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25 years of video clips gone as Paramount axes Comedy Central wesbite

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Re: 25 years of video clips gone as Paramount axes Comedy Central wesbite

#101

Post by modeless »

jpk wrote: post #55
hannasm wrote: post #53

Free content removed by previously benevolent publisher. It's too bad they weren't able to make their free content into a profit stream. The sad part here is that they were / are a steward to something beloved by many but through copyright they take it as hostage to the grave. If they no longer find value in distributing it shouldn't they be obligated to waive their ownership? Maybe copyright itself needs some reform…

I'm reminded of how trademarks work: If you don't bother to defend them, then you lose them. Maybe copyright should be the same way: If you're not distributing copies any longer, you lose the copyright protection.

A better fix would be to make copyright last 5 years from the date of publication. I'm betting that for the vast majority of copyrighted content the vast majority of the money is made in the first five years.

Copyright is a tax on society. It's not an inalienable right. We keep it for the noble purpose of encouraging authors to create. We don't want them to rest on their laurels. So why are we locking up all of our content for life plus 70? It sounds like a prison sentence.

Re: 25 years of video clips gone as Paramount axes Comedy Central wesbite

#102

Post by autoexec »

defrost wrote: post #25
anigbrowl wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't help thinking that zapping sites with no warning is intended to defeat amateur archivists.

Stable, Horse, bolted ... Other content lost in the purge were clips and full episodes of other short-lived late-night entries like The Opposition with Jordan Klepper, The Nightly Show with Larry Wilmore, the Chris Hardwick-hosted @midnight (predecessor to After Midnight), and Lights Out with David Spade. To quote Life of Brian "I know where to get it if you want it" ... these shows were archived as they aired.

I imagine that finding copies of much of that will be difficult. I know someone who took to the high seas for episodes of the Colbert Report, but how many people are still seeding full seasons of that, let alone shows like Lights Out which were nowhere near as popular.

Re: 25 years of video clips gone as Paramount axes Comedy Central wesbite

#103

Post by theturtletalks »

beej71 wrote: post #90
theturtletalks wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why can't the videos be downloaded and uploaded to the Internet Archive? There's a lot of copyrighted videos there already.

While this is a great idea, it's generally illegal for IA to share that content. And it's looking increasingly unlikely IA will be in existence 90 years from now, so it's unclear there'd be a point in them simply archiving it. If copyright were 14 years, if give IA a lot more of a chance of still being around then. And apparently the videos are no longer available to download, so it's not an option, anyway. Barring s…

I think down below, they are saying the episodes aren't gone, just paywalled behind Paramount+ now.

Re: 25 years of video clips gone as Paramount axes Comedy Central wesbite

#104

Post by varunnrao »

What I find really interesting is that all these studios who ran TV channels for so many years fumbled the bag when it came to streaming.. It's like all these people who basically were in content distribution didn't really wise up to the next, new thing in their business even as it happened in front of their eyes.

It's pretty wild that Paramount+/Disney+/Peacock or whatever really struggle to get going, especially given that they provide access to top shows that people really want to watch. It's like having Breaking Bad-esque product but really screwing up when it comes to wanting people to watch it.

Given the extent to which the tech behind streaming platforms -- storage, CDNs, tie-ups with telecoms -- have been standardized (and democratized, to some extent) by big players like YouTube and Netflix, you would think that a basic ad supported layer of any of these studio specific platforms would make many multiples of what they actually need to put in to setup a basic platform.

The tech's cheap and they already have the content. Most of the older content would be relatively low traffic -- hell, most of these old topical Comedy Central late night shows barely broke a million views when they were new and I don't think jokes about Saddam Hussein and GW's folksy demeanor would click now. How much would it really cost for any big studio to let people view these archives? Am I missing something big that causes somebody like Paramount to go $14B in debt trying to get people to use their streaming service? Is it a function of the business they're in or is it just a case of LA movie studio types not understanding tech?

Re: 25 years of video clips gone as Paramount axes Comedy Central wesbite

#105

Post by wiseowise »

Daz1 wrote: post #43
redundantly wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you also think Adblock is piracy?

It's not 'piracy', but it is theft of a different nature in that you're indirectly reducing the revenue that would have been received by the content creator.

It’s a theft because I don’t want to watch 40 seconds of unskippable ads every time I open same video in succession on YouTube or whenever I rewind? Seriously?

Provide fair conditions and people won’t pirate.

Re: 25 years of video clips gone as Paramount axes Comedy Central wesbite

#106

Post by kube-system »

morsch wrote: post #93
kube-system wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But copyright isn't just for publicly distributed mass media made by corporations -- it is for all works made by anyone. Copyright also protects work that people wish to keep private, or work that people want to share at some times, with some people, but not all people. (Also depending on how that idea might be implemented, it could cause some strange situations for copyleft software)

So limit the changes to works the copyright owner intentionally distributed to more than $threshold people. Have it only apply to situations where the number is tracked already, e.g. due to commercial obligations. Or something. This does not seem like an insurmountable problem.

Then you're bringing into the question why the rights that someone gets is different depending on how people exercise them. What's the right threshold? What does it mean to intentionally distribute? Are we going to have protracted court battles over what tracking numbers are accurate or valid? Could those who want to abuse this (big business) simply work around it by making it infeasible to directly measure?

And also, the copyleft complication too: If Bob writes a FOSS app with a GPL license, and it becomes popular, but then Bob retires and stops distributing it, does the copyright expire?

I don't think the problem being discussed here is insurmountable to solve, I just think the proposed solution opens a whole new can of worms. I think a good start at a solution is to first shorten the duration of copyright.

Re: 25 years of video clips gone as Paramount axes Comedy Central wesbite

#108

Post by Anotheroneagain »

ninjin wrote: post #94
ryandrake wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The copyright cartel would fight that with their lives. They would rather destroy content forever than let it out for free, even if neither option costs them a cent. “The people come with nets to fish for potatoes in the river, and the guards hold them back; they come in rattling cars to get the dumped oranges, but the kerosene is sprayed. And they stand still and watch the potatoes float by, listen to the screaming…

For those of us not reading widely enough and/or not being raised in the American literary tradition, the quote is from John Steinbeck's "The Grapes of Wrath" [1]. I have long been aware of the work, but reading this quote makes me regret not having read it yet. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Grapes_of_Wrath

There was a (massive) excess of food during the depression, so that is likely made up.

Re: 25 years of video clips gone as Paramount axes Comedy Central wesbite

#109

Post by TeMPOraL »

paulddraper wrote: post #35
ajmurmann wrote: post #28

Could they just have uploaded these to YouTube and monetized there through ads? Might not go with their brand, but better than deleting!

And not subscribe to Paramount+?!?

Isn't Paramount+ the hole that's sinking the ship in the first place?

Re: 25 years of video clips gone as Paramount axes Comedy Central wesbite

#110

Post by croes »

mattmaroon wrote: post #30
tombert wrote: post #17

How much could it possibly have been costing them to leave old clips up? I suspect the really old stuff was pretty low traffic, file storage is ridiculously cheap, how much money could this realistically save them? I'm sure it's not "zero" but I think I'm missing something...is it copyright savings or something?

You’re missing that they want you to subscribe to Paramount Plus, so they’re going to have all of their content there, where you pay them. They mention it in the press release. Their company IS paramount plus now. It’s all going there.

And you're missing

>Unfortunately for those in search of older episodes of The Daily Show and The Colbert Report, neither can be found on Paramount+.

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