Ever got your youtube videos sound turned off? - Page 6

rrh · 11-06-2009, 04:13 PM

Even if you don't make money off the content you put on Youtube, Youtube does, otherwise they wouldn't keep hosting it. So they end up obligated to address whether they are making money off of someone else's effort without their permission. They address it by using their takedown request process. It's not a perfect process, and the opening post gives some info on how you can respond if it impacts one of your videos. I'm not one of the people that would say, "Oh no! A little knowledge is dangerous, so we should have no knowledge at all."

Personally, I think the way Youtube should address this (and I think they have been approaching) is some kind of mechanical license system where Youtube shares the ad money with the song's owners, rather than removing the audio. But I understand there's the logistics involved in setting that up are pretty elaborate, the details will need to be negotiated with the major parties, some accommodation will need to be provided for the many independent music publishers out there, etc.

Bringing it back to the analogy of the bridges and other locations, the city governments usually justify the licensing requirements not in terms of intellectual property, but in terms of film shoots impeding the normal flow of traffic. Now, there's a certain element of cash-grab here as well, which is why it can get frustrating for indy film-makers, if they want to do a 30-minute shoot with a crew of three and they meet some government official who is only interested in a shoot where they fill an entire block with trailers and drop thousands of dollars a day into government coffers.

But if you park a van across the street form the U.N. and shoot Cary Grant walking towards the buildings, it legitimately does not impact the traffic flow.

I guess you're viewing morals from the standpoint of intent, while I'm viewing them from the standpoint of impact. If I can shoot footage of a bridge without impacting the traffic of that bridge, I don't feel a moral obligation to get a film permit. But if I do impede the traffic, I'm not going to pick my moral stance based on whether I intended to benefit my education or my pocket book.

WakeUpStudios · 11-06-2009, 04:23 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Koolpenguin89

Wexler, all you have done is put a spin on everything thats already been said. Regardless of how you feel about copyright laws, breaking those laws is still illegal. The very fact that this thread describes methods for breaking those laws puts Next New Networks in a position of criminal entanglement (it wouldn't be the first time an angry parent sued a company because their kid broke the law and got caught). These are not my opinions, this is not how i feel things should work, this is the law. Your arguments are pointless and flawed, and the things you point out clearly show that you also have no idea what you are talking about.

Dylan

Actually that can't happen. All the OP was doing was telling people information that has nothing to do with hacking, coding, modding or anything else. The OP was pointing out a way to argue fair use, and not take these people's shit.

I actually used this system of arguing fair use a couple of years back. I posted a video where someone said "AM I RIGHT?!" and the part from the song "Oh Yeah" said "OOHHHH YEEAAAHH!!!" Youtube shut down the audio, so I contacted them about it and argued that it is fair use since it is less than 2 seconds long.

Two days later, what do you know? Sound's back on...

Koolpenguin89 · 11-06-2009, 08:16 PM

Quote:

Actually that can't happen.

Lol, of course it can, what are you talking about? Im not saying that a judge would find NNN at fault (that would be ridonkulous), but why wouldn't an angry parent be able to sue them? If NNN were sued because of it, they would need to hire lawyers and appear in court, and the lawyer would almost certainly advise them to shut down these forums, at least temporarily. The parents lawyer would argue that while the orginal post didn't intend for the information to be used illegally, subsequent posts in the thread described why doing so is "morally okay" ::cough:: wexler ::cough::, thus warping the child's fragile little mind.

Of course, these arguments are ridiculous, but we are talking about a country who's citizens sue video game companies because their kids shot up a high school, where their are advertisements on the radio, television, and internet for http://www.whocanisue.com/.

So yes, it very well can happen, and that is why i suggested this thread be closed.

Dylan

WakeUpStudios · 11-06-2009, 11:08 PM

OH, my bad, I misread your other post. I thought you were saying they'd hold NNN at fault. My bad.

I also don't understand what's wrong with the American public. We gotta just stop whining and think a lawsuit fixes everything.

I'm gonna write a song about this mayhem...wait...the Eagles already did that

wexler1775 · 11-07-2009, 02:10 AM

rrh, you do make a very important distinction that I did overlook in my zeal. Yes, YouTube profits, and that must be where the line is crossed. And I do agree that it would be a brilliant idea for all of the parties concerned if YouTube worked out a system which passed on a portion of their ad revenue to the music studios. Indeed, it would pose one hell of a logistical challenge, but it would so drastically broaden the selection of videos that they could host, the money they could make, the money the studios can make and, hopefully, people's awareness of music they have not yet been exposed to. Win-win-win-win across the board as far as I'm concerned.

