Facebook’s Piracy Problem • Hacker News Board

Re: Facebook’s Piracy Problem

#151

Post by baddox » Thu, Jul 09, 2015, 2:38 AM UTC

gknoy wrote: post #78

baddox wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Is it that in your world, eating and paying the rent isn't necessary either? Of course it is, and thus figuring out an occupation or business model that allows you to eat and pay rent is important.

While that sounds great, I suspect that there are many people with the skill and interest to be professional artists who, if they were spending their days writing code or welding or $JOB, would be uninterested / unable to dedicate resources (time, money) towards Creating Things in the degree that they can when creating such things is their full-time job. tl;dr: There should be a way for creative people to make Creati…

There's also undoubtedly lots of interesting and potentially profitable art and innovation that is impossible because of those IP laws. I can't confidently say that one set is more worthy than the other.

Re: Facebook’s Piracy Problem

#152

Post by hackuser » Thu, Jul 09, 2015, 2:39 AM UTC

saidajigumi wrote: post #106

jessaustin wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But saying that being paid to be creative isn't necessarily [sic] means that you get very little art, if at all. Humans have always created art. Modern conceptions of intellectual property have not always existed. Why would art depend on that?

Because here, in the post-industrial world, it's very hard to make a living from one-off works of craftsmanship. That didn't used to be the case, when that was the only way to get things made. It happens today, but the economics make it an unusual situation. The labor involved forces the per-unit prices to be stratospheric, vastly limiting the market. But we have an alternative: leverage digital technology's nigh-zer…

> If we just drop IP laws, that further enriches these corps at the cost of individual and/or small creators. That makes no sense to me whatsoever.

A good question, but I'm not sure. Those large corporations produce a lot of IP; maybe the small guy will benefit more than the big guy. Remember we're all stealing from and building on each other's IP. Imagine if all the proprietary software was open source, from OS X to Office to SunOS to SAS to Mathematica to Photoshop to AutoCAD to Google's search algorithms.

It would be a dream for many to be able to study, learn from, and reuse that code. It would be like the IP of the academic world, which generally is open and reusable by others.

Re: Facebook’s Piracy Problem

#153

Post by stephen_g » Thu, Jul 09, 2015, 2:43 AM UTC

Buge wrote: post #141

plorg wrote: post #97

I have a friend/acquaintance who had a similar experience on YouTube itself. He had created a large number of instructional videos on his YouTube channel, and from them he was deriving a significant passive income (admittedly from the overbearing amount of ads he enabled). One day he received a takedown notice suggesting that his videos were illicit copies. His investigations led him to believe that another YouTube u…

I had someone steal one of my videos on youtube. I reported it for infringement and it was taken down in 30 minutes. I found that pretty impressive. A month ago one of my videos about a reported and fixed XSS vulnerability was taken down for violating some rules (it didn't say what rules exactly). I submitted an appeal and it was reinstated a few days later. Several years ago one of my videos that used some public do…

I don't understand the point of your comment - it's obvious and well known that YouTube's copyright protection procedures work in some cases. Describing a few of those situations doesn't really add anything to this thread of the conversation or do anything to invalidate the fact that in some specific ways it's incredibly stupidly broken..

Re: Facebook’s Piracy Problem

#154

Post by nitrogen » Thu, Jul 09, 2015, 2:45 AM UTC

neotek wrote: post #145

viraptor wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd like to hear more of this story and what channels of communication were used exactly. DMCA is pretty clear on how this case should be handled and even if it's a stupid procedure that takes you down for a few days, I don't believe YT can legally refuse to act on the counter-claim. If they do and you relied on the income from those videos, you could sue them. So why did it take months? How were they blocked in the…

I'd put money on it being an abuse of YouTube's Content ID. It's a common YouTube scam - find a video with a lot of views that's rising quickly, download it and reupload it to your own account and submit it to Content ID. YouTube will automatically scan its library for copies of "your" video, and gives you the option to either take the copies down, or monetise them via ads. Because of the DMCA's stupid counter notifi…

...YouTube isn't really to blame for all of this...

In the case of ContentID, which bypasses the DMCA, yes, they are to blame, along with all the media companies that demanded its creation.

