Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

YouTube CEO says EU regulation will be bad for creators

theverge.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

41–50 of 121 posts

Re: YouTube CEO says EU regulation will be bad for creators

#41

Post by mmirate »

pjc50 wrote: post #35

Just so we're all on the same page, this is article 13.1: https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/HTML/?uri=CEL... "Information society service providers that store and provide to the public access to large amounts of works or other subject-matter uploaded by their users shall, in cooperation with rightholders, take measures to ensure the functioning of agreements concluded with rightholders for the use of the…

> Now, as written, that seems to be not so bad for X who already have Y, but bad for other competing services starting up which would have to develop it?

That is generally the cause, effect and purpose of all government regulations, yes. (for all valid combinations of incumbent megacorp X and costly item Y)

Re: YouTube CEO says EU regulation will be bad for creators

#42

Post by shady-lady »

knaik94 wrote: post #28
josefresco wrote: post #6

"YouTube has already invested more than $60 million into its Content ID system" That actually seems low to me, given we're talking about numbers (revenue, users) in the billions.

I think the fact that so little has human oversight and no direct way of disputing with a human is probably how they can handle it.

Exactly. So the solution YouTube has isn't appropriate. They should invest in a better solution even if that involves having more humans in the loop for review/approval.

That's the true cost of their business. They'd just like to portray it as the law being an ass rather than their solution being inadequate for the laws.

It's a clear case of "Our machines aren't humans and we don't want to have to comply with laws that could substantially damage our payroll spend"

Re: YouTube CEO says EU regulation will be bad for creators

#43

Post by nkkollaw »

simias wrote: post #32
nkkollaw wrote: post #13

The EU has passed this law so that it can be there waiting to be used to shut down dissidents. It doesn't make sense otherwise. These are smart people. With mostly bad ideas IMHO, but smart. They know what they're doing. This law has too many issues to be good for regular people.

The EU has passed this law because of the lobbying of the record industry, movie industry etc... There's really no need to search for some Big Brother conspiracy theory. Maybe the law can be abused that way but I doubt that's the main motivation.

Why "Big Brother conspiracy theory"? It sounds like a great tool for them, it wouldn't be the first time a government passes similar laws for that reason. For instance, the law https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/election-trol... passed in the UK: without a clear definition of what a troll is, you can easily get rid of your opponent by saying he's an internet troll (and you can probably prove it for just about anybody, everyone has made at least 1 questionable comment, if anything as a kid).

The EU is not the US.

If it was the US I would definitely put lobbying as the only or main reason for passing such a law, but the EU doesn't seem to be as favorable to lobbists (see GMOs, labelling laws), while they seem to love pushing their agenda no matter what nowadays (see attacking other member states like Hungary and Poland), and creating a just-in-case legal framework to better their chances makes very much sense for them, IMHO.

That's what I think, anyway. No one knows, for sure it's not the official explanation that it helps content creators, or they're unbelievably incompetent.

Re: YouTube CEO says EU regulation will be bad for creators

#44

Post by Silhouette »

AllegedAlec wrote: post #14
dvfjsdhgfv wrote: post #8

This is even better: > The burden of copyright proof will be too high for most independent creators to instantly demonstrate. If I record a video, and YT bans it because their faulty algorithm triggered a false alarm, how exactly the "burden of copyright proof" should be "too high" for me? First of all, they should prove that someone else owns the copyright. If they're mistaken - because of copyright trolls or faulty…

> First of all, they should prove that someone else own the copyright. If they're mistaken - because of copyright trolls or faulty algorithms - it should be their burden, not the authors'. That's rather optimistic; it's not a court of law. According to the rules as written, Youtube is responsible for not taking down the content. If they do not take down content which is actually copyrighted by someone else, they are…

Of course they'd err on the side of caution in this case.

I think this is symptomatic of an underlying problem with the increasingly centralised Internet.

It used to be that if you wanted to share content online, you put it on your web site and others could visit. If it was infringing someone else's copyright and they objected, they would send a friendly message and/or legal C&D notice to you, and you'd probably all be sensible about things.

Today, ISPs don't tend to provide everyone with some basic web hosting allowance any more, while a tiny number of huge third party content hosts are making staggering amounts of money from redistributing others' content as a middleman. However, those hosts typically have no obligation to anyone to provide this service.

So all the small creators are making themselves beholden to businesses that see them as the tree that money grows on but are quite happy to cut off a whole branch if there's any fruit that might be rotten rather than risk spoiling the lot.

On top of that, a significant proportion of people are also uploading other people's content to the hosting services, but for some reason the hosting services get to have magic legal shields that mean they can be running extremely lucrative business models based in no small part on turning a blind eye to being accessories to infringement, all while offering debatable social benefits over what we used to have instead.

So I think "erring on the side of caution" is probably understating things. The hosting services would do almost anything to defend that legal shield and their business model, because as things stand the hosts are basically laughing all the way to the bank while mysteriously immune to the normal laws that apply to you and me and while having no real obligation to the people who provide the very content on which the hosting service depends.