However there are a few other concerns. As far as taking the bridge analogy to the next level there, I'm still not convinced that you can equate the unlicensed use of music to "stopping traffic," unless it's specifically a person making a film for distribution, and for profit, and is using music without permission.

While YouTube is it's own thing, I'm still not convinced by the argument that using music that you didn't pay royalties for, if you're not making any profit, is anything like stealing. It is absolutely nothing like stealing a car, and the prior argument that it would be more like copying the design of a watch, a design made by somebody else, is only a little less absurd. To support this: I fear I'll be putting out what may be an even more absurd argument to the contrary:

Consider the whiz kid who walks into the patent office with a hollow-handled hammer (because that's where you put the nails!) He patents it, and finds a company that will produce them and sell them to wholesalers. Then a man walks into Wal-Mart and buys one. All's well in the world. The watchmaker argument only holds in this case is some less whizzish kid were to whip up a couple such hammers and either pitch the idea as something original or try to sell them on the street. All of the above represent voluntary transactions in a free market, the latter example being blatantly illegal.

It's my view that if a filmmaker makes a film not for the sake of profit, it would morally fit somewhere between the man who bought the hammer at the store loaning it to somebody else, (I mean, he's not using the hammer twenty-four hours a day,) and at the very worst making one of his own. This would be more controversial, true, but I would see no moral dispute with a man buying any other hammer, and drilling his own nail compartment in the handle, for the sake of his own use. The sanctity-of-intellectual-property extremists may bemoan something like this, but lets be honest, a hammer with a nail compartment is about as much of an evolutionary leap as most new music. I'd venture to say that this is no different from the ever-popular $14 steadicam, which you extremists out there should be equating to stealing a purse, or maybe even murdering a child. Why not?

And one more for you extremists, you'd best sidestep your own hypocrisy and promptly delete all those unlicensed movie quotes from your post signatures. The kind of use of music that I'm describing, which I believe should fall under "fair use," is not any different from putting those quotes at the bottom of every post. You're using somebody else's artistic creation in the hopes that readers will glean some aspect of your disposition by virtue of that stolen bit of text. It's juxtaposition, is it not?

To wrap my latest tirade up, and in response to Koolpenguin89's subtle hint that I may warp a child's mind with my rhetoric, I'm still not talking about the law. "Fair use" is indeed a legal precedent, but there is a moral perspective on what fair use really is. I'm still no closer to believing that there is something unfair about sampling music in a completely non-commercial setting. I realize that the free market tempers itself with the (hold on, let me blow the dust off my Econ 101 textbook) exclusion principle; that if you don't pay, you don't play. And I'd never be the one to try determining the dollar value of using a song if we're talking about a voluntary, free-market transaction. YouTube aside, as there is the ad revenue element, I'd say that using music for a film that will never generate one penny of profit, has a zero ramifications on the market, or on morality. The "traffic" keeps on flowing.

But keep at it, I like to hear what other people think about the issue.

WakeUpStudios · 11-07-2009, 09:11 AM

But what if the nails put into the hammer are melted down from the stolen watch?

rrh · 11-08-2009, 05:36 PM

An important distinction that I've made but you (wexler1775) keep glossing over is the distinction between making a movie and distributing that movie.

How is making something for your own personal use (a hammer in your latest example) a good analogy for the act of distributing something so anyone can use it?

wexler1775 · 11-08-2009, 06:31 PM

I do make the distinction, that's just the problem with these metaphors. The key distinction maybe should be commercial distribution versus personal distribution.

Let's see how far I can push the hammer metaphor, keeping in mind that the market is its own entity. If we don't consider the market as it's own thing, then there would be no way to draw a line. But let's take a few simple steps: Personal use is pretty clear, the "consumer" fashions his own hammer and keeps it at home. He loans it to a friend, the friend loans it to a friend, but there is no money changing hands, and this does not constitute a market transaction. I'd even say that if one of the consumer's friends asks for it, the consumer should feel free to make another hammer and give it to the friend because, I don't know, the friend doesn't know anything about carpentry. Still zero dollars, zero cents, and zero effect on the market.

But let's recognize the flaws of using any tangible product as a metaphor. There really isn't any apt comparison that can be drawn. Intellectual property and tangible property are two very different things, in the eyes of the law and of morality. I'll go back to the personal example, or maybe even make it painfully simple.

I turn on my camera, I press "record," I record sixty seconds of footage with, say, thirty seconds of unlicensed music. Now, because both the music and the footage are intangible, there should be no difference between showing the footage to somebody and giving them a copy of the file.

