YouTube-dl's repository has been restored • Hacker News Board

Re: YouTube-dl's repository has been restored

#391

Post by quotemstr » Mon, Nov 16, 2020, 6:05 PM UTC

musicale wrote: post #340

Are 1201 takedown notices even supposed to be a thing, or were they just invented by the RIAA and/or other overly enthusiastic copyright holders? I was under the impression that DMCA notices were for the removal of infringing content, not alleged anti-circumvention tools. That's what the law seems to specify. The notification and takedown process is specified for infringement of copyrighted works, not distribution of…

Right. GitHub seems to have made up a 1201 notice-and-takedown mechanism out of thin air, with this mechanism serving as Microsoft voluntarily doing favors for other big corporations rather than the fulfillment of some kind of legal obligation.

I find the GitHub announcement deeply unsatisfying for that reason: GitHub is unilaterally inventing a body of "law" that's going to meaningfully govern the lives of tons of developers in the future. This body of rules is "law" and not law because the entity doing the enforcement is GitHub and not some government, but GitHub still has enough power to cause injury if it decides it doesn't like you.

Re: YouTube-dl's repository has been restored

#392

Post by yellowapple » Mon, Nov 16, 2020, 6:05 PM UTC

roywiggins wrote: post #374

Aissen wrote: post #363

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Other browsers have the key, why would this one be different ?

Because they have a license.

So if a program used a licensed browser as an intermediary to obtain Widevine-protected content, would that be circumvention?

Re: YouTube-dl's repository has been restored

#393

Post by mdoms » Mon, Nov 16, 2020, 6:05 PM UTC

Why on earth is this project still hosted on Github? There are plenty of non-US based git providers that would be happy to have them on board.

Re: YouTube-dl's repository has been restored

#394

Post by jjeaff » Mon, Nov 16, 2020, 6:05 PM UTC

mox1 wrote: post #356

kmeisthax wrote: post #296

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right, but the law makes no mention of secret keys, it just says you can't go around anything that controls access to a copyright work; and you can't provide tools to do so. The actual legal definition of tools covers both actual technical purpose as well as marketed purpose. Rebranding, say, OBS as "Recorder for YouTube" and talking about how you can use it to get around YouTube's downloading protections by screenca…

The rebuttal to your reasoning is in the letter. Basically a federal judge has previously ruled that utilizing a publicly available password is not circumvention of a copyright protection mechanism. The code containing the "sig" (as google calls it) or "rolling cipher" (as RIAA calls it) is available to anyone by viewing the JavaScript. This sig / cipher being public means it is not a copyright protection mechanism.

What is considered publicly available?

I suppose right clicking and selecting view source is ok, but reverse engineering a code out of a hardware chip isn't?

Because any kind of DRM basically has a key in the possession of the user. There are just different levels of difficulty to read that key.

Re: YouTube-dl's repository has been restored

#395

Post by LeoNatan25 » Mon, Nov 16, 2020, 6:07 PM UTC

"Standing up for developers"

No, the EFF stood up for the developers. GitHub only looked for a legal scapegoat to reverse the decision in a legally-protected way. That's not what "standing up for" means.

Re: YouTube-dl's repository has been restored

#396

Post by seph-reed » Mon, Nov 16, 2020, 6:08 PM UTC

paledot wrote: post #230

gogopuppygogo wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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If you want to put your everyday Amazon spend to good use, don't spend on Amazon.

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Re: YouTube-dl's repository has been restored

#397

Post by LeoNatan25 » Mon, Nov 16, 2020, 6:10 PM UTC

wgjordan wrote: post #367

CivBase wrote: post #292

Why did the EFF have to step in here? What did the EFF letter provide that GitHub couldn't have figured out itself? If GitHub really was "standing up for developers", why couldn't Microsoft's own army of lawyers figure this out? If youtube-dl (or any OSS project) continues to use GitHub, I hope they have a backup plan ready at all times. Even if GitHub truly is on the right side, they've proven themselves to be a lia…

> If GitHub really was "standing up for developers", why couldn't Microsoft's own army of lawyers figure this out? I think the 'What we're changing' section is the real interesting part of this post regarding this. I read this section as a half-apology for not doing enough to stand up for developers in this case (allowing the repository to be taken down to begin with), and a promise to do more in the future to preven…

So ... they didn't stand up for developers? Promise is not "standing up for".

Re: YouTube-dl's repository has been restored

#398

Post by jjeaff » Mon, Nov 16, 2020, 6:10 PM UTC

ryanar wrote: post #184

It seems like EFF fought for youtube-dl and GitHub used their letter as legal firepower to bring the repo back online. If GitHub were fighting for the developer they would have funded the attorney, right? Though from their blog post it does look like they are taking steps to fund defense in the future as well as other steps to improve the situation. Reading EFFs claim is pretty interesting, they state that saving a c…

How has youtube not sent a cease and desist for the name youtube-dl?

They would most definitely have a case that the name makes it appear to be a youtube product. Would a cease and desist for the name only somehow imply that google has no issue with the functionality?

Because I know not protecting your trademark can lead to dilution. And by issuing takedown notices, they are showing that they are aware of the existence of this usage of the youtube trademark.

Re: YouTube-dl's repository has been restored

#399

Post by remram » Mon, Nov 16, 2020, 6:15 PM UTC

tantalor wrote: post #29

chongli wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was under the impression that those obfuscation methods were exclusive to certain YouTube partners, including the RIAA members. If youtube-dl stopped supporting that method, it would still be a useful tool for the bulk of its use cases and the RIAA would no longer have any leg to stand on since it'd no longer be able to download their members' videos.

There's no need to keep that code in the main yt-dl codebase if it is for special cases. You could imagine a siloed yt-dl plugin called crack-riaa with separate tests, hosting, etc. If yt-dl detects the obfuscation, it could fail with an error message point to the plugin's documentation.

That would only move the problem. That plugin would still need a Git repository, an issue tracker, tests, and an update mechanism. Or are you trying to say you don't care if this specific part of yt-dl gets deleted from the internet by RIAA?

Re: YouTube-dl's repository has been restored

#400

Post by jrochkind1 » Mon, Nov 16, 2020, 6:16 PM UTC

> Every single credible 1201 takedown claim will be reviewed by technical experts, including when appropriate independent specialists retained by GitHub, to ensure that the project actually circumvents a technical protection measure as described in the claim.

huh. Can you still take advantage of DMCA "safe harbor" if you are independently applying legal judgement to whether they would have a good chance of winning in court before deciding to comply with them?