone else. I really hope they will lose. Also, paywall.

Where you were last Friday night is also a fact, and even if you were somewhere in public most people would consider that personal information.

Same with your age, your gender, your height and weight, your address, your phone number, where you work, etc.

All could be either measured in public or are likely to already be in a public database somewhere.

Yet most would consider those to be personal information.

That information might not be private, but that doesn't make it any less personal.

Re: Players to sue for hundreds of millions over use of their statistics

#55

Post by joegahona »

simonebrunozzi wrote: post #50

Can we change the "Players"in the title to "Soccer Players"? Otherwise, I'd guess most people would think of videogame players.

This is a fair point, because even if you are familiar with the source of the article (The Athletic), as I am, it's unclear which sports are discussed.

Re: Players to sue for hundreds of millions over use of their statistics

#56

Post by csallen »

The belief that information and ideas should be "owned" as if they are physical property is insidious, was always going to lead to absurd lawsuits like this, and will lead to worse in the future.

Information is non-rivalrous. It cannot be "stolen" in the same way that, say, an apple can. If I take your apple, you no longer have it. If someone repeats your information, you haven't been deprived of it. These athletes are as free as ever to collect and share statistics about their performances, regardless of who else is also doing it.

When you move through the world, you emit information, but that doesn't mean you "own" it.

Re: Players to sue for hundreds of millions over use of their statistics

#58

Post by renewiltord »

csallen wrote: post #56

The belief that information and ideas should be "owned" as if they are physical property is insidious, was always going to lead to absurd lawsuits like this, and will lead to worse in the future. Information is non-rivalrous. It cannot be "stolen" in the same way that, say, an apple can. If I take your apple, you no longer have it. If someone repeats your information, you haven't been deprived of it. These athletes a…

GDPR does not use ownership semantics. There are "data subjects", "processors", "controllers" and they each interact with "personal data" in some way.

Then certain restrictions are enforced on processors and controllers with data subjects having certain rights recognized.

The rights and restrictions differ from ownership semantics sufficiently that it's not useful to talk about as owning.

Re: Players to sue for hundreds of millions over use of their statistics

#59

Post by csallen »

renewiltord wrote: post #58
csallen wrote: post #56

The belief that information and ideas should be "owned" as if they are physical property is insidious, was always going to lead to absurd lawsuits like this, and will lead to worse in the future. Information is non-rivalrous. It cannot be "stolen" in the same way that, say, an apple can. If I take your apple, you no longer have it. If someone repeats your information, you haven't been deprived of it. These athletes a…

GDPR does not use ownership semantics. There are "data subjects", "processors", "controllers" and they each interact with "personal data" in some way. Then certain restrictions are enforced on processors and controllers with data subjects having certain rights recognized. The rights and restrictions differ from ownership semantics sufficiently that it's not useful to talk about as owning.

Yes, this is why I'm careful to limit my criticism specifically to the belief that information can be "owned." That's subtly different from the belief that we can make contracts around information.

But if you ask the average layperson or watch popular media about data, they speak and think in terms of ownership. That's the wrong model, and it leads to the wrong assumptions and conclusions.

From what I understand, this wasn't always the case. The belief rose alongside the term "intellectual property" in recent decades, which was itself popularized by media companies who have the rights to lots of information, and who stand to gain financially the more we shift toward conceiving of these rights as permanent ownership.

Re: Players to sue for hundreds of millions over use of their statistics

#60

Post by slg »

jb775 wrote: post #47
haubey wrote: post #7

I'm not a lawyer, and I'm especially not a British lawyer, but I do have an Athletic subscription. The article discusses a lawsuit on behalf of Primer League and mostly lower league soccer players in England around their "personal data." > More than 400 current and former players have signed up to pursue gaming, betting and data-processing companies who utilise their personal statistics without consent or compensatio…

> facts are not copyrightable This is the nail in the coffin. Imagine the lengths lawyers would go if they could monetize any abstract reference to something.

The results of my last STD test and the transaction history of my bank account are also facts. We have decided some facts deserve specific protections, at least in the US. So I don't think we can dismiss the players here with "facts are not copyrightable" without knowing what specific statistics are being recorded and to which the players reject. Sports technology has exploded over recent years and the data collection of athletes is now an industry of its own. There can be a range in the degree of ownership that a player deserves from the total number of goals scored in public matches to the heartrate of a player throughout a private practice session.
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