Of course I would call this distribution, but it's distribution in the sense that you distribute sandwiches among people. It's a transfer, not a transaction. I'll say again and again, it has no bearing on the delicate rights balance in the free market.

WakeUpStudios · 11-08-2009, 09:23 PM

Yeah, if you're not distributing, who gives a shit? But if you are, that's where it gets touchy.

rrh · 11-12-2009, 04:08 PM

Well, we also should distinguish between negligible impact and zero impact. In the hammer example, I think it's incorrect to say that the availability of a free or cheap alternative will have zero impact on the market for the special hammers.

I think you're putting too much weight on the question of whether you're charging money or not, as some kind of magical indicator of whether you've entered "the market."

I think you should focus more on the transformative element of the movie. Your hammer analogy fails on this aspect, since one hammer with a nail compartment can easily substitute for another. One movie with a song in it doesn't necessarily substitute for another movie with the same song in it, or for the song itself. If you can make the case that your movie with a song in it has zero impact on the market for the other movies or the music itself, I think that difficulty in substituting is a better subject for you to focus on.

The idea that if I charge one cent to view a movie, it impacts the market, but if I give the same movie away for free, it has zero impact, I don't think that holds up if you think about it.

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11-06-2009, 04:13 PM	#51
rrh Senior Member Join Date: Oct 2007 Location: Winnipeg	Even if you don't make money off the content you put on Youtube, Youtube does, otherwise they wouldn't keep hosting it. So they end up obligated to address whether they are making money off of someone else's effort without their permission. They address it by using their takedown request process. It's not a perfect process, and the opening post gives some info on how you can respond if it impacts one of your videos. I'm not one of the people that would say, "Oh no! A little knowledge is dangerous, so we should have no knowledge at all." Personally, I think the way Youtube should address this (and I think they have been approaching) is some kind of mechanical license system where Youtube shares the ad money with the song's owners, rather than removing the audio. But I understand there's the logistics involved in setting that up are pretty elaborate, the details will need to be negotiated with the major parties, some accommodation will need to be provided for the many independent music publishers out there, etc. Bringing it back to the analogy of the bridges and other locations, the city governments usually justify the licensing requirements not in terms of intellectual property, but in terms of film shoots impeding the normal flow of traffic. Now, there's a certain element of cash-grab here as well, which is why it can get frustrating for indy film-makers, if they want to do a 30-minute shoot with a crew of three and they meet some government official who is only interested in a shoot where they fill an entire block with trailers and drop thousands of dollars a day into government coffers. But if you park a van across the street form the U.N. and shoot Cary Grant walking towards the buildings, it legitimately does not impact the traffic flow. I guess you're viewing morals from the standpoint of intent, while I'm viewing them from the standpoint of impact. If I can shoot footage of a bridge without impacting the traffic of that bridge, I don't feel a moral obligation to get a film permit. But if I do impede the traffic, I'm not going to pick my moral stance based on whether I intended to benefit my education or my pocket book.