Re: YouTube CEO says EU regulation will be bad for creators

#45

Post by qubax »

kibwen wrote: post #29

This is rich. Every YouTube creator that I follow has at least one video whose purpose is to rail against YouTube's mystifying demonetization policies, their trigger-happy DMCA policies that aggressively favor major copyright holders, and their opaque and useless litigation process. Here's one for reference: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=bGZ_a6gL0f4 . Listening to the CEO of YouTube cry "but think of the content crea…

> Every YouTube creator that I follow has at least one video whose purpose is to rail against YouTube's mystifying demonetization policies, their trigger-happy DMCA policies that aggressively favor major copyright holders

To be fair, youtube was forced to do so because of corporate, news/media and political pressure. People forget that youtube also fought against the DMCA and corporate/media pressure before they lost.

https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/ezp4xa/youtube-is...

https://www.recode.net/2016/6/20/11974514/taylor-swift-youtu...

> Listening to the CEO of YouTube cry "but think of the content creators!" is about as transparently self-serving as a US politician crying "but think of the children!"

Of course it is self-serving. But it's also true. Youtube has been consistent in their support of fair use because as you pointed out, it's in their own self interest.

The problem for youtube is that content creators on youtube aren't organized or powerful like the media companies. And whatever you think, they have to follow the law and like most companies, they are going to err on the side of caution when they are forced to.

Re: YouTube CEO says EU regulation will be bad for creators

#46

Post by pluma »

thomasahle wrote: post #39
kibwen wrote: post #29

This is rich. Every YouTube creator that I follow has at least one video whose purpose is to rail against YouTube's mystifying demonetization policies, their trigger-happy DMCA policies that aggressively favor major copyright holders, and their opaque and useless litigation process. Here's one for reference: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=bGZ_a6gL0f4 . Listening to the CEO of YouTube cry "but think of the content crea…

> their trigger-happy DMCA policies that aggressively favor major copyright holders So which is it? Do you think YouTube is too much in favour of DMCA or too against it? Perhaps mystifying and arbitrary is just the way it looks when this kind of law is applied at scale (with robots as prescribed in the law.)

The problem isn't DMCA. The problem is Content ID, which allows rights holders to take down other creators' content automatically.

YouTube goes out of its way to grant rights holders a level of control that wouldn't be possible with a strict interpretation of the DMCA because an illegitimate DMCA takedown request would be a felony whereas an illegitimate Content ID claim goes unpunished.

EDIT: Note however that Article 13 strongly implies a system like Content ID. So the irony is that for YouTube Article 13 doesn't really change anything and the filter they complain about is bad for all the same reasons Content ID is bad.

Re: YouTube CEO says EU regulation will be bad for creators

#47

Post by throw2016 »

There is already widespread censorship and suppression of dissent [1] and content on these platforms by new 'ministry of truth' government formations like the Atlantic Council that are completely arbitrary with no due process or transparency.

The EFF was recently interviewed [1] and discussed some of these issues and highlighted the importance the Santa Clara principles [2] for more transparent operation.

It's better to have formalized mechanisms than arbitrary behind the scenes processes these companies are running anyway with no transparency. Creators do not benefit from lack of transparency and no due process so this sudden concern for users on article 13 by Youtube and others without rolling out some due process consistent with the Santa Clara principles is entirely self serving and insincere.

[1] https://therealnews.com/stories/social-media-purge-silences-...

[2] https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/may/09/santa-cla...

Re: YouTube CEO says EU regulation will be bad for creators

#48

Post by jsonne »

kibwen wrote: post #29

This is rich. Every YouTube creator that I follow has at least one video whose purpose is to rail against YouTube's mystifying demonetization policies, their trigger-happy DMCA policies that aggressively favor major copyright holders, and their opaque and useless litigation process. Here's one for reference: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=bGZ_a6gL0f4 . Listening to the CEO of YouTube cry "but think of the content crea…

Their automated policing system is horrific. I make how to marketing videos with no music in the background, and randomly get strikes for copyright that I have to appeal to keep my account in good standing. I used to not understand all the love hate that creators have with the platform but I'm slowly getting it.

Re: YouTube CEO says EU regulation will be bad for creators

#49

Post by IBM »

>“This legislation poses a threat to both your livelihood and your ability to share your voice with the world,” Wojcicki wrote. “And, if implemented as proposed, Article 13 threatens hundreds of thousands of jobs, European Creators, businesses, artists, and everyone they employ. The proposal will force platforms, like YouTube, to prioritize content from a small number of large companies.

I find it extremely hard to believe that an ad business that depends on scale and a long tail of videos, would ever just limit it to videos produced by big companies.

I'm sure they'll make do even if it passes, because they literally have no choice.

Re: YouTube CEO says EU regulation will be bad for creators

#50

Post by kibwen »

ptero wrote: post #34
kibwen wrote: post #29

This is rich. Every YouTube creator that I follow has at least one video whose purpose is to rail against YouTube's mystifying demonetization policies, their trigger-happy DMCA policies that aggressively favor major copyright holders, and their opaque and useless litigation process. Here's one for reference: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=bGZ_a6gL0f4 . Listening to the CEO of YouTube cry "but think of the content crea…

I think you are right. However, almost any large company CEO often tries to skew policy/rules/politics in different directions, some of those may be beneficial to the society. What this is the case (as I think is happening here) I prefer to cheer them on instead of pointing that their real cause is self interest. My 2c.

I'd be happy to cheer them on if there were any indication that this represented a legitimate change of heart. But we all know that as soon as they get their way in Europe, their concern for creators will mysteriously and instantly evaporate. I believe that favoring small players over large ones is a benefit to society, so I will continue to dismiss YouTube's outright hypocrisy until such time as they have earned the benefit of the doubt.
Post reply on HN