Re: Facebook’s Piracy Problem

#155

Post by beedogs » Thu, Jul 09, 2015, 2:57 AM UTC

Buge wrote: post #141

plorg wrote: post #97

I have a friend/acquaintance who had a similar experience on YouTube itself. He had created a large number of instructional videos on his YouTube channel, and from them he was deriving a significant passive income (admittedly from the overbearing amount of ads he enabled). One day he received a takedown notice suggesting that his videos were illicit copies. His investigations led him to believe that another YouTube u…

I had someone steal one of my videos on youtube. I reported it for infringement and it was taken down in 30 minutes. I found that pretty impressive. A month ago one of my videos about a reported and fixed XSS vulnerability was taken down for violating some rules (it didn't say what rules exactly). I submitted an appeal and it was reinstated a few days later. Several years ago one of my videos that used some public do…

So... uh... I guess it works sometimes in favor of the actual content owner. But I'm not sure what your point is.

Re: Facebook’s Piracy Problem

#156

Post by dragonwriter » Thu, Jul 09, 2015, 2:58 AM UTC

nitrogen wrote: post #154

neotek wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd put money on it being an abuse of YouTube's Content ID. It's a common YouTube scam - find a video with a lot of views that's rising quickly, download it and reupload it to your own account and submit it to Content ID. YouTube will automatically scan its library for copies of "your" video, and gives you the option to either take the copies down, or monetise them via ads. Because of the DMCA's stupid counter notifi…

...YouTube isn't really to blame for all of this... In the case of ContentID, which bypasses the DMCA, yes, they are to blame, along with all the media companies that demanded its creation.

ContentID doesn't bypass DMCA. It is neither required to take advantage of the DMCA safe harbor with regard to suits by copyright owners not compliant with the DMCA safe harbor provisions for suits by users hosting media, but it doesn't bypass anything required by the DMCA.

People sometimes confuse the things which trigger DMCA safe harbor provisions with mandates but they aren't, and the only reason to be guided by them is to take advantage of the safe harbor attached to them. Real businesses often want to have better relations with big money content suppliers than the minimum required to avoid copyright liability, and can already structure their relations with end users in a way that they would have no liability for any take-down in any case, so exceeding what is necessary for the safe harbor on the content owner side while not concerning oneself with the safe harbor on the end-user side if perfectly rational, and doesn't bypass anything.

It might underscore why the DMCA isn't as balanced as it seems on the surface but instead radically tilted in favor of content owners, since only one of the superficially parallel safe harbor provisions is even relevant to most hosts.

Re: Facebook’s Piracy Problem

#157

Post by paulhauggis » Thu, Jul 09, 2015, 2:58 AM UTC

hackuser wrote: post #52

A radical idea: Maybe our model of intellectual property is wrong, or outdated. When IP was tied to a physical object, it made some sense to restrict and explicitly license each reproducer. Now we have incredible machines that can reproduce intellectual property almost infinitely, distribute it anywhere on Earth, and find it almost anywhere on Earth. Wow! Maybe we should embrace that innovation, and find a model that…

"Now we have incredible machines that can reproduce intellectual property almost infinitely"

I think the main problem with this line of thinking is that it takes nothing to reproduce IP, but creating it takes thousands (and sometimes more) man-hours.

"A third: Many creative people are motivated to do great things withhout payment. Remember, all those FOSS creators, from RMS to Linus Torvalds to Tim Berners-Lee to every little FOSS project on Github."

https://www.google.com/?gws_rd=ssl#q=linus+torvald+net+worth

Linus has a net worth of ~$150 million. So I'm not sure if this is a good example of someone creating FOSS out of the kindness of his heart.

RMS makes money through autographs, donations from big organizations, and winning prizes likes this: http://tech.mit.edu/V121/N59/59stallman.59n.html

Again, he's making a very good living by pretty much anyone's standard.

"Remember also Van Gogh and millions of other starving artists you have and haven't heard of (quick, name a poet who cashed in on their life's work). Perhaps financial renumeration, while fair, isn't entirely necessary (and perhaps we'd have less crap with less of it)."