11-07-2009, 02:10 AM	#55
wexler1775 Junior Member Join Date: Nov 2009	rrh, you do make a very important distinction that I did overlook in my zeal. Yes, YouTube profits, and that must be where the line is crossed. And I do agree that it would be a brilliant idea for all of the parties concerned if YouTube worked out a system which passed on a portion of their ad revenue to the music studios. Indeed, it would pose one hell of a logistical challenge, but it would so drastically broaden the selection of videos that they could host, the money they could make, the money the studios can make and, hopefully, people's awareness of music they have not yet been exposed to. Win-win-win-win across the board as far as I'm concerned. However there are a few other concerns. As far as taking the bridge analogy to the next level there, I'm still not convinced that you can equate the unlicensed use of music to "stopping traffic," unless it's specifically a person making a film for distribution, and for profit, and is using music without permission. While YouTube is it's own thing, I'm still not convinced by the argument that using music that you didn't pay royalties for, if you're not making any profit, is anything like stealing. It is absolutely nothing like stealing a car, and the prior argument that it would be more like copying the design of a watch, a design made by somebody else, is only a little less absurd. To support this: I fear I'll be putting out what may be an even more absurd argument to the contrary: Consider the whiz kid who walks into the patent office with a hollow-handled hammer (because that's where you put the nails!) He patents it, and finds a company that will produce them and sell them to wholesalers. Then a man walks into Wal-Mart and buys one. All's well in the world. The watchmaker argument only holds in this case is some less whizzish kid were to whip up a couple such hammers and either pitch the idea as something original or try to sell them on the street. All of the above represent voluntary transactions in a free market, the latter example being blatantly illegal. It's my view that if a filmmaker makes a film not for the sake of profit, it would morally fit somewhere between the man who bought the hammer at the store loaning it to somebody else, (I mean, he's not using the hammer twenty-four hours a day,) and at the very worst making one of his own. This would be more controversial, true, but I would see no moral dispute with a man buying any other hammer, and drilling his own nail compartment in the handle, for the sake of his own use. The sanctity-of-intellectual-property extremists may bemoan something like this, but lets be honest, a hammer with a nail compartment is about as much of an evolutionary leap as most new music. I'd venture to say that this is no different from the ever-popular $14 steadicam, which you extremists out there should be equating to stealing a purse, or maybe even murdering a child. Why not? And one more for you extremists, you'd best sidestep your own hypocrisy and promptly delete all those unlicensed movie quotes from your post signatures. The kind of use of music that I'm describing, which I believe should fall under "fair use," is not any different from putting those quotes at the bottom of every post. You're using somebody else's artistic creation in the hopes that readers will glean some aspect of your disposition by virtue of that stolen bit of text. It's juxtaposition, is it not? To wrap my latest tirade up, and in response to Koolpenguin89's subtle hint that I may warp a child's mind with my rhetoric, I'm still not talking about the law. "Fair use" is indeed a legal precedent, but there is a moral perspective on what fair use really is. I'm still no closer to believing that there is something unfair about sampling music in a completely non-commercial setting. I realize that the free market tempers itself with the (hold on, let me blow the dust off my Econ 101 textbook) exclusion principle; that if you don't pay, you don't play. And I'd never be the one to try determining the dollar value of using a song if we're talking about a voluntary, free-market transaction. YouTube aside, as there is the ad revenue element, I'd say that using music for a film that will never generate one penny of profit, has a zero ramifications on the market, or on morality. The "traffic" keeps on flowing. But keep at it, I like to hear what other people think about the issue.

11-08-2009, 05:36 PM	#57
rrh Senior Member Join Date: Oct 2007 Location: Winnipeg	An important distinction that I've made but you (wexler1775) keep glossing over is the distinction between making a movie and distributing that movie. How is making something for your own personal use (a hammer in your latest example) a good analogy for the act of distributing something so anyone can use it?

11-08-2009, 06:31 PM	#58
wexler1775 Junior Member Join Date: Nov 2009	I do make the distinction, that's just the problem with these metaphors. The key distinction maybe should be commercial distribution versus personal distribution. Let's see how far I can push the hammer metaphor, keeping in mind that the market is its own entity. If we don't consider the market as it's own thing, then there would be no way to draw a line. But let's take a few simple steps: Personal use is pretty clear, the "consumer" fashions his own hammer and keeps it at home. He loans it to a friend, the friend loans it to a friend, but there is no money changing hands, and this does not constitute a market transaction. I'd even say that if one of the consumer's friends asks for it, the consumer should feel free to make another hammer and give it to the friend because, I don't know, the friend doesn't know anything about carpentry. Still zero dollars, zero cents, and zero effect on the market. But let's recognize the flaws of using any tangible product as a metaphor. There really isn't any apt comparison that can be drawn. Intellectual property and tangible property are two very different things, in the eyes of the law and of morality. I'll go back to the personal example, or maybe even make it painfully simple. I turn on my camera, I press "record," I record sixty seconds of footage with, say, thirty seconds of unlicensed music. Now, because both the music and the footage are intangible, there should be no difference between showing the footage to somebody and giving them a copy of the file. Of course I would call this distribution, but it's distribution in the sense that you distribute sandwiches among people. It's a transfer, not a transaction. I'll say again and again, it has no bearing on the delicate rights balance in the free market.

11-12-2009, 04:08 PM	#60
rrh Senior Member Join Date: Oct 2007 Location: Winnipeg	Well, we also should distinguish between negligible impact and zero impact. In the hammer example, I think it's incorrect to say that the availability of a free or cheap alternative will have zero impact on the market for the special hammers. I think you're putting too much weight on the question of whether you're charging money or not, as some kind of magical indicator of whether you've entered "the market." I think you should focus more on the transformative element of the movie. Your hammer analogy fails on this aspect, since one hammer with a nail compartment can easily substitute for another. One movie with a song in it doesn't necessarily substitute for another movie with the same song in it, or for the song itself. If you can make the case that your movie with a song in it has zero impact on the market for the other movies or the music itself, I think that difficulty in substituting is a better subject for you to focus on. The idea that if I charge one cent to view a movie, it impacts the market, but if I give the same movie away for free, it has zero impact, I don't think that holds up if you think about it.