10 years ago, I remember many people saying the exact same thing that you are saying now. The result has been less developers actually being hired. With so much free software out there, why would a business want to hire an actual engineer when they can hire a software mechanic (at a much lower wage)? Since the engineered parts are given away for free with so much free sofware, it makes the choice pretty easy.

Intellectual property has made it so with basically a computer/tablet/phone/very little startup capital, anyone has a real chance at making a living. Why are we actively trying to take away a very good way for social mobility?

It already happened in the music industry. Before the explosion of piracy, an indy artist could make a living selling music. Because of piracy, music is pretty much seen as worthless, which is what piracy does: It's not stealing, it's counterfeiting. Which completely devalues the item being counterfeited.

Re: Facebook’s Piracy Problem

#158

Post by viraptor » Thu, Jul 09, 2015, 3:04 AM UTC

neotek wrote: post #145

viraptor wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd like to hear more of this story and what channels of communication were used exactly. DMCA is pretty clear on how this case should be handled and even if it's a stupid procedure that takes you down for a few days, I don't believe YT can legally refuse to act on the counter-claim. If they do and you relied on the income from those videos, you could sue them. So why did it take months? How were they blocked in the…

I'd put money on it being an abuse of YouTube's Content ID. It's a common YouTube scam - find a video with a lot of views that's rising quickly, download it and reupload it to your own account and submit it to Content ID. YouTube will automatically scan its library for copies of "your" video, and gives you the option to either take the copies down, or monetise them via ads. Because of the DMCA's stupid counter notifi…

Are people sending DMCA notifications for the copies? They have the right to and if you stop the troll copies (whether they did use DMCA process or not), nobody can benefit from them. Still not perfect, but why do the scam if you can't benefit from it.

Re: Facebook’s Piracy Problem

#159

Post by thegeomaster » Thu, Jul 09, 2015, 3:15 AM UTC

plorg wrote: post #97

I have a friend/acquaintance who had a similar experience on YouTube itself. He had created a large number of instructional videos on his YouTube channel, and from them he was deriving a significant passive income (admittedly from the overbearing amount of ads he enabled). One day he received a takedown notice suggesting that his videos were illicit copies. His investigations led him to believe that another YouTube u…

Back in the day, I uploaded a music video of my relative, with filming, production and post funded completely by her, and with her retaining all the copyright. It was a couple of years before and I was the "guy who knows this computer stuff" so I did it for her. Fast forward to 2014, and I receive a claim that a company which acts on behalf of a certain nationwide TV station here has put a copyright claim on the video and that it will be either taken down or monetized (with the revenue going to that company). I angrily issue a counter-notice on her behalf saying that she holds all the copyright and there is no possible way that the claim has legal ground. A few days after that, I'm informed by YouTube that the company has lifted the claim and the video is back online.

What happened here is that there's a talk show on that TV station where she appeared as a guest, and they aired the music video during the show (with her consent, of course). The episode got uploaded to the Content ID system and YouTube detected the music video as part of the station's intellectual property. However, the fact that they immediately lifted the claim without even bothering to ask for a legally binding document, signed by her, confirming what I said in the counter-notice, is indicative of the fact that these claims are all hit-or-miss and that the companies who issue them are blatantly aware of that. As soon as someone issues a counter-notice, they bail out pretty quickly in order to escape the potential legal ramifications of issuing false DMCA notices, even though my counter-notice could have been completely false and with no legal ground of itself.

Re: Facebook’s Piracy Problem

#160

Post by crgt » Thu, Jul 09, 2015, 3:24 AM UTC

Tyr42 wrote: post #136

stevenh wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wish Google would start fighting dirty. Want to access Facebook mobile? Hope you have an iPhone, because Google pushed a mandatory update last night which banned Facebook from all Android devices. Want to access Facebook through Chrome? Sorry, it seems that site has been flagged as a malicious piracy hub; however, you might enjoy this 302 redirect to an automatically-generated clone of your Facebook profile hosted…

That's when you get slapped with an antitrust lawsuit.

I could maybe see an antitrust lawsuit if Google dropped Facebook from search, because of their dominant market share there. But neither Android nor Chrome is a monopoly, so it's unclear to me how much legal risk they have if they stopped playing nice with Facebook there. Am I missing something?